To help in his quest to move America and the world backwards, in 1987 Reagan finally pushed through the end of the Fairness Doctrine in media publishing and broadcasting, doing so by Executive Order! It was the repeal of this policy that removed any sort of balance to the way news—and especially opinion—were offered to the public by the corporate owners of the mass media.
One Congressman warned that with the end of the Fairness Doctrine:
“Candidates would lose the right to reply, parties out of power would not be able to respond, radio stations could allow supporters of one candidate to dominate the news, and local and state ballot issues could no longer be covered.”
Another Congressman said:
“I am concerned that . . . broadcasters could use the public airwaves as their bully pulpit. They could every day pound away at their point of view, with absolute, total disregard to the other point of view.”
Twice the Congress passed the Fairness Doctrine into law and twice Reagan vetoed it.
The predictions about the demise of the Fairness Doctrine have unfortunately come to pass. Abandoning its responsibility to investigate stories that might harm the regressive Republican/Corporatist cause, the country has never been the same as the mass media, now regularly holds back newsworthy items and has been taken over by the conservatives. Even the New York Times and the Washington Post have succumbed, while Fox News and the Washington Times regularly omit key news and put outrageous slants on nearly all stories with gross impunity. It can all be traced back to the Reagan era.
So what do we do now? Obviously, having the Fairness Doctrine back would be nice, but that ain't gonna happen before '08.
We are not going to save this planet with Internet News and Blogs. We are not going to take this country back with protests. We are not going to be able to kick the Republicans out of the White House with the situation we have now, with a Wimpocratic Party vs. the bare knuckles GOP. We progressives and the Democratic Party in general are not going to be supported by the corporate media who will "Gore" and Swift Boat ANY candidate the Democrats put up in '08.
THe solution is not being stronger or more articulate in arguing with neo-con pundits on Media Whore TV, or even finding the "Most Electable" candidate. The solution is not more blogs or Internet sites. In an election, a very small percentage make up their mind based on what they saw on the Internet.
No, it is TV, it is radio, and most of all it is the newspapers--for they drive the news cycle.
So what can we do? Well, besides building a continuous campaign machine as the Republicans have,
we need our own media. We have radio already in Air America, which has been such a resounding success. Now we need to do the following:
1. Start out own Progressive USA Today-type newspaper and bring back real investigative journalism. Use satellite to download and locally print the papers each morning, as USA Today does. Shame the rest of the media into reporting the truth big-time. Hurt them through circulation!
2.Start our own Progressive Cable TV News channel, which would be able to repeat investigations made by the Progressive Today paper.
Let's get together, raise the funding, and do it! This is the only real solution in the final analysis.
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