A Second Hand Conjecture

Often I am told how certain people value tolerance. The most irritating are a certain species of left/liberal/progressive. If it doesn’t apply to you, please don’t be offended. This species claims it is tolerant based on certain beliefs they have. For example, they believe homosexuals deserve equal marriage rights or stem cell research should be funded by the government, and since they are not opposed on religious grounds, they are “tolerant.” Typically these are amongst the most intolerant people one can meet.

Quick to condemn others for “reactionary” views, belittle their intelligence, etc. It doesn’t matter that I agree in a large number of cases, their belief is one must agree. They confuse having positions that suggest tolerance in a specific instance with actually being tolerant. This would be no big deal if it was hot air, but when in the hands of a left/liberal/progressive it goes from a personal failing and hypocrisy to a real threat. People of the left need to be more tolerant than others because to not be so means that the force of the state is right around the corner. I can be a bigot whose speech knows no bounds and all I am is offensive as long as I don’t believe in the states right to do anything about it.

The preferences of the left however all to often need to carry the force of law. If they believe fast food isn’t good for me, next thing you know an effort is underway to restrict it.

The tolerant are all in favor of free speech, at least for them. However, if the speech isn’t going their way we get comments like this from Howard Dean:

“I believe we need to re-regulate the media”

George Will is a bit exercised:

Some illiberal liberals are trying to restore the luridly misnamed Fairness Doctrine, which until 1987 required broadcasters to devote a reasonable amount of time to presenting fairly each side of a controversial issue. The government was empowered to decide how many sides there were, how much time was reasonable and what was fair.

By trying to again empower the government to regulate broadcasting, illiberals reveal their lack of confidence in their ability to compete in the marketplace of ideas, and their disdain for consumer sovereignty—and hence for the public.

The illiberals’ transparent, and often proclaimed, objective is to silence talk radio. Liberals strenuously and unsuccessfully attempted to compete in that medium—witness the anemia of their Air America. Talk radio barely existed in 1980, when there were fewer than 100 talk shows nationwide. The Fairness Doctrine was scrapped in 1987, and today more than 1,400 stations are entirely devoted to talk formats. Conservatives dominate talk radio—although no more thoroughly than liberals dominate Hollywood, academia and much of the mainstream media.

Beginning in 1927, the government, concerned about the scarcity of radio-spectrum access, began regulating the content of broadcasts. In 1928, it decided that the programming of New York’s WEVD, which was owned by the Socialist Party, was not in the public interest. The station’s license was renewed after a warning to show “due regard for the opinions of others.” What was “due”? Who knew?

In 1929, the government refused the Chicago Federation of Labor’s attempt to buy a station because, spectrum space being limited, all stations “should cater to the general public.” A decade later, the government conditioned the renewal of a station’s license on the station’s promise to broadcast no more anti-FDR editorials.

In 1969, the Supreme Court rejected the argument that the Fairness Doctrine violated the First Amendment protection of free speech, saying the doctrine enhanced free speech. The court did not know how the Kennedy administration, anticipating a 1964 race against Barry Goldwater, had wielded the doctrine against stations broadcasting conservative programming. The Democratic Party paid people to monitor conservative broadcasts and coached liberals in how to demand equal time. This campaign burdened stations with litigation costs and won 1,678 hours of free air time.

Bill Ruder, a member of Kennedy’s subcabinet, said: “Our massive strategy was to use the Fairness Doctrine to challenge and harass right-wing broadcasters in the hope that the challenges would be so costly to them that they would be inhibited and decide it was too expensive to continue.” The Nixon administration frequently threatened the three networks and individual stations with expensive license challenges under the Fairness Doctrine.

In 1973, Supreme Court justice and liberal icon William Douglas said: “The Fairness Doctrine has no place in our First Amendment regime. It puts the head of the camel inside the tent and enables administration after administration to toy with TV and radio.” The Reagan administration scrapped the doctrine because of its chilling effect on controversial speech, and because the scarcity rationale was becoming absurd.

Adam Thierer, writing in the City Journal, notes that today’s “media cornucopia” has made America “as information-rich as any society in history.” In addition to the Internet’s uncountable sources of information, there are 14,000 radio stations—twice as many as in 1970—and satellite radio has nearly 14 million subscribers.

Of course, that sets some peoples teeth on edge. David Sirota:

Does George Will really believe Americans are stupid, or is he stupid? … What Will doesn’t say is that while the number of stations may have increased, the number of owners of stations has dramatically decreased – and as we all know, ownership decides content. According to the nonpartisan Project for Excellence In Journalism, “the top 20 companies own more than 20 percent of all domestic radio stations.” Meanwhile, two companies (XM and Sirius) own all of satellite radio. So the question again, is whether George Will is too stupid to actually research these facts before writing a column, or does he think Americans are just stupid enough to believe his propaganda?

To which I have to ask, so what? Before the fairness doctrine there were only 100 talk shows nationwide, now there are 1400 as Will pointed out. Nor does that account for the thousands of other outlets for political speech. Still, in radio the number of outlets has increased. Well, this is the answer to so-what?

In his column, Will cites the willingness of media companies to promote right-wing voices and the difficulty of progressive voices from getting the same treatment as proof that progressives can’t “compete in the marketplace of ideas.” He says “consumer sovereignty” is choosing conservative voices. Yet, he says nothing about the fact that, with the media now owned by a handful of for-profit corporations that simultaneously use their Washington lobbying clout to push for all sorts of conservative policies, those media owners that decide who to put on the air have a personal/financial stake in promoting conservative voices. Does Will really think Americans are so stupid that they don’t know that companies owned by conservatives will put conservatives on the airwaves they own, and that such a decision has nothing to do with “consumer sovereignty?” Or is Will too stupid to understand that basic truism?

Sounds like a truism with the same characteristics as “truthiness” (where are all those conservative suits squashing Stewart and Colbert anyway?)

I love the little bit of editorial deception in the first sentence. “Will cites the willingness,” Will tells of the difficulty. One would assume Will accepts that characterization. Of course, as you have read, he does no such thing. He just says they lack confidence in their ability to compete in certain areas of the media. The rest however is typical left wing intolerance. They can’t win in certain market areas, therefore they are being shut out.

Never mind whether corporations care about conservative politics above their bottom line, shouldn’t we test this theory? Is Bill O’Reilly so popular because Fox will not allow a liberal in his spot? Given the massive institutional lead CNN and other channels had when FOX started with liberals opposing him at every turn, it is hard to see how this possibly can be explained by the preferences of the owners and management. Head to head can Keith Olbermann win? Doesn’t seem that he can. If he does, can we imagine Republicans or libertarians asking for a fairness doctrine? In talk radio, have liberal and left wing hosts been tried? Yes they have. Have they done well? With a few exceptions they haven’t. Have liberals done well on the internet? Yes. Should Republicans who are behind on the internet, especially in networks built for activism and fund raising, move to regulate that advantage away? I’ll say Sirota’s entire argument is filled with “truismness.

Of course we won’t get fairness, what we will get is little talk at all as Captain Ed makes clear:

Instead of offering a compelling product, liberals want to shut down the market. They want to put government in charge of deciding what comprises each side of an argument, how much time each gets allocated, and so on. In practice, it’s completely unworkable. Radio stations don’t have the time and resources for that kind of accounting, and their already-thin profit margins will disappear entirely if they are forced to air broadcasting that interests no one — as Air America has proven over the last few years. Stations will either go off the air or offer informercials, sports talk, or more top-40 broadcasting.

More from Will

Eighty-seven percent of households have either cable or satellite television with more than 500 channels to choose from. There are more than 19,000 magazines (up more than 5,000 since 1993). Thierer says, consider a black lesbian feminist who hunts and likes country music:

“Would the ‘mainstream media’ of 25 years ago represented any of her interests? Unlikely. Today, though, this woman can program her TiVo to record her favorite shows on Black Entertainment Television, Logo (a gay/lesbian-oriented cable channel), Oxygen (female-targeted programming), the Outdoor Life Network and Country Music Television.”

Of course, the critiques are not necessarily consistent:

Some of today’s illiberals say that media abundance, not scarcity, justifies the Fairness Doctrine: Americans, the poor dears, are bewildered by too many choices. And the plenitude of information sources disperses “the national campfire,” the cozy communitarian experience of the good old days (for liberals), when everyone gathered around—and was dependent on—ABC, NBC and CBS.

Even if that were desire able, it ain’t happening with the internet unregulated.

Back to Howard Dean:

“I believe we need to re-regulate the media,” says Howard Dean. Such illiberals argue that the paucity of liberal successes in today’s radio competition—and the success of Fox News—somehow represent “market failure.” That is the regularly recurring, all-purpose rationale for government intervention in markets. Market failure is defined as consumers’ not buying what liberals are selling.

McQ has a few thoughts:

Not enough choices, too many choices, in reality the problem is the Dems, or at least some of them, want to ensure they have a means to force you to listen to their message whether you choose too or not. And as we’ve pointed out in the past, the determination of what is ‘fair’ in the media would be entirely up to them.

Yep, a tolerant bunch.if you don’t like how things are working out pass a law to squelch what you don’t like, even if it comes to free speech.

Others blogging:

D.A. Ridgely 

The Anchoress

The Progress Freedom Foundation

Libertarian Leanings

With What Time is Given

Crush Liberalism

The Long Eyeland Scribes

Tags: Congress, Democrats, free markets, Free speech, government, history, media, politics, Republicans

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