The medium is the message. So much noise and all controlled by corporations who practice suppression of free speech. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a flat-out liberal on the Sunday talkfests? The very same people who were right that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction and that the Iraq invasion and Occupation was all from the Neocon/Thinktank playbook should be the very people the media turns to when looking for balance but that’s irrelevant when there is no need for balance. That is why the Fairness Doctrine was repealed by Republicans under Reagan. Now someone is standing up and I want to applaud him. From Raw Story:
Concerns about monopolies and fears of a possible “fascist” takeover of the US media have prompted a Democratic congressman to push to restore the Fairness Doctrine, RAW STORY has learned.
“Media reform is the most important issue confronting our democratic republic and the people of our country,” Representative Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) said at the Free Press National Media Reform Conference held in Memphis, Tennessee last weekend. “This is a critical moment in history that may determine the future of our country…maybe forever.”
Hinchey told RAW STORY he plans to reintroduce the Media Ownership Reform Act (MORA) that would break up media monopolies and restore the Fairness Doctrine, which was eliminated by the Federal Communications Commission under the Reagan administration.
“If Rush shoots his mouth off, he must give equal access to our side,” Hinchey said. “The American public will begin to get both sides or all sides of an issue. That is basic – fundamental to a democracy.”
There are so few voices in the media speaking about impeachment and freedom of speech that just hearing Rosie O’Donnell on the View today was a cause for joy. Sadly there will be forces trying to make her pay a price for it. From all appearances even Lou Dobbs was cut off the air by ABC for answering her impeachment question.
Check out the link for the whole story, and the photo which wouldn’t download for some reason. Well, I know the reason actually, i’m a tech dunce!
I can see the photo… or at least one of Hinchey.
Not sure how things owrk on a Mac… but I use IE rather than AOL to download photos. they have lots of extra little ”helps” built in, compared to AOL.. Or I use Firefox. Both are better than AOL… which often downloads photos in some complicated way that makes a mess of things.
Very untechie language, but best I can do… ๐
Madman figured out the correct link of course. I’m in the corner with my pointed cap on ๐
When I right-click on a picture with Firefox, the context menu has an option for “Copy Image Location.” Then you can just paste the URL to the image from the clipboard. I can also copy images, but I can only paste them in certain places.
That’s in Linux or Windows. I suspect on the Mac it would be a control-click or shift-click or something.
I can see the photo just fine too.
As a fairly recent member of the ‘politically aware’, I didn’t even know about the Fairness Doctrine until a few days ago. While I was reading about it on wikipedia, my thought was Holy shit, something like this EXISTED?!? It’s no WONDER the right wing killed it!!
just another of the “gifts” to Democracy given to us by Ronnie Raygun and his corporate masters.
All too little attention is paid to tech matters these days in Congress. My perception is, that’s because lots of people think “tech is so harrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrd” and don’t really want to understand it. This includes congresscritters. (Well so are agriculture and veteran’s affairs . . . ok, bad examples, they don’t pay enough attention to those either. Tech just happens to be my strong suit.) This leaves a big opening for megacorps and their buddies to come up with real doozies like Sen. Ted “Tubes” Stevens’ Deleting Online Predators Act and various attempts to legislate anti-consumer measures like vendor lock-in of consumer devices and draconian penalties for copyright infringement.
So when you see something like Rep. Hinchey’s MORA bill, it’s like a breath of fresh air. Good on ya, Maurice! I hope this sucker passes, and if His Nibs vetoes it I hope it passes again.
Hinchey has been my hero for a long time. He pushed hard for the declassification of Nazi war crimes, and also was involved in in trying prosecute Pinochet for the Letelier bombing. He is really a cool guy!!
Thanks for that info Cruz. I have to say i was not familiar with Hinchey before this article although i read his bio at Wikipedia. As I live in NY I’m going to keep an eye out for him in the future.
Hey Wilfred. If you have him as your congressman you are lucky indeed. He is my favorite member of congress.He’s quiet but he gets things done.
oh if he was my congressman i’d definitely know who he was!
he is from another district many miles away but i’m just so proud to have someone like him from the state of NY.