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About Kate
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I was born in Ohio in 1953. We moved around because my parents did not get along. We kids spent one year in an institutional home near Pittsburgh. My dad took us to Oregon when I was in high school, accepting a job offer there to get me away from the drug culture and radical politics found in the Cleveland area. Despite my uneven high school record, I was accepted at Portland State in Oregon, later transferring to Columbia University in NYC from on the advice of a professor. Politics were nauseating at the time, '74, and I was undergoing a radical shift in my political orientation. I worked in a freight forwarder's office, then in a college library and studied Art History in New York. There, at age twenty, I married my boyfriend from Ohio. He left New York after a year back to Ohio and was caught by God while there. Eventually, so was I, caught by God. The encounter was so transforming that I left college with my degree uncompleted. We moved to a small town in Ohio, raised and home schooled five sons and a daughter.
I made good use of my local library and later found that what I was is known by the term "autodidact". Raising children allowed leisure for reading and my tastes in that were eclectic, but tended to history, often through biography, and literature. Twenty-five years after leaving New York, I went back to C.U. and finished my degree over a summer. I taught high school for three years, also homeschooling my dyslexic youngest for two of those years. Currently, I teach Freshman Composition as adjunct faculty at Lakeland Community College in Willoughby, Ohio. This is much easier than either high school or home schooling; I am finding my way into the working world. I also pleasurably pursue a master's degree in American History and Government at Ashland University through their summer program.
By no right nor reason have I an excuse for writing about or even thinking in any serious way about politics and world events. I always have, since I was a girl. Happily, this is America and I may.
The Tyranny of Conservative Talk Radio
I begin most mornings groggily reading the news online. The Drudge Report is one of the first sites I visit, which probably means I am conservative. This morning the hot topic on Drudge was that Hillary Clinton and Barbara Boxer were overheard by Jim Inhofe discussing a "legislative fix" for talk radio. As a conservative, you hear this kind of thing and think "That's not going to fly" or else you worry about vast left-wing conspiracies. I tend to the former.
However, this seems not to be so far-fetched as I thought. Given the blogs posted on here about the left's apparent domination of journalism, (granted, based on a sample group's political giving, but really, who doesn't know it is true) I begin to wonder why the only medium of political opinion apparently dominated by conservatives ought to be so feared as to be under threat of a "legislative fix". I thought liberals were all for free thinking and all about freedom of speech.
(Which is not to complain about the liberals on this site. No one has told me to shut up, yet, even though I am a Northern female and I am sure we all wonder why I write on here at all. I was invited by someone, doubtless in a weak moment later regretted. One of the reasons I like blogging on GWH is because I get explanations for liberal political thought that might otherwise leave me in that worry I mention above.)
Why does the left seem to think that certain political speech needs to be regulated? Also from Drudge was a link to the Think Progress on the Center for American Progress and the ironically named "Free Press" report, The Structural Imbalance of Talk Radio. 90% of Americans age 12 and over listen to radio, the talk/news/information and talk/personality type of program being mostly preferred, although still trailing country music. This paper insists consumer demand has nothing to do with this ideological predominance of radio. Surprise. I thought they were measuring consumer choice and market share in their statistics. If I am reading this report correctly, their complaint is that there is an inadequacy of "diversity in ownership". Their remedies are three: "Restore local and national caps on the ownership of commercial radio stations", "Ensure greater local accountability over radio licensing", "Require commercial owners who fail to abide by enforceable public interest obligations to pay a fee to support public broadcasting". which sums into government regulation to reverse the status quo.
Incredibly, this report imputes a lack of free speech in America to conservative talk radio. First, I am boggled at the thought that there is some lack of free expression in the US. This suppression, by conservatives, of free speech needs to be addressed by government regulation, both local and federal to limit conservative free speech on the radio in the interest of "free speech". I love that the solution includes the potential for increased support for national public radio, as if that were freest speech available on the radio. I listen to NPR, but "All Things Considered" ought to be titled, "The Few Things We Feel Like Discussing" and when they say they are radio for smart listeners, Rush Limbaugh's hubris seems less of what it is in comparison.
Radio was failing and fading as a medium of expression. Air time could be bought cheaply, and it is still probably cheap in comparison to television and print media. That country music still dominates radio says something to me in relation to this, but it is on the topic of consumer demand, which these liberal think-tanks dismiss out of hand as irrelevant to the discussion. How does government regulation of that which people freely use equate to more freedom and not less? My conservatism must blind me to evident truth of that.
Comments
How Liberals Feel
Liberals do not feel like their views are affirmed when they turn on the TV, login to the news sites, or open a magazine. When I read my New York Times every morning, yes, my views are fairly well-affirmed. But on CNN I've got Lou Dobbs claiming to be the great populist even though his views on immigration certainly don't align with mine or many other Americans. George Will gets the "Last Word" in my Newsweek magazine. From my perspective on the left, the media has largely let the Bush administration off the hook for a series of pretty repugnant moral and legal violations.
I'm not asking for you to agree that there's a conservative bias. I'm just asking you to quit discussing this as if the liberal bias is universally recognized. "Who doesn't know it is true?" you ask. Me and plenty of others.
As far as Clinton and Boxer's alleged comments, they are paraphrases of a conversation supposedly overheard by James Inhofe. He never even fully confirms who made the comments despite being pressed to do so. So I'm not going to lean into a scandal that just isn't there and use it as a looking glass into the real values of the left.
Dustin Kidd
Dustin Kidd
I don't feel affirmed by the Times
It's just information. The much vaunted liberal bias is more myth than reality. It's a background principle against which the paper is read - this is the classic "hermeneutic circle" you probably remember from your Dilthey, Gaddamer, and Heidegger classes in college. (heh)
As the name suggests, it's circular reasoning. That's why leftists see righty corporatist bias and conservatives see liberal bias.
Entertainment or Worse?
kate,
I see two separate points raised by this. First, we do not have an absolute right to free speech- you can't yell fire in a movie theater, you can't use hate speech with impunity, and there are limitations on what can be published (pornography, for example). We place 'date and time' limitations on protest marches, and even restrict where they can be held. We also limit what can be said on television, and even restrict which shows can air at what times because of language or content. For some, especially those in talk radio, professing 'outrage' over restrictions on 'free speech' is little more than an opportunity to rile a given listener base, and directly or indirectly, increase ratings. I am a bit skeptical when someone reports that a senator from one party 'overheard' senators from another party talking about some 'hot button' issue like this. Hearsay is unreliable. So, have you considered that if this conversation took place between Boxer and Clinton, it may not have been accurately described by Inhofe, or that Drudge could be using the 'overheard' comments for his own agenda?
Because legislation cannot effectively regulate the content of speech, I see this as hype to rile listeners. It is highly unlikely that a given political party could craft legislation (that would have to be negotiated with the opposing party and signed by the opposing party's top elected official) that would apply to one party's speech but not another party's.
That being said, the second point relates to the medium- talk radio. I do not listen to Rush or some of the others, but have heard that they describe their shows as entertainment, not news. That distinction is lost upon a great many people. Someone like Rush can say 'we found WMD in Iraq' and countless people will parrot that statement back as if true, never bothering to think critically about whether this is true or not. Fiction becomes fact. Because we do such a poor job of regulating our own speech, and because some people chose not to think critically (and can be exploited), I can see why some might call for greater regulation.
David Niewert wrote an interesting series a while back on how talk radio has expanded the message of ultra right wing groups, like the Patriot Party and Militiamen, noting how those like Rush either wittingly or unwittingly spread the rhetoric to the mainstream. It is an interesting read. http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/The%20Rise%20Of%20Pseudo%20Fascism.pdf
r.johnson
They can totally do it
It would be legal but politically very difficult. It's just an "equal time" reg, and perfectly constitutional. Two reasons it'd be difficult: 1) it would be hard to get past the GOP; and 2) it's not very good policy, so only a handful of Dems would support it. (drudge's ridiculous and breathless "reporting" notwithstanding)
While I could care less if
While I could care less if the morons yammering on AM radio veer wildly to the left or right, I agree wholeheartedly with the notion that caps need to be placed on radio ownership, and media ownership in general. It is one thing to support free speech; it is another to allow the richest couple people to buy all the megaphones and drown out what everyone else is trying to say in the interest of making a buck. And this is not a left or right issue; the person who is most responsible for deregulated media ownership is none other that William Jefferson Clinton.
The idea that economies best serve the public only if completely unregulated is equivalent to saying that elections only work if a ballot box is left in the middle of town square, and whoever can best stuff it gets elected. Economy responds to the bottom line, which is often, but not always, in the best interest of the public. Very often regulations just ensure that the bottom line does not conflict with ethical behavior.
That being said, if the public wants country music and Rush Limbaugh, then by all means give it to them. But allow local stations, who reach markets which are smaller than those sought after by giant homogenizing media conglomerates, to have a chance to compete by reserving them some spots on the bandwidth. Is that such a ridiculous request?
I think people see what they want to see
I've heard the long winded bemoanings that the media is all liberal, but most of the time when I ask where someone heard that from they tell me it was on Fox News or Rush or Hannity said so. I've also seen studies and reports from groups like Media Matters that says the opposite. I would like all media to be held more accountable for being truthful and accurate with their reporting, so we don't get scores of people believing things like the discovery of WMD's in Iraq or that Bush bailed on his national service or any of the stuff that tends to get reported and believed when it should still be being researched and confirmed. Opinions can be had about things in any direction, but falsehoods should not be allowed to be given footholds in the public so easily.
Free Speech?
When I was young, my grandfather, who was actually the type of conservative that makes me very uncomfortable to call myself a conservative, told me that every media outlet was owned or controlled by the left. He showed me a newspaper article from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette (I think) which was hardly a right-wing rag, but not a hot-bed of radical thought, either. For all I knew or know, it might have been true. This was about 1968, I was getting involved in radical politics and I could not see it all. My dad was a Johnson/Humphrey liberal, as conservative as he ever was in his life, and he could not see it, either.
So, your responses, especially Dustin's, was what I thought I would get, though I did not like to be presumptuous. Maybe I was, anyway. I did not mean to imply that the Drudge headline was an absolute truth. I was just reporting it as the Drudge headline and connecting it to a couple of things that had also caught my eye. It was a good opening because it stirred you all. I appreciate that you all have comments and each takes a different perspective on the issue I raise.
However, what I see in your responses are that conservative speech is too prevalent for your tastes and that something ought to be done about it. Actually, not everything I read from conservative sources do I agree with, either. When folks on the right say that something ought to be done about "liberal bias in the news" I ask, "What?" and have had varied answers, but too many including "If Bush was any sort of conservative at all, he would have done something about this," which is no answer as far as I am concerned. The variety of ways that GWB is supposed to have let us all down, depending on speaker, from right to left, has been amazing. If you think it some area of the far right that supports the president, well, you would be wrong.
r.johnson, I think an awful lot of news is entertainment. I cannot stand to watch TV news because it all sounds like entertainment to me. News sells papers and even NPR has an sponsorship that is commercial in nature - "brought to you by...." which I prefer to the idea of government controlling the medium. Just because Rush Limbaugh is forthright in his admission that he is providing entertainment is no reason to denigrate him for that blunt honesty. Feel free to denigrate him for other things, even gurufrisbee's absolutely true "long-winded bemoanings" on this topic, but he is very open about what he is and what he does. Propaganda so open about its bias is clearly opinion and not truly propaganda at all.
I think we have a right to free political and religious speech. Isn't this why we all would prefer that the Internet not be controlled, because of the amazing freedom of political speech on here? I am worried, and hope that I am wrong, that restrictions of political speech will come from the left, for well-meant reasons. I would suggest that some of you see falsehood where I see freely expressed opinion. I would not see the restriction of free political speech. Is that conservative or liberal?
Kate Pitrone
Dixie Chicks are illuminating
This is a reiteration of what I said below, but I wanted to point out that this same discussion was more or less had just a few years ago. When the Dixie Chicks were banned by Clear Channel for dissing Bush, many liberals made a bunch of hay about free speech.
Conservatives correctly pointed out that, because Clear Channel owned those radio waves, there was no free speech issue. The liberal rejoinder to that, in turn, was that the issue wasn't about free speech as legal doctrine but as ethical rule. In other words, we generally ought to tolerate political speech within certain limits and not punish the speaker. So, if a houseguest of mine expresses a political opinion contrary to mine, I ought not throw that person out. It's important to note that that's a principle of ethics or political theory, not a legal doctrine.
Same basic thing is happening here. The issue here clearly isn't free speech as a legal doctrine (see: Red Lion Broadcasting, IIRC, holding that the fairness doctrine doesn't implicate the First Amendment). However, there may be an ethical concern: even if the First Amendment isn't involved, we generally ought to respect the will of the people as expressed through the quasi-free market of radio ratings.
And that's a perfectly reasonable argument. I think it holds for the Dixie Chicks as well as for the Fairness Doctrine.
Talk Radio
r.johnson's post above (second from the top) is particularly helpful — especially its third paragraph, on Rush Limbaugh. Helpful in revealing how some on the left can convince themselves they have a case for government regulation of talk radio and that this would not represent a profound undermining of the First Amendment.
r.johnson begins the paragraph by telling us he does not listen to Rush Limbaugh. He then proceeds to construct his own strawman hypothetical both of what Rush might say ("we found WMD") and of what Rush's listners would probably do with that claim ("parrot" it back). I do listen to Rush from time to time. None of what r.johnson depicts here remotely reflects what the general tenor of the show is. Yes, there are the ditto-heads who genuflect before Rush. As often as not, however, even they then say things Rush freely contradicts, argues with them about, qualifies or uses simply to expound as he intends to all along. It's very freewheeling and not at all predictable. Sometimes it's lunacy and humor. Other times, however, it is more detailed analysis of legislation, policy, etc. than you will ever get on the evening news. Of course it is from a conservative perspective. It is often quite thorough nonetheless.
Of course, if instead of this you depict Rush as a demon and his listeners as brainless fools, you have the perfect recipe for squelching this as some sort of Jerry Springer-like intellectual porn. I suppose then the regulators can simply say, "we know it when we see it." All in the name of free speech. Heaven help us all!
Sheep's Clothing
Freewheeling, humor, unpredictable, and even lunacy. You make my point. You describe something designed to sensationalize, something designed to attract your ear, but nothing intended as a 'real' debate over a given topic. Meanwhile, it masquerades as something it is not. When a wolf dresses in sheep's clothing, there is a desire to make sure the wolf is unmasked, regardless of whether those deceived are brainless fools or well minded human beings who don't realize they are dealing with a wolf in sheep's clothing.
r.johnson
"Free speech" in this context is a metaphor, FWIW
There are no free speech claims at issue, legally speaking. The airwaves aren't public property, where I have a right to speech; they're government property, where the government can regulate fairly freely. It's the difference between a public park (where I can sing "Video Killed the Radio Star" at the top of my lungs) and the floor of the Senate (where I'd prrrrrrobably get in trouble if I tried to exhibit my beautiful voice).
Also, FWIW, I'm a fan of local control. Driving 'cross country listening to the same clear channel programs is bo-ring.
Why are airwaves government property?
The public park analogy doesn't work—even if we assume there is a good argument for the social ownership of parks—because you can turn off or tune out radio waves but not sounds waves. Clear Channel is not in existence because its owners spend their leisure time broadcasting (like your singing venture); it exists because it makes money and is supported by a market.
It was a mistake to allow the government to regulate the airwaves. The State created the problems that led to the need for regulation in the first place. It increased the scarcity by limiting non-military bandwidth and delaying the entry of FM. Then it created a tragedy of the commons by handing out licenses for free.
If airwaves had been treated like any other good on the free market, we wouldn't be having this discussion. You're right that this isn't a real "free speech" issue. It's a property rights issue.
Well, they are gvt property
A law back in the early 20th century declares them public. It'd be an interesting, discussion over whether they ought to be (radio waves strike me as a prototypical public good, since there's an extremely limited supply, a lot of demand, and no clear way of "staking a claim."). I don't know much about the theoretical / normative bases for the public / private distinction, though.
Staking Claims on Airwaves
Thankfully, stare decisis doesn't have quite the same force as it did in ancient Persia. Hopefully, clearer thinking will lead us to liberate the airwaves from government intervention. As I said before, part of the airwave scarcity issue was due to the government's intrusion in limiting what was available and inhibiting innovation. I may regret this universal declaration later, but I feel comfortable saying scarcity in itself is never a reason to remove a good from the price market.
As for "staking a claim", I don't see any reason why the principle of homesteading (in the Lockean tradition) wouldn't work with radio. Some of the messier details would have to be worked out through civil court decisions, but there's no obvious reason the general principle wouldn't work.
Isn't the horse out of the homesteading barn?
Given that the property is already explored, so to speak, a homesteading wouldn't really work - it'd need to be an auction. A conceptual problem is that the Lockean notion of property (I assume you refer to matter + labor = private property) doesn't really seem to fit all that well with airwaves; one can broadcast, but that never really transforms the airwaves.
Because of that, the airwaves seem less like real property and more like waterways, which have historically been part of the public trust and subject to the overriding interest of the general public and the state. I understand that this analytical framework isn't fully adequate to the normative question of how airwaves & property rights ought to be structured, but per the conservative principle of ordered liberty, there's gotta be something rational about a principle so ingrained in the history of anglo-american law.
What's Done Need Not Be Forever Done
You're invoking an entirely different issue: now that the government has intruded, how can the airwaves be liberated? The homesteading principle shows us that the airwaves need not have been regulated in the first place, which is an argument that we should proceed with their liberation.
As far as airwaves being like waterways, you're invoking another area of contention regarding public goods, which is far from settled. Try this argument against the public ownership of dikes for starters.
Maybe we could pass something like this...
Maybe we could pass something like this:
to ensure that folks who use their free speech do so responsibly.
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