Attention, Ashcroft Libertarians!
You know who you are; you're one of those people who thought Libertarians were quaintly silly, and that libertarian beliefs were vaguely off.
Then John Ashcroft was sworn in as Attorney General, and suddenly you were...well, not a Randian, but you certainly obsessed about civil liberties (well, some civil liberties, anyway - not the declasse ones. Just the important ones, like the right to suspend crucifixes in urine and download pr0n at the public library and abortion).
But let's grant for the moment that you are all champions of civil liberties, keenly sensitive to the blowing of the chill winds that creak the rafters of liberty. You look at community restrictions on downloading pr0n in libraries and see stormtroopers in the press room at the NYTimes; you encounter the Ten Commandments in a courthouse and see Christian imams packing infidels off to camps in Idaho. Fine.
What do you make of this?:
The Communications Act of 1934 provides your network with a free broadcast license predicated on the fundamental understanding of your principle obligation to act as a trustee of the public airwaves in serving the public interest. Nowhere is this public interest obligation more apparent than in the duty of broadcasters to serve the civic needs of a democracy by promoting an open and accurate discussion of political ideas and events.
So: two of the most powerful men in the US Senate are invoking the Communications Act...as if the Communications Act overrides the First Amendment? And over a program that, even if it
were slanted toward Conservatives and the administration - and much of the buzz about the pre-broadcast versions of the show indicate it's just as hard on the Bush administration as it was on Clinton - would be very nearly a first in television history?
So what if it did look at events from a conservative persepctive? Editorial perspective,
even overtly political, is legal and protected - a fact that's made Michael Moore and Al Franken very rich men.
But Reid and Durban want to threaten networks for criticizing Bill Clinton (not to mention bringing back the "Fairness Doctrine", which would extinguish with a pen stroke that pesky conservative media that keeps getting the way of the Great March of Progress)?
Is this making any of you Ashcroft Libertarians take notice yet?
Posted by Mitch at
September 9, 2006 09:02 AM
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"Nowhere is this public interest obligation more apparent than in the duty of broadcasters to serve the civic needs of a democracy by promoting an open and accurate discussion of political ideas and events."
So I guess that means Reid & Durbin will equally protest the premiere of "Good Night and Good Luck" when it premieres on broadcast television. And this must be the end of Bill Moyers on PBS as well. Good. I'm glad I will no longer be financing his media empire with my tax dollars.
Posted by: Terry at September 9, 2006 09:42 AM"which would extinguish with a pen stroke that pesky conservative media" yada yada yada..
You mean, that pesky conservative media that insists on distorting facts, leaving out the truth, and lying openly, and also insists on networks not providing equal time, equal coverage of actual counter-points?
Yep.
Oh, wasn't it also that ever-so-ethical conservative lie machine that bellowed long and hard about a movie about Reagan, so hard that they moved the movie to far down the cable line-up?
But your objection here is different somehow.
Only in that you are goaring the ox, rather than having your favored son goared.
Conservatives and liberals lie equally well, liberals just happen to be foolish enough to discuss points from the other side of the argument while conservatives, in their zeal for freedom, choose to suppress truths that are not convenient.
Posted by: ted at September 10, 2006 12:08 AMThe difference is that the Reagan movie was protested. It was not threatened with legal action by elected officials and presidents who have claimed to be part of the only party that cares about free speech for the last 40 years.
When you bring up highest-ranking officials that threatened license revocation for CBS, we'll talk. Until then, there's no comparison.
Posted by: David Poe at September 10, 2006 05:14 AM"Oh, wasn't it also that ever-so-ethical conservative lie machine that bellowed long and hard about a movie about Reagan, so hard that they moved the movie to far down the cable line-up?
But your objection here is different somehow."
As a matter of fact, yes.
Quick - show me any conservative senator, congressman, executive branch leader or judge who suggested - even obliquely - that the weight of government should be brought down upon the producers of the "Reagan" biography.
Any answer?
Get back to me on that one.
The answer to speech with which one disagrees is more speech. I have every right to *ask* that something not be shown (although I didn't re the Reagan miniseries); I have no power to enforce that, and (unlike Reid and Turbin) have no desire to use the government to enforce my political will againdst someone else's speech.
Posted by: mitch at September 10, 2006 08:39 AMTed is a perfect example of the disengenousness of the left.
Posted by: MLP at September 10, 2006 10:51 AMWhat's the difference between two Senators threatening a network with the might of the federal government and a lot of citizens protesting a television show?
It's just too nuanced for these simpletons to grasp.
Speaking of "too nuanced for these simpletons to grasp"...
Is it so hard to believe that there some of us on the left who believe it's an overreaction to threaten to pull CBS's license, yet still also believe that airing a movie that claims to be the truth yet uses outright lies and fabrications to attempt to sway political opinion about a horrendous and tragic event is inexcusable, and CBS shouldn't do it?
It's fine to challenge what a couple of elected officials are threatening. Just don't paint all Dems or liberals with the same brush.
Posted by: Beeeej at September 11, 2006 09:12 AM(Obviously, I meant ABC.)
Posted by: Beeeej at September 11, 2006 09:15 AMAn "overreaction"? Really?
Posted by: Troy at September 11, 2006 12:03 PMWhat a unique and interesting way to characterize this action by two leading United States Senate Democrats.
Thank you for making plain the point of Mitch's post.
Troy:
I did not, and do not, dispute most of what Mitch said in his post (other than perhaps referring to outright lying and fabrication of events that never happened as "editorial perspective"). I was addressing the implication that liberals must either support airing the movie in all its offensive entirety or be branded utter hypocrites and fascists who would burn the Bill of Rights, with no options in between.
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