Talk Radio and the Fairness Doctrine

There was a time when going up and down the AM dial brought almost nothing but hit music. It’s mostly gone, replaced by a no less homogenous product – talk radio, mostly conservative talk radio. Going up and down the AM dial today brings a steady flow of talk shows railing against Barack Obama. He “hung out” with Weatherman Bill Ayers . . . He benefited from a sweetheart deal with a Chicago wheeler-dealer . . . He is closely tied to ACORN, which is accused of presenting false voter registration data in several states.

The ubiquity of conservative talk radio, Air America’s relative lack of success, and miscellaneous passions/animosities of the day, cause many to call for bringing back the Fairness Doctrine, which decades ago forced “balance” onto electronic media. The doctrine was a mistake in the 1960s, and bringing it back now would be a mistake as well.

Buzz, Digg, Heat

The Fairness Doctrine, like the more recent Patriot Act, was named in a calculated manner to dupe and manipulate the public. Who after September 11th wasn’t a patriot? And who has ever thought him/herself as anything but fair? But the Fairness Doctrine was a shapeless FCC principle of the late 1940s that the Johnson administration annealed into a weapon. Johnson used it to silence critics such as Billy James Hargis who used their radio broadcasts to rail against the administration’s policies. Fairness had nothing to do with it. It was a way to silence opponents.

Supporters of redeploying the Fairness Doctrine point to the danger of one point of view dominating the media. No one can deny that AM radio is dominated by hosts whose espousal of GOP talking points appears reflexive and at least invites suspicion of collusion. But AM radio is only part of the media, and a rather small and limited one at that. Conservatism prevails on the AM dial, but remains an ordinary player in many other forms of media such as FM radio, cable television, newspapers, and the internet. There are plenty of diverging points of view out there, and they are by no means drowned out, marginalized, or endangered by conservatives.

The Fairness Doctrine did not lead to an equitable exchange of ideas in the media. It led to avoidance of the exchange of ideas, as station managers usually declined to broadcast any point of view that might require them to provide free air time to anyone who perceived even a trace of opinion. The media were intimidated and unwilling to explore or create. Inasmuch as society today is far more fractured, politicized, litigious, and pockmarked with opportunistic interest groups than forty years ago, the number of such claims would be far more numerous, making station managers even more cautious and content even more superficial.

Enforcement of a new doctrine will at least partially lie in the hands of political appointees. The partisanship and unscrupulousness of many appointees make for an unpleasant scenario, regardless of which party has won the most recent pageant. And one might wonder if critics of military misadventures, to which both parties are prone, might fall under the ominous and growing shadow of the FBI and Homeland Security.

The vilifications of Obama from Limbaugh et al exceed, at least quantitatively, anything Lyndon Johnson had to endure from Hargis et al. The temptation to bring back the Fairness Doctrine will be substantial, especially if a President Obama believes that talk radio mobilizations have stalled his agenda. It is hoped he will take the high, open road.

~ ©2008 Brian M. Downing
Brian M. Downing is a regular contributor to The Agonist and the author of several works of political and military history, including The Military Revolution and Political Change and The Paths of Glory: War and Social Change in America from the Great War to Vietnam. He can be reached at brianmdowning@gmail.com.

Brian Downing October 20, 2008 - 11:16pm

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( categories: Opinion | USA: Campaign 2008 | USA: Domestic Issues )

You can lead a horse to water...

Wingnut talk radio is successful because that what the people listening want to hear. The people who listen to it would just tune out an alternative point of view, fairness doctrine or no. There is no way to force low information voters, conspiracy nuts and the like to listen to the voice of reason, or any alternative to people telling them what they want to hear unless it is equally outlandish and inflammatory.

tjfxh October 20, 2008 - 11:38pm

Lots of hypotheticals here.

Lots of 'what ifs' that we have to assume will be unintended consequences of fairness. The trouble is we don't have to get hypothetical about the decline of discourse in this country.

Political dialogue has really gone to the dogs since the end of Fairness.

The truth is, AM radio and 'nut' Fox TV have completely changed the terms of the debate. A progressive tax regime is now 'socialism.' Hell, the Clintons are 'socialists' - my God, think of that - the RIGHT wing of the democrats are 'socialists.' Clinton signed off on ending welfare, bombed Iraq a lot - but he's 'socialist.'

You're right Brian, we have become a thousand times nuttier in the past twenty years - doesn't a relentless, unaswered propoganda machine have a LITTLE something to do with that?

Whoever posseses more trust in the 'wisdom' of the common man than suspicion of Rupert Murdoch's motives is truly a rube - maybe he needs to hear both sides of the story...

KingElvis October 21, 2008 - 9:31am

adsf

I've been around this awhile and can speak from some experience. In my view, the wingnuts found talk radio, not the other way around. That kind of thinking was widespread, probably more widespread than it is today, as shown by the fact that Obama is running ahead in the polls. Never could have happened back then. The big scandal of 1960 was a Catholic running for president, with widespread fear being sowed that the Pope would secretly or not so secretly be running America. What changed it? Mostly "sex, drugs and rock and roll."

BTW, corporate America is interested in profits. They will put on what sells. At first, there was a reaction against the transition in popular music on the radio, especially FM. When it became obvious that that's where the money was, everyone rushed there in spite of the organized opposition of the traditional values folks.

Different groups get their entertainment ("news" is now entertainment) in different places. It would be nice if there were more elevated programming, but it's not comercially viable given the level of culture in the US. PBS struggles to make it on its own. If a similar private company could make money doing something similar, it would exist. Radio and TV aren't the preferred venue for this type of thing. With the net here, they never will be.

The game can change quickly, however, as the success of KO and Rachel Maddow (ratings double)) goes to show. I suspect that in an Obama administration, we will see spontaneous changes taking place on both TV and the radio due to shifting interest. The right wingnut thing is playing itself out as time passes it by. Of course, if McCain wins, the scenario will be different and there will be no new fairness doctrine anyway.

However, the biggest change is going to be the melding of the various sources into one as digital appliances are developed that combine them in one unit. At that point, there will be a much bigger segmentation of the markets, resembling the net. Remember, TV started out as essentially only a few broadcast channels. We've come a long way from there, baby.

tjfxh October 21, 2008 - 11:42am

I disagree completely.

I say bring back the Fairness Doctrine, and the sooner, the better. Why? The problem is sharing. Most rich people don't like to do it. They don't want to pay taxes to the federal government and see it "redistributed" to their country. They like keeping it. All of it.

Which party makes a deal with rich people, 'you support us, we'll make laws that let you keep all your money?' Republicans. Who owns the MSM? Rich people. So there you go, the rich owners of the MSM are more likely to support conservatives, which means Republicans or Democratic sellouts.

Here's the sneaky part: They don't want to support conservatives explicitly, because they're afraid - get this - that the public will get mad and demand the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine! For that reason, the rich owners tell their PR people to come up with a plan. They'll call their propaganda shows "Fair and Balanced" and "The Most Trusted," etc. Then they tell all their talking heads to continuously carp about "the liberal media" which of course barely exists at all. Isn't that clever?

I will happily acknowledge that competing forces have finally begun to catch up to the corporate media. Sites like Agonist and Kos and Huffington and such are having an impact. But a substantial portion of Americans still form their political opinions from what they see on TV and hear on the radio. And that's 95 percent right wing garbage.

In fact, even so-called "sports" shows are infected with the right wing disease. As an old sports junkie, I can't tell you how nauseating it is to hear a football pundit start spouting about what an honor it was to shake hands with George Bush or John McCain.

Today add to that mega-churches enjoying a completely unfair tax-free status while continuously spouting inflammatory right wing rhetoric from the pulpit, and you've got the atmosphere of stubborn paranoia and ignorance we see today, aka: McCain's base. Somebody's got to crack down on politicized churches. The government has got to take away their tax-free status.

Meanwhile, reinstate the Fairness Doctrine. Yes, it may have been abused by LBJ, but do it anyway. Fix it to work better. Today's MSM is virtually a monoculture of right wing bullshit. Rule of Nature: Greedy corporate bigwigs will never, ever do the right thing without being forced. Example: America.

The Fairness Doctrine was not perfect, but it was far better than having nothing to fight off the reichwing disease. We would not be facing economic and ecological disaster today were it not for the dominance of America's conservative illusionists. Good for us and lucky that we do have progressive blogs, Air America and Olberman, but we are still a long, long way from 50-50 exposure with the hundreds of right wing propaganda sources.

Bring back the Fairness Doctrine and maybe we will get a little closer to equity. It will still take years to happen even if it does happen, but at least we will have a chance to knock down some of the shrill voices on the right. For every 15 minutes of Sean Hannity, there should be 15 minutes of Mike Malloy, not that pipsqueak Colmes.

Good times for Smiley! :-D

Jimbo92107 October 21, 2008 - 9:59am

Nazi propaganda

The fairness doctrine was instituted in 1949 as a response to the excesses and success of Nazi propaganda in manipulating the German population during the '30'3 and '40's. Propaganda works...as Goebels said...tell the lie often enough and people believe it.

Propaganda is not for educated, intelligent people. Of course they ignore it as most of them ignore Rush Limpaugh.
Propaganda is for ignorant, gullible people. And there are a lot of ignorant gullible people who are propagandized by hate radio. That had horrible consequences in the Balkans in the '90's and we are not immune to that here.

The fairness doctrine was in use in this country during the 1960's and you use the example of someone opposed to Lyndon Johnson. Well, I was alive during that time and I seemed to have missed all the silence that the fairness doctrine imposed.

When wealthy individuals with extreme ideas can buy a volume of free speech that drowns out opposing voices, we have gone too far into Goebbels world. And Ruppert Murdoch is an example of such an extremist.

And I bet if Ruppert went all librul on us and started calling for universal single payer health insurance and for getting out of Irak, that ole fairness doctrine would be back in a heart beat.

Getting rid of the fairness doctrine was a right wing tactic and it succeeded admirably.

JT October 21, 2008 - 10:34am

64 thousand repetitions...

I hate to say it, but Orwell was right. Even intelligent people are vulnerable to sufficiently prolonged propaganda. Remember also that propaganda is a mixture of techniques for both persuasion and dissuasion. At the same time Sarah Palin is rallying her base of racists and bigots, Republican operatives are intimidating potential Democratic voters with a campaign of lies, scams and threats.

After awhile, even intelligent voters can be conditioned to avoid resisting the forces of evil, if they think resistance will be met with violence. Note the police brutality against convention protesters. After seeing that, would you join a protest? Would you let your children do it?

Republicans bank on fear, and that's one of the most reliable investments out there. The Fairness Doctrine is a good way to counteract that fear. People need to know that the good guys still outnumber the bad guys.
.
Good times for Smiley! :-D

Jimbo92107 October 21, 2008 - 11:56am

Working Class 'rage'

Who was it who once said "repetition is insistence."

Look at these pathetic people. If they weren't so 'angry' you'd pity them.

http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2008/10/10411_video_mad_for_mcain.html

KingElvis October 21, 2008 - 1:14pm

This is the problem with being "issues-oriented"

The liberal Dems want to run an issues-oriented campaign based on critical thinking, i.e., sound argumentation grounded in true premises and valid logic. The GOP base is largely emotionally charged and low information. These people are not interested in reasoning about issues. They are ruled by the gut, not the head.

The problem is that a lot of these people are naturally allied with the Dems on the basis of their own self-interest, at least economic. The challenge of the Dems is to speak their language and win them over through a strategy that brings them in instead of excluding them as irredeemable.

Remember, these people or at least their ancestors used to be Dems pre-LBJ and Nixon. It was Nixon that created the wedge issue of race and "values." The context of this division is fading, however, and the Dems should be chipping away at it instead of ceding these votes by default.

Race as such is no longer the issue it was. Nor is welfare. But these are still wedge issues used by the GOP to the degree that the Dems have not worked sufficiently to overcome them.

Instead of unloading on GOP propaganda and the stupidity of the low information voters, the Dems need to develop a strategy for getting them back on board in their own interest. The Dems are attacked as elitist because they are. There is no populism of the left anymore as there was before Reagan killed the New Deal, to the degree that even Social Security and Medicare are now under attack by the right.

There are gut issues here that the Dems need to tap into, which don't require a lot of critical thinking. Pocket book issues are the biggies in hard times, when they become gut issues rather than merely abstract ones turned into gut ones through dog whistles like "socialism" and code works like "welfare."

Wise up, Dems.

tjfxh October 21, 2008 - 1:32pm

There's a piece (publisher's editorial) in this month's Harpers

that argues much the same thing. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be online.

_{"Frankly, we've lost a lot in recent years." - General Colin Powell}

Raja October 21, 2008 - 1:39pm

Yet you are hearing these

Yet you are hearing these 'dead ender' McCain types throw around 'socialism' - and it's so maddening after we just saw (painfull irony) the nationalization or socialization - only of WEALTH.

It took the right twenty years to get to this point. Look at the link in my other post. It's these working stiffs who are working themselves into a lather screaming at a Mother Jones reporter. Nobody would call himself a rube (least of all - a rube) - but my god, the credulity of these McCain dead-enders is sickening. How can you tell them - "Hey, you've been brainwashed."

KingElvis October 21, 2008 - 5:31pm

Just can't agree with you on this one.

You make a good point about the distortions and potential for abuse from the Fairness rule, but look at what the alternative has produced. If putting the Fairness rule back into play causes station managers to avoid partisan talk entirely on the radio I think that would be a large improvement over what we have now.

I suppose the argument I would make is that we do not now have anything that even approaches an open medium where radio and television are concerned. Money rules. Period.

As to the notion that the shock jocks do what they do because this is what people want, I question that as well. Small children want to stay up all night, eat too much candy and play in traffic. Do we permit this because it is what they want? Does our responsibility to be good stewards and guardians for our families cease to apply at all when we step beyond the family circle into concerns that impact the entire community?

May I recommend this book

http://www.amazon.com/Democracy-Problem-Free-Speech-Sunstein/dp/0028740009/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224616630&sr=1-13

It is by Cass Sunstein on the topic of First Amendment rights. He argues that the Oliver Wendell Holmes concept of the "marketplace of ideas" is a limited, less effective way of framing matters than the view later elaborated by Brandeis. Justice Brandeis spoke in a more targeted fasion of political speech, of the idea that there needs to be a real forum, a level playing field if you will, for civic discourse. Following that logic, Brandeis reasoned that whatever promotes the health of robust civic discourse is the arrangement to pursue.

I would argue that a healthy forum for civic speech should include regulation if it is needed to counteract the distorting influence of money. For now, I think it is the lesser of two evils.

someofparts October 21, 2008 - 2:28pm

As Radio is for Profit

It's not full free speech. It's commercial free speech and is constrained. Limited.

Right wing radio is propoganda. Needs to be limited.

Synoia October 21, 2008 - 4:49pm

Why is talk radio so right wing?

It's overwhelming right of center in New Zealand as well. Why?

John Carter October 21, 2008 - 3:57pm

One word: Nuance.

When you delve deeply into any subject, you really need to start qualifying your explanations. You dig into the whys and wherefores and find this complexity - you tap into the varying contours of each individual case.

When you don't give a damn about portraying the devilish details of any problem - well hey, that really frees things up doesn't it? Now you just say all negroes are lazy - who cares that it literally can't be true? Not the mind connected to the ears of John D. Everyman - and especially in AM radio, raw numbers of listeners is all they care about.

There's a great essay on hate radio by David Foster Wallace in his great collection of journalism/essays called "Consider the Lobster." It may not answer your question but it's edifying nonetheless.

BTW, isn't NZ a nuclear free zone? Not exactly the 'right' we know in the super-state of YEW ESS AY! YEW ESS AY!

The closer you get to 'moral clarity' the farther you are from reality.

KingElvis October 21, 2008 - 5:24pm

i suppose another solution,

i suppose another solution, if not the fairness doctrine, would be to simply break up the media giants that own it all. go back to the 777 law or something along those lines.
It wouldn't suddenly solve everything but at least more than a handful of people run it all.

Warvigilent October 21, 2008 - 5:51pm

Freedom of Speech

Doesn't freedom of speech, especially via the public airwaves, carry a responsibility that what is said should also be TRUE? A major cause of our present political divisiveness is a belief that somehow there are two versions of the truth. That is not possible.

I'd say it should be dealt with administratively. Declare some vital need for the frequencies in the AM band, raise fees drastically on licensing for FM stations, go back to media ownership limits, and realize that a lot of the right wing misinformation is coming from religious broadcasts so limit their accessibility as well. If we require truth in advertising for products the same standard should apply if the product is opinion.

Phil October 21, 2008 - 6:54pm

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Talk Radio and the Fairness Doctrine

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