How could anyone justify the "Fairness Doctrine"
 

So much for free speech...Force broadcasters to use specific content regardless of the ratings.

We're on our way to becoming China with the help of Obama and the Democrats. Too bad they are only focusing on AM radio and not broadcast news and television.

There is a reason Air-America went bankrupt.

Who here supports such an idea and if so how can you rationalize this not being against free speech?

If the Fairness Doctrine applied to TV, geez, what would happen to all the left-sided network news program? Unfortunately, they are targeting all talk show programs that are not left enough....

Sirius radio would probably exempt from it...

:thumbup: maybe my 3500 shares now worth about 0.26 cents a share will get back up to the $3 a share I paid.

That would be the only good I could see coming out of this mess.

Could you imagine Democrats putting together a panel to rate EVERY talk-show host as to how Liberal and Conservative they are on a scale? I mean you have such a HUGE difference between Al Franken and Michael Savage. Then they ignore Bill Maher...Go figure. I'd like to see what Bill Maher would say if the government told him he would have to give Michael Savage equal time on HIS TV program.

When the fairness doctrine existed prior to the mid-1980s, it applied to all media. Remember that the airwaves are owned by the public. They are not privately owned. And as such, they are supposed to provide some sort of good to society beyond being advertising machines.

I would guess that both satellite radio and cable television would be exempt because they do not broadcast over the airwaves.

Free speech does not give someone the right to use limited publicly owned airwaves to say whatever they want. You are forgetting that the airwaves are not privately owned. If they were, then this would indeed be against free speech.

For example, the government has no right to say what can be printed, or put on a website, or even what can be said on cable television. But broadcast is different. And as our country is rather politically divided, it is the government's responsibility to make sure that the viewpoints heard on publicly owned airwaves fairly represent the public's viewpoints, and not the viewpoints of the large corporations that own the stations.

Eric...The airways are indeed public and unlike China our airwaves as it relates to radio programming is dictated by what the public wants to hear and that is measured by ratings.

If people wanted to listen to Liberal talk shows on AM which is indeed the only media dominated by Conservatives they could launch such a program. Liberals tried this with Air-America and failed miserably. If Michael Savage did not get the audience he draws he would be off the air like many before him. Now I don't often agree with his tactics but I'll fight for his right to say what he feels as long as he does not violate FCC rules.

Once Government steps in and dictates what the people WILL hear it no longer becomes a "Public" domain.

Here we go again....

I am in the music business and I deal with radio stations all the time, and I can tell you that ratings have very little to do with what the public wants to hear and more to do with advertising and broadcasting power.

A good example of this is music airplay. Whether a song is a hit or not has very little to do with the quality of the music and much more to do with the advertising and distribution. Studies have shown that people don't actually have any real taste in music and tend to like whatever they hear most often. So if you want a hit song, you spend a lot of money in promotion, buying off the right people, and getting it on the radio. If your song gets enough airplay and it is somewhat decent, it will become a hit and soon people will begin requsting the airplay and buying the albums.

Talk radio program content is not much different.

You also are under the impression that the goal of all radio and television stations is actually to make money at all costs. Yet there are many examples of stations firing hosts that had good ratings because management did not agree with the message being portrayed. One example of this is MSNBC firing Donahue back in 2003. He was their best rated program in the history of the network up to that point, yet he was let go because of his constant protesting against the leadup to the Iraq War -- a message that no other MSNBC hosts were pushing at that time.

Obviously people wanted to watch Donahue as was shown by his high ratings. Yet the management of the station did not care about that. Not that the fairness doctrine would affect cable television, but broadcast stations are no different. The management and owners of the station do not always make programming decisions based on ratings, but more based on what kind of message they want to push.

Another thing is advertising. They are not going to put a host on the air who may say something controversal, even if that's what the public would want to hear, as they do not want to offend any advertisers. For example, a station who gets lots of advertising revenue from the fast food and junk food industry is not going to put a anti-fast food doctor on the air to host a health food show even if that's what the public would like to hear.


That's because they had no broadcasting power. I live in the NYC suburbs, and I could not listen to Air America ever unless I happen to be in mid-town manhattan and there the reception was still pretty crappy. It's because it was being broadcast on a low-power station.


The fairness doctrine does not "dictate" what people will hear. It just provides certain guidlines and regulations. The stations are free to choose which subjects are discussed, which personalities will host the programs, etc.

I know the conservative talk radio guys have been preaching to make you believe that if the fairness doctrine comes back that they will be out of a job. But that is simply not true at all. There are plenty of conservative talk radio hosts that worked when the fairness doctrine was around. One good example is Bob Grant who does the 8-10pm slot on WABC in New York. He has been on the radio for 40 years and is about as conserrvative as they come.