George Rebane
[This aired last night on KVMR-FM 89.5 as my bi-weekly commentary. It continues on the recent thread of how our journalistic industry is changing in an environment of ever rapidly evolving events, ideological polarization, propaganda, government's desire to control content, and the availability of new technologies.]
Dr Lee Bollinger, President of Columbia University, recently made an impassioned argument in the national press that journalism needs government help. He started with the laudable notion that “free speech and a free press are essential to a dynamic economy”, and then proceeded to lay out a path that all but guarantees that neither of these essentials will be met.
Both the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission have awakened to the fact that the print and conventional broadcast media are on a steep decline, and have launched studies to see what government should do about it. These agencies have immediately overstepped the question of whether Americans are being more poorly informed today than they were in olden days – their unasked answer seems to be a firm YES.
One of the inevitable results of the FCC and FTC labors is that government should increase public funding of journalism beyond what it already pumps into TV’s Public Broadcasting System, and radio’s National Public Radio. The launch point for more government involvement and oversight of journalism seems to be that the FCC already allocates radio and TV frequencies and to a degree regulates their content. Based on this, it seems natural to increase public funding and do a bit more regulating of content.
Bollinger points to England’s BBC as a poster child of the good that more government involvement in journalism will provide for us all. Most people haven’t a clue about what kind of journalism Britain’s beloved Beeb puts out. By any measure of content – selected stories, timing, and slant – the BBC has become a reliable communications organ of Britain’s political left. It is far from the paragon of journalistic accuracy and independence it was fifty years ago. Today the Beeb definitely knows from which side its butter comes.
The good professor does understand that money influences content, and cites that current media are already corrupted to an extent by corporate cash. His answer seems to be that things could be evened out if we broaden the corruption to include more influence by government cash. In his mind, and to be sure, many other minds in government, this would level the playing field.
In fact Lee Bollinger feels that journalism is all about leveling here and there. He wants us to “think about American journalism as a mixed system, where the mission is to get the balance right.” The mission is to get the balance right?! And all along I thought that the mission of journalism was to get the truth of what’s happening out there to the people in a timely manner, and not really worry about how it balances out.
People around the world, especially Americans, have never-ending choices for news, information, and opinion. The number of outlets and their cultural and political colorations are endless. And each of the purveyors of news and commentary are competing for eyeballs or earballs, and doing their darndest to get things right to attract maximum audiences. The cable TV channels and the World Wide Web on the Internet have given us most of these benefits.
As long as information providers are free to compete, these and even newer technologies, and the outlets they enable, will continue to satisfy our needs for information and education. And in such a competitive environment we will be free to fulfill our potential as humans in tomorrow’s inter-connected societies. Somehow government has never gotten it right when it uses its power of the purse to nudge us into some correct direction of conformity.
I’m George Rebane, and I expand these and other themes in my Union columns, and on georgerebane.com. The opinions here are mine and not necessarily shared by KVMR. Thank you for listening.
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