That is the only thing I can figure. They purchased government monopolies on the public airwaves (I am *NOT* allowed to broadcast my views on the public airwaves, right-wingers have purchased a monopoly on all use of the public airwaves in my area), then scream and shout "free speech!" whenever anybody suggests that government-granted monopolies should be required to broadcast *all* viewpoints, not just right-wing viewpoints.
Note my point that THERE IS NO FREE MARKET ON THE PUBLIC AIRWAVES. All radio and television stations broadcasting on the public airwaves are GOVERNMENT-GRANTED MONOPOLIES. I cannot simply grab a microphone and start broadcasting my own ideas, I would get hauled away to jail. Talk radio today is dominated by right-wingers NOT because they out-competed me in the free market. Talk radio today is dominated by right-wingers BECAUSE RIGHT WING BILLIONAIRES PURCHASED GOVERNMENT MONOPOLIES AND PURSUE ME WITH GUNS AND PUT ME IN PRISON IF I DARE TRY TO COMPETE WITH THEM.
This is wrong. My views have as much of a right to be heard on the public airwaves as the views of Rush Limpdick and Michael Sewage-mouth. But I can't get my views heard because the billionaire supporters of these people have purchased GOVERNMENT-ENFORCED MONOPOLIES over all possible radio stations in my area and will have me arrested and put in jail if I try to broadcast my own views on the PUBLIC AIRWAVES.
There is only one thing that will allow my ideas to be heard on the public airwaves: regulation of these GOVERNMENT-GRANTED MONOPOLIES so that if Rush Limpdick is allowed to spew his drivel, then I (or similar like-minded liberals) should be given equal time to rebut him (i.e., the "Fairness Doctrine" that Ronnie Ray-gun repealed). Why are Rush Limpdick and the right-wingers so terrified of liberal ideas that they refuse to give equal time to them, indeed, have purchased government-granted monopolies over the PUBLIC airwaves in order to keep liberal ideas off of the public airwaves? Why are Rush Limpdick and the right wingers so absolutely TERRIFIED of my ideas that they would USE THE GOVERNMENT TO PUT ME IN JAIL if I *DARE* use our *PUBLIC* airwaves to broadcast my own ideas? There is only one reason, and one reason only, that they purchased these government monopolies and now use government guns to terrify and put into jail anybody who would dare broadcast liberal ideas: RIGHT WINGERS ARE TERRIFIED OF LIBERAL IDEAS. Why else are they fighting so hard, spending so many billions of dollars buying GOVERNMENT MONOPOLIES over the public airwaves, if they weren't so terrified of us?
-- Badtux the (sometimes) Liberal Penguin
And now Randi Rhodes has gone off the air, and Nova-M Radio, which had the most leftist voices that you could hear outside of the transmitters the CIA has implanted in my skull, has imploded. It doesn't seem to be due to any right-wingery, except for the fact that Air America Radio and Nova-M are mostly shut out of stations on account of that fascist ownership thing, so they aren't making money. And that puts a stress on the system.
ReplyDeleteWhat's going to wind up happening is that radio will cut its own throat. How much of the potential audience is going to tune out because it doesn't want to listen to clinically insane people like Michaeal "Savage" Weiner, religious beggars and jock-chatter? In times when advertising is declining, declining audiences will spell death for AM broadcast radio. Good riddance. People probably once thought vaudeville shows were indispensable, too.
Pressure on the FCC to regain some of our property.
ReplyDeletePut this post up just a bit ago that about a slug in Denver who slimed a congess women while Obama was in town calling for him to be fired. We may not have control but numbers can make a difference. Some things said have to carry a price and this was one of them.
You are correct BT. Thanks
Bukko, these guys are so filthy rich that they can lose money literally for centuries on these radio stations and not care. It's like the Moonie Times (Washington Times), which has never made a profit in its existence. Or the New York Post, which is as profitable as Fox News (i.e., not at all). These people would rather shut out any voices than their own than make money, because they know that if liberal ideas could be heard, they might lose some of the power they have to control the minds of the sheeple. They're scared of us, pure and simple, and will do everything possible to use their government-granted monopoly power to prevent our voices from being heard.
ReplyDelete- Badtux the Shut-out Penguin
From my viewpoint, conservative thought barely has a foothold in America. Talk radio is the only place where you can find it consistently. When I see news magazines at the store, it's by and large left of center with a few token conservatives (Time, Newsweek,etc.). When I turn on broadcast T.V. all all I see are liberals on all the major networks (ABC,CBS,NBC) with a few token conservatives like Stossel. When I go to the newsstand, it's almost wall to wall liberal thought. Denver Post, New York Times, LA Times, the Associated Press who is carried by all the papers.
ReplyDeleteWhen I go to Media Matters.org to see what their beef is, it is with people like Limbaugh, or O'reilly who are doing *opinion* not news. But all the sources I mentioned above are covering the left of center agenda as if it is straight news. Reporters like Stephenopolous get to have special conference calls with Obama. Liberal advocacy journalism dominates the minds of the country.
The reason for the popularity of talk radio among conservatives is that it is a medium that allows you to remain productive while listening. A lot of conservatives are small business owners who are in their cars a lot. All the liberals I know listen to music. F.M. is dominated by liberals...when they can fit that message in between songs.
So with all of the above news outlets influencing the minds of most Americans, you can't find it in your heart to let me get a few seconds of Limbaugh on the way to lunch?
Put yourself in my shoes. I wish there was equal time for conservatives at the New York Times or in News Week. And how about cable T.V. You want Fox shutdown, but I think MSNBC is a travesty. And CNN is only slightly better. If you shutdown O'reilly why can't I shutdown Chris Mathews as well? And what about libertarians? Or anarchists? Who gets to decide whether some group is getting their fair share?
Bukko admitted that there are a lot of cheap radio stations doing low budget stuff. These guys will sell their stations for the right price. There is no monopoly preventing every single station from carrying Air America. If there were a bigger market, you'd hear more of it. I don't buy the conspiracy theories.
I say let the conservatives have their little voice and take comfort in how well liberals get their message across in other venues.
Hmm. It appears to me that what you're saying is that conservative ideas cannot compete in the marketplace of ideas unless right-wing billionaires are allowed to purchase a government monopoly that allows them to shut out liberal ideas, and that in forums where liberal ideas compete with conservative ideas on an equal basis because right-wing billionaires cannot purchase a government monopoly that allows them to shut out liberal ideas, liberal ideas win. No wonder conservatives are scared to give equal time to liberals! They don't trust the power of their ideas to win!
ReplyDeletePersonally, the reason I don't listen to talk radio (whether left-wing or right-wing, I've lived in Air America markets before) is because it's *boring*. It's all about telling "ditto-heads" that their beliefs are true. Geeze. Echo chamber, anybody? If I could hear a true debate of ideas on talk radio, rather than one overweight drug addict sneering at anybody to the left of Atilla the Hun and no dissenting voices allowed, I'd be far more likely to listen to talk radio. Same deal with Randi Rhodes. I caught her show before Air America forced her out, and it was unlistenable left-wing echo chamber, no ideas to the right of Trotsky allowed. Echo chambers are *BORING*, unless you believe exactly like they believe and only are listening to have your own beliefs reinforced. But I like hearing lots of ideas, so I listen to other things instead.
I do believe that talk radio would be much more interesting if both left *and* right wing ideas were debated there, instead of it being a screeching echo chamber to reinforce the political beliefs of one side or another. The "Fairness Doctrine" before it was overturned did that for broadcast radio, and it's hilarious to see right-wingers frothing at the mouth about how they might get contaminated by left-wing ideas if they had to give left-wingers equal time. Wow. Reasoned debate where people get to hear *both* sides, not just the side they agree with. That *would* be different, I suppose...
BTW, I've never worked for any business with more than eighty employees world-wide (my current employer has twelve employees in its corporate offices, of which five of us are engineers who create our patented technologies), so I'm baffled about your "small business" statement and right-wing talk radio. I've certainly never heard radios tuned to talk radio in any business I've worked in. Of course I work in the technology industry rather than in a gun shop, so... (shrug).
BTW, the New York Times is not, and never has been, liberal. They are pro-business and anti-socialist and always have been, and were important in selling the notion that Iraq had WMD to a dubious public in the runup to the Mess in Mesopotamia. Can you name one (1) liberal story or opinion article by anybody other than Paul Krugman that the New York Times has run recently? They only have one liberal opinion writer on their entire staff, and that's Paul Krugman. One liberal out of a dozen opinion writers on their staff does not a liberal newspaper make.
ReplyDeleteSo please -- give me the URL to a "liberal" story at the New York Times. If you can. I want *DATA*. Without data, it's bullshit. Period. I'm a Missouri mule. SHOW ME. If you can't show me, it isn't true.
- Badtux the Mulish Penguin
I had always attributed the success of right wing radio to the fact that many on the right are indeed afraid of nearly anything that they do not understand or agree with. Then the study linking a startle response with conservative leanings came out
ReplyDeletehttp://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14761-voting-republican-may-be-a-survival-response.html,
and it seemed obvous why right wing radio was more popular, I had not taken into account the monopoly part, as talk radio never really interested me. O.K., I listen to it for laughs, and to find out what the enemy is thinking, but thats it.
The way that you are concentrating on just radio implies to me that you are more interested in silencing the Great Ego and his ilk than the concept of fairness. Why should we exclude TV? What about Michael Moore's so-called documentaries? How about the Internet? That's an awfully slippery slope being proposed.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing that prevents the creation of liberal talk radio. As a matter of fact, there was an attempt a few years back called Air America. Guess what happened? Nobody listened. I don't think that we should be having the government dictate what is aired. The best way to solve the problem is for someone to figure out how to get Air America or a similar network to be successful.
Things are considerably different from the time when the fairness doctrine was in place and now. As an example, in spite of the fact that you cannot get a radio license, you seem to do a pretty good job of getting your message out.
I do agree that the Fairness Doctrine should apply to *all* government-granted communications monopolies, including broadcast television. Government should not be in the business of allowing billionaires to use government-granted monopolies to shut out views contrary to those billionaires' views.
ReplyDeleteI am not aware that the government has granted Michael Moore a monopoly on making documentaries, or that the government has granted Fox News a monopoly on cable news, or that the government has granted anybody a monopoly on publishing their views on the Internet. If such things have occurred, please provide a reference. On the other hand, the government most definitely has granted a small group of billionaires a monopoly on radio broadcasting in my area. I can make my own documentary with my own views, I can publish my own blog with my own views, but if I attempted to broadcast my own views on the public airwaves I would literally be arrested and thrown in jail for doing so because billionaires have purchased a government-granted monopoly on the right to do so. That is what makes broadcast television and radio different from the Internet. On the Internet, anybody can publish their views. On the public airwaves, nobody can except the billionaires who have purchased monopolies from the government to do so.
As for why I am most interested in radio: Radio is the only media that I can use in my car. I cannot read the Internet while driving. I cannot turn on a television and watch it while I'm driving. All I can do is listen to the radio. It irritates me that, instead of being able to hear reasoned discourse from both sides of the aisle on MY airwaves (the public airwaves), instead a small group of billionaires have bought a government monopoly that allows them to inflict screeching harpies such as Rush Limpdick upon me. I don't want to shut Rush Limpdick up. I do want him to have to give equal time to whoever he decides he's going to lambast today, whether it's feminists or liberals or whatever. That way I can hear both sides of the story, which is always more interesting.
- Badtux the Communications Penguin
Nathan, re: the New York Times, what do you call David Brooks, William Kristol, Thomas "Mr. Globalisation" Friedman and a lot of their lesser light opinion columnists, especially in the bisness section? They are all conservative. That's in addition to what Tux points out about the Times' bias in its news stories. When did you see anything in the NYT supposrtive of socialism, nationalising the health care system or making union membership mandatory?
ReplyDeleteAmerica is full of CAPITALIST daily newspapers. Please tell me of any SOCIALIST big-city daily, Nathan.
And Tux, you left out Bob Herbert as a reliably left-wing commenter. And perhaps Nick Kristof too. He doesn't strike me as all that lefty, except that he has a conscience and is moved by human suffering. That's all it takes to qualify as "left" these days.
As far as that echo chamber on lefty radio, I like it. My favourite talker is Mike Malloy, who's as full of screaming hatred for the Right as Michael Weiner-Savage is for the Left. The difference is, Malloy has FACTS about what the right is doing, whereas Weiner just has prejudice and lunatic supposition. Randi and the others have facts too, and often alerted me to news items that I didn't know about otherwise. And I consider myself well-informed. On top of that, they interview people like Congresscritters and people in advocacy groups who don't get on corporate media. The leftwing talkers aren't afraid to ask hard questions, either.
Lastly, many left-wing talk show hosts DO have dissenting viewpoints. Thom Hartmann of Air America has on all sorts of repulsive conservatives, including John Bolton. He gives them respectful interviews, not trashing their viewpoints, although he will challenge them. His point is that he wants the Left to know how the other side thinks. The woman who replaced Randi, and Jeff Farias, also have rightists on. I can't stand it, because I hate these people and I don't find they have anything worthwhile to say, but some left-wing talkers do exercise fairness.
And one last thing, Nathan. I don't want Rush forced off the air -- I want him LAUGHED off the air. And not just because he's a fat drug abuser. I want him laughed off because he tells FAT FREAKING LIES! He should be held up to ridicule and his advertisers should back off the show because Rush is full of shit. But I'm not saying the government should do it. That's just your right-wing paranoia, which is admmirably stoked by Rush.
I'd like to shed some light on a few things that I have observed in the comments here. First, everyone believes that they are the best arbiter of what "fair" means. Second, the political spectrum has been simplistically divided into right and left.
ReplyDeleteI think this observation is proof enough of the intractability of regulating fairness. The very concept of what is fair is subjective. The very concept of the political spectrum is subjective. Who decides what is fair? When we get into the business of deciding fairness, we adopt the same tactics as communist countries.
Let me briefly talk about the political spectrum. There isn't just left and right. Their is north, south, east, west, and everything in between. So is the fairness board going to ensure that every mode of thought is included? Has anyone ever taken the worlds shortest political quiz? Google it.
Assuming you can somehow devise a universal standard of fairness to which everyone can agree, why only apply it to A.M? You are all strangely silent about FM. I do give credit to BadTux for being willing to apply it to Television. But now this begs the biggest question of all, why stop at political talk? I personally think FM radio is unfair in the songs they select. I personally think broadcast TV is a bunch of mindless junk that should be banned from the air. We should do something! We need more educational channels and less reality TV. Politics is more important than dancing with the stars right?
So now, let's talk about why we've set our sights on broadcast media. Because it is a government granted monopoly right? A monopoly is exclusive ownership or control. I have not researched the entire market out there, but here in Colorado, I invite you to check this out
Of the talk format channels, many are owned by Clear Channel, which itself, at least in this market, has three radio stations, one conservative, one centrist, and one Air America.
I do not know who the "fat cats" are who are pulling all the strings. I don't see it here. But Colorado is a state that was bought and paid for by Democratic "fat cats". Six years ago this was a fairly solid "red" state. Now it is solidly blue thanks to the Gang of Four Gill, Styker, Polis, and Bridges.
Lastly, A word about the FCC. The purpose of the FCC is, in my mind, similar to that of the Highway Patrol. It ensures everyone stays in their lanes, leaves room for emergency vehicles, and prevents accidents. But with a few exceptions, the Highway Patrol does not regulate the content of trucks on the highway. If use of a public resource such as airwaves, or a highway is the excuse to control the content, then I get to regulate all of the content of America's newspapers which are shipped on highways that I paid for via taxes. If it's good for the goose, it's good for the gander.
I remain committed to free speech, even if I have to live with the influence of fat cats like George Soros, the Gang of Four, the Hollywood left, etc. etc.