This is not a Whitmanesque ode to diversity. But there is also no shortage of debate and no deficit of conflicting opinions in the current media landscape. Cable, satellite, and the Internet have not only spawned it, they guarantee it. And as powerful as talk radio is, radio itself is a much smaller and less significant piece of the media constellation today than it was in 1949.
The fairness doctrine is an old idea for a time now past. And despite the good intentions that prompted it, it was never a very good idea, anyway. It is best left dead and buried.
Congress should more fruitfully spend its time coming to grips with the massive concentration of communication power in an ever-shrinking bucket. Private companies pay a pittance to use public airwaves. What price are they really worth? The president and Congress are unwilling to dissolve or downsize media giants; perhaps they will be willing to require a better price for the airwaves if coupled with creative requirements for community broadcasting.
The public has benefited from communication revolution in a broad way. But monopoly ownership has lead to a one-size-fits-all conception of broadcasting that ill serves the grassroots. It’s time to think about broadcast audiences as communities to be served, not audiences to be exploited. That — not the fairness doctrine — is the real issue.
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Toxic talk: Hating Obama, Star crossed, Dance, monkey!: Bobby Collins, More 
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During and just after the 2008 presidential campaign, the antipathy of right-wing pundits toward Barack Obama reached remarkable, often repugnant depths.
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Rush Limbaugh, pink cheeked and increasingly porcine, has emerged as the de-facto head of the Republican Party.
- Dance, monkey!: Bobby Collins
Every week we put a comic in the hot seat. This week's victim is....
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Would everyone please go running out of your house screaming in utter hysteria right now.
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Imagine what will happen once the relatively sane folks now running the White House and the Republican National Committee pack up and go home?
- Newspapers censor Bono’s ‘fucking’ gaffe
Why does our ostensibly “free” press insist on acting like prudes or cowards when reporting stories for which it’s vital that readers learn someone said “fuck” rather than an undefined “expletive”?
- Ditto drama
It’s so reassuring when a holier-than-thou “family values” judgmental-type turns out to be human. Rush Limbaugh certainly made my weekend.
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These are scary times for far-right conservatives.
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Things do indeed look bad for their Grand Old Party. Actually, it's even worse than they think.
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My Zen moment with Mastodon hit at about the point where the maelstrom of "The Czar, pt. I: Usurper" receded only to be replaced with the falling-down-stairs drum battery and faux Southern-rock riff twang and intentional pick squeals of "The Czar, pt. II: Escape."
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, Politics, Media, Senate, National Public Radio Inc., Domestic Policy, Political Policy, Social Policy, Edward M. Kennedy, Radio, John McCain, Less
