George Rebane

Naah! nobody who wants to go after our First Amendment rights or start censoring our media would call it that.  How about something like ‘Fairness Doctrine’ instead; this is the name the FCC has used in the past, and the socialists are trying to revive today to put a lid on people like Rush Limbaugh and Michael Medved.  Their argument seems to be straight forward enough – the Right is brainwashing too many people, and the Left wants to do their fair share of brainwashing.

The problem the Left has is that there aren’t enough people on their side who want to listen to their copy.  Today we read (here) again of liberal radio continuing to have problems of ‘no one who can understand cares’.  Nova M Radio is filing for “liquidation”, and the left-wing flagship Air America continues to be, well, “troubled”.  Meanwhile, there is no lack of opportunity for the collectivists to get their extended message out there – media channels abound, all looking for content that will draw an audience.  And now a new left-wing startup – On Second Thought Radio Network – is leaping into the breach.  This is as it should be.

The problem seems to be with the ‘extended message’ part.  The short message of socialism is simple for the sheep to swallow – ‘We take it from the rich, and spread it around the poor so everyone gets a fair share, and we know what’s fair.’  The problem comes when you start explaining how the taking and the giving and the fairness all fit together, then it gets more than a little silly. 

And here’s the part of the explanation that doesn’t get much air time or column inches.  America’s adult population is over 40% functionally illiterate and over 90% innumerate.  Except for a small intellectual set aside of academics, government workers, media professionals, and some very rich, the Left draws its constituency mostly from the poor unfortunates whose long suit is not understanding the Limbaugh/Medved type arguments mirrored from the left.  My own brain is equally unqualified there.  Put more crudely – not enough brains there to wash.  So why can’t the socialists scrabble up enough of their intellectuals to make a paying audience for their ‘extended message’?

This is where we come to the hard part that the congressional Dems have to climb to get the Federal Control of Media Act (aka “Fairness Doctrine”) passed.  The socialist extended message sounds silly to anyone with half a brain.  After a few minutes of having the matter explained to them, they either start giggling or simply change the station because it all sounds like the pigs talking to the barnyard in Orwell’s Animal Farm.  Bottom line, neither cohort of the Left’s constituency can or will put up with more than a few well crafted slogans that can stand up under scrutiny.

So the only alternative is to create an environment where conservative programs must be reigned back by media outlets who are forced to provide some form of ‘equal air time’ for stuff no one wants hear.  And if no one wants to hear such extended liberal messages, then no one wants to sponsor them.  Then the feds apply the ‘equal air time’ rule giving the media outlet no choice but to take a loss or cut back on the time for conservative programs – capiche?  And that’s how the Fairness Doctrine will fix the brainwashing calamity that is threatening the nation.  For a view of the Fairness Doctrine more refined than the crude summary I have offered, please read this now classic paper – ‘Why the Fairness Doctrine is Anything But Fair’ – on the subject.