Is the Fairness Doctrine fair?
Published Brownsville Herald Nov 9, 2008
Of late there has been a lot of comment about being fair. On the electronic media especially the radio there has been interest in government regulation of the conservative versus liberal content. Essentially the goal seems to want a liberal talk show host for every conservative one. I wonder what the real result would be with a Democrat controlled Congress as well as a Democrat President.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) originally instituted the “Fairness Doctrine” in 1949 by, which was soon recognized as a contrivance for silencing any opposing views – particularly conservative ones.
“The FCC repealed the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 admitting the doctrine ‘had the net effect of reducing rather than enhancing the discussion of controversial issues of public importance.’”
Zogby conducted a poll in October of likely voters nationwide that found that 50% were against the “Doctrine” and 17% in support. The margin of error was +/- 2.9 percentage points.
I grew up with AM radio through the 1950’s and 60’s. At the time, I was mostly interested in Rock and Roll and got my news and perspective through the ‘DJ’ and the announcers.
In those days names like “Wo Wo Ginsberg in Boston, and “Boom Boom” Branagin in Buffalo, told us what music was groovy, described what “Buffalo Hot Wings” were, at a beach near Buffalo and “Cousin Bruce Morrow” was our guide to the “Submarine Races” broadcasting from New York, from Mexico the howl of Wolfman Jack brought “The Music” to the airwaves from “The Gold Buckle of the Bible Belt” and then Alan Freed helped pioneer Rock from New York.
Gabrial Heater gave us news commentary, Paul Harvey told us the rest of the story and Arthur Godfrey introduced new talent.
Then came TV, three channels where I lived!
As I remember most public perspective that I was aware of in rural New York would be classified as conservative, to the point I really wasn’t aware of liberal thought.
The AM stations declined until the 1970’s and 1980’s as the music format moved to the high fidelity sound of. FM. Talk Radio format began to catch on in more large cities. Former music stations such as WLS (Chicago, Illinois), KFI (Los Angeles, California), WRKO (Boston, Massachusetts), WBAP (Ft. Worth and Dallas, Texas), and WABC (New York, New York) made the switch to all-talk as their ratings slumped due to listener migration to FM.
Pew researchers found in 2004 that 17% of the public regularly listens to talk radio. This audience was mostly male, middle-aged and conservative. Among those who regularly listen to talk radio, 41% are Republican and 28% are Democrats. Furthermore, 45% describe themselves as conservatives, compared with 18% who say they are liberal.
In 1987 the FCC fairness doctrine was repealed. It had required that stations provide free air time for responses to any controversial opinions that were broadcast and provided an opportunity for a kind of partisan programming that had not previously existed.
Today, according to Wikipedia, the top five talk radio programs are those of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage, Neal Boortz, and Glenn Beck, which are conservative in format.
To feed the liberal 18% segment of the market, Air America Radio, a network featuring The Al Franken Show, was founded in 2004. It described itself as a “progressive alternative” to the conservative talk radio shows. However, where most talk radio supported itself, it was a subsidized operation with wealthy backers buying airtime, and largely not able to support itself by selling commercial time to advertisers.
Liberal format radio has been around, on the Pacifica network, yet only available in a few cities, and in formats that more often act as a volunteer-run community forum than as a platform for charismatic hosts who would be likely to attract a large audience. Long-format news programming on National Public Radio (NPR) also promotes a liberal bias.
It is clear that there are Liberal format radio stations and shows and were there a market there would be many more. The commercial demographics tell the story. AM radio is still the home of Country music, Oldies Stations, George Noory and Art Bell of Coast to Coast Live talk radio at night, and a few progressive stations. When there is more interest, I believe that advertising interest will support more Liberal programming.
We certainly do not need the government to tell us what entertainment we have to watch and then what to think about it. The Fairness Doctrine should stay on the ash heap of bad ideas.
This historic election is over and I congratulate President Elect Obama and wish him well.
We Libertarians had a few pluses as well. Our candidates have made enough of an impact that as the returns were going on in the major media candidates with a (L) were there providing a choice to the socialist directions. Here in Texas our candidates have succeeded in securing enough votes that will guarantee the Libertarian party access to the ballot in 2010. Thanks to those Libertarians in the Statewide campaigns for their public interest and courage.
Locally, thanks to Libertarian Bob Bolkcom who provided a choice and a voice to the 9332 voters or 14% of the electorate that wanted an alternative in the Tax Assessor position.