Stamp out free speech: Bring back the Fairness Doctrine

Oh, the gnashing of teeth, the renting of cloth, the pulling of hair, the despair and lamentations.

It seems that inside the Beltway, where Democrats control the presidency, the Senate and the House and outnumber Republicans 10 to one, the liberals (They call themselves progressives.) will not have but a single representative on the radio, according to liberal radio talk show host Bill Press, writing in the Washington Post.

Press says the liberal station OBAMA 1260 is dumping its progressive talk format in favor of pre-recorded financial advice.

He says the only liberal left will be some guy named Ed Schultz (never heard of him) and he “will be outgunned in this market by at least 15 conservative talkers: Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Mark Levin, Chris Plante, Michael Smerconish, Michael Savage, Andy Parks, Fred Grandy, Bill Bennett, Monica Crowley, Bill O'Reilly, Dennis Miller and Lars Larsen.” He must’ve counted Limbaugh twice.

That’s just not fair complains Press, who blames this situation not on the lack of marketability of liberal talk radio but because stations don’t spend enough on promotion and too soon pull the plugs on unprofitable (my words, not his) programs.

Press whines that radio stations operate on publicly owned airwaves and under their FCC licenses “afford reasonable opportunity for the discussion of conflicting views of issues of public importance."

Never mind that there are liberal newspapers, liberal television networks, liberal bloggers, liberal books and liberal colleges and universities. That’s irrelevant. That darned talk radio drives them nuts. They stamp their feet and shout: “It’s just not fair.”

The marketplace of ideas is not working because in one tiny niche one side is winning. I thought that was the whole point of Milton’s “Areopagitica” — in a fair fight, truth wins out over falsehood. In Press’s world the battle never ends. There is no victor. There is not right or wrong, just the back and forth bickering without resolution.

To him I suppose fair programming would be an hour of George Soros, followed by an hour of Ron Paul, or more likely John McCain.

Press claims Ronald Reagan’s “experiment” of dumping the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 — “insisting that in a free market, stations would automatically offer a balance in programming” — has failed (I don’t think Reagan ever said that.)

“That experiment has failed,” Press wails. “There is no free market in talk radio today, only an exclusive, tightly held, conservative media conspiracy. The few holders of broadcast licenses have made it clear they will not, on their own, serve the general public. Maybe it's time to bring back the Fairness Doctrine — and bring competition back to talk radio in Washington and elsewhere.”

Listen to Bill Press and Sen. Debbie Stabenow try to persuade you:

Accountability hearings?

Instead of going to the unnecessary expense of filling half its programming time with unprofitable liberal rantings, radio stations will simply opt for noncontroversial, nonpolitical mush. Offending no one, informing no one, engaging no one.

That’s what happens when you interfere with a free market, whether of goods or ideas.