Monday, August 22, 2011

That Slow Dog Is Hit Again

With his see-through skin, presumably: the dog that wouldn't bark is once again shot dead. Which dog? The Fairness Doctrine, killed (again) by the FCC, per this poorly-headlined Politico story ("FCC finally kills off fairness doctrine"). Of course, the Fairness Doctrine has been totally and completely dead, certainly way beyond the capabilities of Billy Crystal and Carol Kane, or even Willow Rosenberg, to resuscitate it. Mostly because, conservative nuttiness aside, no one has been particularly interested in doing so for a couple decades.

Anyway, since I mention it every time I do a "dogs, not barking" post, I figured I should do a post about this. The real question is: having now succeeding in killing it once again, will conservatives allow the Doctrine to finally rest in peace? Or will they continue raising money off of the specter of government censorship through its revival?

I know where I'll be placing my money on that one. But I'll be on the lookout for evidence -- and I'd certainly appreciate any tips from those of you who pay closer attention to this stuff than I do.

(Via David).

5 comments:

  1. I don't understand why conservatives would hate the fairness doctrine. Isn't the press supposed to have a liberal bias? In that case conservatives would be the main beneficiaries of the fairness doctrine and the liberals would hate it?

    Also does this mean that “True Hatred” isn’t enough of a reason for resurrection?

    Doug

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  2. Anonymous: Talk radio. The fairness doctrine was about both broadcast TV and radio, and talk radio has never remotely attempted to pretend they're unbiased.

    Plus, there's the general paranoia that the FCC would use the fairness doctrine to attack conservative media while looking the other way on liberal media.

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  3. IIRC, Carol Kane didn't actually do much for Wesley - she mostly just nagged Billy Crystal during his miracle-making efforts.

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  4. CSH,

    Yeah, yeah, everyone's a nitpicker.

    ReplyDelete

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