RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (Full Version)

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luckydog1 -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/4/2007 10:40:59 AM)

Orion, you got the concept exactly, it means what ever the poster wants it too.  Which of course ultimatley leads to a system of whims (instead of clearly defined laws).  But thier goals are good hence thier whims are also.  And if you don't agree you are obviously bad thinking and should be silenced.



farglebargle -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/4/2007 10:44:13 AM)

One one end of the spectrum of Government Control is Anarchy.

On the other end is Communism ( Maximization of Gov't Control )

It'll take LESS, thanks.




Sinergy -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/4/2007 12:15:50 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

On the other end is Communism ( Maximization of Gov't Control )



Uh, not really.

The Theory of Communism involves the dissolution of governmental control (and need for such) when the means and control of production was passed back to the body politic and capital was no longer consolidated with a few people.

It is an economic system, not a form of government.

I believe the system of government that maximizes government control is Fascism.

Sinergy



dragone -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/4/2007 5:52:14 PM)

BRAVO, meatcleaver; critics argue media conglomerates within the US are responsible for the limited view broadcast and cause uniformed political support by US citizens. Rupert Murdoc admits openly, he twekes or tilts the news. Money rules, there never has been any 'free market'. No one can just go to radio shack buy and a transmitter and set up broadcast shop. If you do, you are a pirate, tracked, stopped arrested and fined or imprisioned or both.

While the belief regins supreme, the air waves are free, owned by the people, it is a lie, when the FCC regulates all interstate and international communications, radio, TV, wire, satellite,. cable' licenses radio & TV stations, assigns radio & TV frequencies, regulates cable rates, and common carriers, telephone & telegraph as well as wireless telecommunications service providers; how can anyone say the air waves are free. The FCC can revoke station license, impose monratary forfeiture and issue warnings of violations to law.  But, the air-waves are free, owned by the people.

Film is also under scrunity; The Federal Advisory Commission Act, established a system  where virually everything; film included; is investigated, and recomendations to government is channeled; every state has their film boards, as does every country, to review content, make suggestions, fund, and whatever, being sure law requirements are met. Matters of nationarl security, government critiques are scrunitized, obscene material, a host of content....So where is free market then?

I've said it in other posts; while 'Free market' is nice to believe, idealistic, it is not the reality. The Golden Rule applies...he who has the gold, makes the rules.
Noame Chomsky...my hero.



Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 12:13:29 PM)

quote:

I hope you do see my view, and interpetation. Yes, the theory of Free Market should be competition, offer a quality product, and one should be successful...well, not entirely so.

True. There are no guarantees. The competition’s product may be of lesser quality but if the consumer is willing to settle in exchange for a lower price. Weather may adversely affect production. There a hundred, if not a thousand reasons why a company may fail. The free market is not about everybody succeeding, it is about everyone having the opportunity to try. It is about people being free to buy or not buy what they want. To work or not work for who they want. In short, it is about people, and not the government, making their own economic decisions. Those who decide wisely will usually (usually!) see success. Those who don’t won’t. Hopefully, those who don’t will learn from their mistakes and do better next time. Some do and become successful, others don’t and become democrats.

quote:

While you can have a better product, that does not mean 'success'; From that product, you must be able to have the funds to promote, advertise; and this is where the rub comes in. You are limited to the money you have to invest in advertisement of your product or service. That alone, will stop you dead in your tracks, I know. Then...it's the crowd you run with, are aligned with; all want a piece of the action; those in the power circles grant their favor, but they extract a price.

Limited advertising funds (something I am quite familiar with) simply means looking for alternatives. I work for and am part owner of a family business. When we started the only advertising we could afford was classified ads and leaflets. As profits increased we we’re able to take out real ads in the papers and later magazines. We’ve now reached a point where we can afford radio. Our story, our course, will not be the same as everybody else’s story. That’s is the underlying fact of economics that most people fail to grasp. One size does not fit all.


quote:

I've done a lot of promotions, and when I meet a novice advertiser, I always ask how they intend to promote their product. You would be amazed at the people who want a direct mail campaign, and never give a thought as to postage. Simple as that, they spend money on brochures, printing, and have nothing left for postage. So they mail out 50 to 100 pieces at a time, with no follow up; no media adverts, no trade show events; and blame me for the failure of their effort.

So they didn’t know what they were doing and they blamed you. That doesn’t surprise me. The first rule for anyone going into business for themselves should be "the buck stops here."

quote:

It's all about money, the bigger you are,... like Disney, you can sell a bunch of Mickeys, worldwide. You have the money to create any media vehicle you wish, even to purchasing a news outlet; then you can decide what you want to send out on the airwaves; the news, as you see fit; slant it any way you desire, use it to create more of a market for your product, a Rubert Murdoc syndrome; and if any other enity wishes to advertise on your network, you can charge through the nose, thus prohibiting any competition; because you own the network and the license. However, if the competition is willing to pay, and do so, then I would say your definition is correct, the free market exists.

But if they charge to much, no one will buy (and others will seek to move into the market with cheaper rates) – so there are still limits. Also, don’t fall into the false belief that corporations are so all powerful that they are here to stay forever. Contrary to popular belief, corporations are not a united, monolithic power block. They compete with each other and are subject to the same market forces and social changes everyone else is. Look at a list of the richest corporations twenty years ago, then look at a list of the richest ones today. Sure, some are still around but many have fallen by the wayside while new ones have emerged. In the 1930's, the largest grocery chain in America was Safeway. Today they are nowhere near the top.

quote:

The more viewers your news outlet gets, the more other advertisers want in, and the government wants it share of 'propaganda' value; so you have a venue that is created to sell products, even the government has a product to sell...that being their agendas. This Iraq war, was a product, which was sold through every media vehicle available. Money was involved, No, you say...in a word; Haliburton.

Of course the government has a product to sell. It is our responsibility as citizens to be skeptical hold the government accountable. If we fail to do that, we have only ourselves to blame. I forgot who said it (so all do credit to whoever credit is due), but they hit the nail on the head when they said "in a democracy the people can have what they want and will get what they deserve).

quote:

The rights to Mickey Mouse and a host of other Disney properties were due to expire, I forget just when, about 15 or so years ago. Disney properties bring in millions if not billions; and the copyrights were due to run out. Thousands of firms were poised to flood the market with Disney products, as it was to become public domain. Disney, petitioned the government to extend the copyright law, granting another 25 years, or, I think, it's 100 years now, but has been amended to be forever, I'm not sure.

Of course Disney would seek to do this. It was in their self interest. Self interest (which should not be confused with greed) is the driving force of economics.

quote:

So, by virtue of their extrodinary position in the world ecomomy, they got done, what you, or I could never have gotten done. They had the government ammend a law, so their property would be protected; and in doing so, everyone else just recieved the benifit thereof. But, if I petitioned the gov. for additional protection, I'd be more of a laughing stock than I am here on CM.


Now, I say what I say from a perspective of the common guy; not from an intellectual's classroom theory position, nor from the corporate elite. It has always been a 'mouse that roared' situation.

I think what this boils down to is that you (along with many, many others) consider it unfair that the big guys get to do things the little guys can’t. Well, life is not fair. And we should be careful in our "remedies" to make it fair. Intentions and consequences are seldom the same. In our efforts to make life fair we often trample over others. I’ve said before that we need a body of laws neutrally applied. Obviously we don’t have that, but it is our own fault for electing the same assholes over and over again. If more people became informed and participated in government (that is, vote) and expressed a greater concern over the character of those they elect, then perhaps Disney would have been told to take their proposed amendment and cram it up Mickey’s soon to be public domain ass. But alas.

quote:

I'm going to get that book, count on it.

Good. It was an eye opener for me. Especially in realizing that centrally planned economies (i.e. socialism) are doomed to failure right from the start.
I think for me the bottom line is this: Winston Churchill once said that democracy was the worst form of government, except for all the others. In a like vein, I believe that the free market is the worst economic system – except for all the others.

Edited to add: the heart of the problem isn’t so much our economic system but our education system. We are not teaching people how to be economically self sufficient.



Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 12:57:11 PM)

quote:

You have to look at who is making the laws, rules and regulations! Originally in this thread it was proponents of the 'free' market that were complaining about regulations such as making talk radio broadcasts balanced.

But who decides what is "balanced?" The people making the laws, rules, and regulations! I prefer to let the chips fall where they will. And there already is a wide range of views in the communications industries. You can easily find liberal and conservative viewpoints. But because conservative thought dominates talk radio, some have decided that it’s not "fair" (do the same people think it’s not fair that liberals dominate the newspaper industry?) and so they have to rig the outcome. Liberal viewpoints aren’t selling on talk radio because the majority of talk radio listeners don’t want to hear it.

quote:

To say the free market doesn't have interests is a nonsense when a prerequiste of operating in the free market (broadcast and press) is to have money enough to operate, which leaves out the majority view of people.

No it does not because the consumer is the ultimate arbitrator. They won’t listen to what doesn’t interest them. The broadcasters then have a simple choice – adapt to the consumers desires, or go out of business.

quote:

The west relies on free speech as a safety valve but when desenting voices have no outlet...

But dissenting voices do have outlets. I hear dissenting voices all the time. Not all talk radio is conservative. Not all print media is liberal. This notion that "we can’t be heard" is complete and other nonsense. I laugh whenever I hear someone say that on a news program (being watched by millions of people).

quote:

As Chomsky put it "The United States is unusual among the industrial democracies in the rigidity of the system of ideological control / ''indoctrination',' we might say / exercised through the mass media."

Well, here’s a major part of your problem. Take all of your copies of Chomsky and put them in the trash where they belong – right next to Howard Zimm.

quote:

Without intervention to broaden alternative views getting to the majority of people, all that there is is the propaganda of the corporations, the establishments and their political puppets. This is why idiotic and useless wars like Vietnam and Iraq have been fought because 'free speech' in the 'free market' is skewed towards the establishment view.

And who intervenes? What is their agenda? Why should I believe them any more that I believe the corporations? I am not disagreeing with you that those who have more money have an easier time getting their message out than those who don’t. I do disagree that there are no alternatives for those with less money. My major disagreement is with the proposed "solution."
If a small group of people have too much power, the solution is NOT handing that power to another small group of people. We need to defuse power, not concentrate it.



dragone -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 1:26:44 PM)

Hello marc; Thanks for the response; and I agree, only you said it much better than I could have; except for the Democrate barb. I'm not a Dem, BTW.  I agree with you, no arguement here.

Disney is due for a rude awakening when Mickey et al come into public domain; but, I think the copyright laws, trademarks, patents will all be ammended. Disney is one of the 5 major corporations in the world; and they are not about to let the sun go down on their golden era.

I used to work for Safeway, years ago; and yes, they were once, a force to be reckoned with...now....'what the bloody el was a safeway.'

Thanks again mark.

Those who can...do
Those who can't do...become teachers
Those who can do neither...become policemen, or politicians



Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 8:04:57 PM)

Thanks.  As for the thing about democrats, that wasn't a barb directed at you, just a little political joke to tweak a few noses around here.



NorthernGent -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 10:03:57 PM)

Fast reply:

The free market is certainly not a measure of freedom in the classical liberal sense. Correct me if i'm wrong, but weren't the founding fathers liberals? If those people had been around today, they would not have agreed with the current state of affairs. Freedom and democracy involve (among others):

1) Mass participation.
2) An active civil society.
3) An open economic system.

In today's society, 1 and 2 do not exist. Roughly 50% of people in the US are active in the democratic process. There is, consequently, no mass participation or active civil society.

Without these 2 key pillars, then the people are simply slaves to the prevailing culture. Ok, the prevailing culture is not dictated by kings and queens, but it may as well be. In modern society, the corporation is king, and the people are their subjects.

Ultimately, market democracy is not freedom or democracy. It is simply conditioning people to be consumers/robots. Every time you switch on your television, you will see the prevailing culture beamed into your home - whether it be through advertisements or sitcoms full of people whose dreams and aspirations are limited to a huge house, a ferrari and spending an inordinate amount of time in a coffee shop. You will never see an alternative view that aims to inform people about the consequences of rampant consumerism. Consequently, most people do not have the information to make an informed choice, and, thus, their choices are dictated by the prevailing culture/kings/corporate masters.



OrionTheWolf -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/5/2007 11:37:04 PM)

I don't think you could label the founding fathers as liberal. As far as a democracy goes, Ben Franklin said they had given us a republic, if we could keep it. Jefferson felt that government should be severely limited and the ultimate check was an armed populace willing to die for their freedom. Personal liberties of life and property were the cornerstones, but somewhere along the way the federal government became the center piece and things have been going to hell since. Free Market is not free as has been pointed out, Free Speech does not really exist, and the politicians love it that we give up our freedoms for a false sense of security and to be taken care of by them.

Republicans and Democrats are just different heads on the same hydra, and profit is not well balanced with the welfare of the community. I lean towards more conservative views, but I would not say I am a republican, especially if the Neo-cons represent the republican party. I am willing to vote for a politician that will be honest and stick to his principles, and at this point, even if those principles are not exactly aligned with my own. Support those that will be honest and accountable now, and worry about the particulars of issues later. Issues are just those things politicians can make catch phrases out of anyway.

Orion



meatcleaver -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 5:10:11 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b


But who decides what is "balanced?" The people making the laws, rules, and regulations! I prefer to let the chips fall where they will. And there already is a wide range of views in the communications industries. You can easily find liberal and conservative viewpoints. But because conservative thought dominates talk radio, some have decided that it’s not "fair" (do the same people think it’s not fair that liberals dominate the newspaper industry?) and so they have to rig the outcome. Liberal viewpoints aren’t selling on talk radio because the majority of talk radio listeners don’t want to hear it.



Balanced in the sense you mean is subjective but if acess to the media is given to  to a wide a range of people as possible then there will be a broader range of opinion or broader than now where access depends on money and political friends. In a democratic society worthy of the name, the aim should be to give as many voices as possible an airing, not close them down through licences and financial hurdles.

quote:

To say the free market doesn't have interests is a nonsense when a prerequiste of operating in the free market (broadcast and press) is to have money enough to operate, which leaves out the majority view of people.


quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b

No it does not because the consumer is the ultimate arbitrator. They won’t listen to what doesn’t interest them. The broadcasters then have a simple choice – adapt to the consumers desires, or go out of business.


If the market only provides a Trabant to drive, you drive a Trabant or you don't drive. The US has very little choice for the consumer to choose from when it comes to broadcast media. A lkot of dnfferent coloured candy floss but all the same taste.


quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b
But dissenting voices do have outlets. I hear dissenting voices all the time. Not all talk radio is conservative. Not all print media is liberal. This notion that "we can’t be heard" is complete and other nonsense. I laugh whenever I hear someone say that on a news program (being watched by millions of people).



Access to the main broadcast outlets are limited to financial and political friends of the establishment. They keep it that way because they recognize that TV and to a lesser extent radio, are the most potent medias.


quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b

Well, here’s a major part of your problem. Take all of your copies of Chomsky and put them in the trash where they belong – right next to Howard Zimm.


It's quite obvious you would think that. He is obviously a political adversary of yours.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b
And who intervenes? What is their agenda? Why should I believe them any more that I believe the corporations? I am not disagreeing with you that those who have more money have an easier time getting their message out than those who don’t. I do disagree that there are no alternatives for those with less money. My major disagreement is with the proposed "solution."
If a small group of people have too much power, the solution is NOT handing that power to another small group of people. We need to defuse power, not concentrate it.


At the moment it is the corporations, the establishment and their political puppets that intervene so intevention is not a philosophical hurdle but to answer your question, the democratisation of the media is not beyond countries that prtofess to be democracies. Media trusts can be voted in on regional and local levels that are free from direct political control of the political establishments. This happens in several European countries (sadly not Britain) allowing ordinary people to make programmes and advocate through the broadcast media and it has in seversal instances proved politically very effective.



farglebargle -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 5:57:50 AM)

That's pretty much my point. The Status Quo sucks, and the solution is to remove the artificial barriers preventing the development of a Free Market.




Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 7:45:40 AM)

It is so easy to get mixed up in definitions and I believe that it is a major cause of misunderstandings amongst posters. The Founding Fathers were indeed considered liberal for their time, even radical (a country without a king? Absurd!). By today’s standards they would almost certainly be considered conservative. Where do you think they would come down on such issues as abortion or prayer in the schools?

It should not surprise us that in today’s society we have found substitutes for kings and queens – we are a hierarchal species and follow the same patterns over and over, even if the surface details are different.

It is easy to dismiss those who participate in mass media culture as corporate slaves but there is a condescending attitude in it that I find distasteful (not that I haven’t done it myself). It is dismissing other people’s choices as uniformed or unenlightened merely because their choices are not the choices we would make. It is, in essence, denying that they have free will. We can scoff at the people who lined up to buy iphones as conditioned to do so but then again, maybe they just wanted an iphone. Maybe they thought it would be useful in their business or personal life.

Beware of what I like to call the ideological filter – the tendency to block out information that doesn’t support one’s world view. I see alternative voices warning of the dangers of over consumption all over the place – on news programs, on cable programs (A&E, etc.), in newspapers and magazines, an right here on the internet.

I’ll say it again, the power of the corporations is not monolithic. They are subject to the same market forces, the same reality, we all are. Macintosh can advertise to they’re blue in the face, if the iphone turns out to be a piece of crap that nobody wants – it won’t sell.



farglebargle -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 7:53:20 AM)

But comparing a Product in Commerce to the limited broadcast medium OWNED BY The People and LICENSED out to Franchisees isn't apples to apples.




Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 8:30:26 AM)

quote:

Balanced in the sense you mean is subjective but if acess to the media is given to to a wide a range of people as possible then there will be a broader range of opinion or broader than now where access depends on money and political friends. In a democratic society worthy of the name, the aim should be to give as many voices as possible an airing, not close them down through licences and financial hurdles.

The problem here is (once again) is the assumption that there is no access for a wide range of opinion. Once again, I see hundreds of tv stations, thousands of radio stations, newspapers and magazines beyond count, books about anything and everything, the internet... just because one medium or another is tilted this way or that way (temporarily, since change is inevitable) is no reason to deny some people their choices – which is exactly what the "Fairness Doctrine," aims to do.

quote:

If the market only provides a Trabant to drive, you drive a Trabant or you don't drive.

Interesting that you would use a typically communist (centrally planned economy) piece of shit to illustrate a point about lack of choice. In a free market, on the other hand, we do have more choices – Chrysler, Ford, Toyota, etc... Likewise in media choices.

quote:

The US has very little choice for the consumer to choose from when it comes to broadcast media. A lkot of dnfferent coloured candy floss but all the same taste.

Again, how many stations are there?

quote:

Access to the main broadcast outlets are limited to financial and political friends of the establishment. They keep it that way because they recognize that TV and to a lesser extent radio, are the most potent medias

These financial and political friends of the establishment, would they be conservative (Rush Limbaugh, Robert Murdoch...) or liberal (George Sornos, Ted Turner...)?

quote:

It's quite obvious you would think that. He is obviously a political adversary of yours.

Not an adversary (I’ve never met the guy), I just recognize paranoid delusional nonsensical ideological bullshit when I see it.

quote:

At the moment it is the corporations, the establishment and their political puppets that intervene so intevention is not a philosophical hurdle but to answer your question, the democratisation of the media is not beyond countries that prtofess to be democracies. Media trusts can be voted in on regional and local levels that are free from direct political control of the political establishments. This happens in several European countries (sadly not Britain) allowing ordinary people to make programmes and advocate through the broadcast media and it has in seversal instances proved politically very effective.


What is a trust but a small group of people who wield power? That aside, consider this. You keep saying that the choices are limited and that there are no alternatives. Yet we a witnessing a gradual merging of television and the internet. People are already making their own programs. Right now it is in it’s infancy (we call it YouTube) but it is growing. Record companies my soon be a thing of the past as bands can now sell their music directly to the public. Now any garage band can hit it big without having to be discovered by the record companies. The same goes for would be authors. The same goes for political speech. There are always alternatives.



Marc2b -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 8:36:59 AM)

quote:

But comparing a Product in Commerce to the limited broadcast medium OWNED BY The People and LICENSED out to Franchisees isn't apples to apples


Once again, you are limiting yourself.  There are alternatives to the broadcast medium.  And (once again!) the broadcast medium is still subject to market forces.  They're not going to sell what the publics' not buying.



mnottertail -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 8:39:39 AM)

Again, how many stations are there?

Very few actually, they are not mom and pops but owned by or minions of, clear channel  and a few others.  The 'fairness doctrine' denys no one their choices, you have the choice to turn the blather on and the choice to turn the blather off.  If this fatuous argument is forwarded, then the fact that 'radical right asswipe radio' pervades the air denies me of choice.  The cake gets cut both ways, you see.

Now, how about the Gitmo and AbuGrahib speech impediment, I think that should be cleared up before we worry about such 'trivial freedom of speech' issues as someone running their yap and sending the radical right to ground....no such legislation is pending here.  

Again, this has not one iota to do with anything.   



dragone -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 9:13:55 AM)

Well there you go again...being brilliant...I couldn't agree with you more, except that paticipation by the people is more like 38 % or less.

I worked in advertising, and what you say is absolute. Clients conduct scientific studies, to test and see where the human eye moves, to test the colors, factors of the eye's directional stimulus. What causes the eye to look in a certain direction as opposed to another direction.  It is an old artist gimmick, of directing the viewer's eyes to the points of interest you want, and redirecting it again. The artist, of old, attempted to control the eye, direct it to, and through a certain path, and back through. It's "the eye of the beholder' concept.

The client, with the financial resourses eliminates every possibility of chance, considering they will be spending hundreds of millions of dollars to sell their product. The media will be controlled by virtue of the dollar spent, best positioning, best time slot, even the decimal sound factors are considered. At 6:00 in the dinner hour, when people are at table, the sound is higher, without adjustment. Game shows on TV are nothing more than 'visual radio', since people at home are about their daily tasks, not sitting and watching, but everything transmitted, need not be watched.

The media is a controlled consumer machine designed to sell, Sell, SELL. Every sitcom sells the sponsors product; every movie has product tie-ins. In the past, cirgaretts were sold through film, every hero, smoked, every romantic lead, lite up two cirgaretts and gave one to the bimbo. Clark Cable, in a movie, was in an intimate scene with the lady, worn no shirt or undershirt, Hanes sales hit the deck, another movie had to be made, where Cable wore an undershirt, and an industry was saved. Computers were introduced to the public, via TV, and movies, every modern movie had a computer in the scene, on or not; In Jurassaic park, they couldn't open the doors without running the computer program, to turn the handle. In the Steinfeld show, the lead character had on his desk, a statue of Superman, by Bowen, the mere presense of the statue pushed like statues to record prices.

Every thing in the US is directed to ultra comsumption, cosummerism, to condition the populace to buy, anything and everything.

HumVee to introduce their vehicle for civilian consumption, gave a military HumVee to Arnold, GAVE;..... no cilivan could buy one, but Arnold was the first to own one. This, to introduce the Hummer to the public, every Jock had to have one like Arnold, and thus the Hummer market opened. Not withstanding at the time, they cost around 84g's; Arnold's fame, introduced the Hummer to the public, not withstanding they are the least efficient vehicle manufactured, and the one that is in Class 1 for repairs. People buy them, because of the Arnold, hero, fantasy, of being like Arnold.

Money is the free market, the more you have, are willing to spend, the more free market there is, ...for you.

As news is concerned; "you supply the war, I'll supply the news" controlled news reporting.



cyberdude611 -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 11:20:56 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: mnottertail

Again, how many stations are there?

Very few actually, they are not mom and pops but owned by or minions of, clear channel  and a few others.  The 'fairness doctrine' denys no one their choices, you have the choice to turn the blather on and the choice to turn the blather off.  If this fatuous argument is forwarded, then the fact that 'radical right asswipe radio' pervades the air denies me of choice.  The cake gets cut both ways, you see.

Now, how about the Gitmo and AbuGrahib speech impediment, I think that should be cleared up before we worry about such 'trivial freedom of speech' issues as someone running their yap and sending the radical right to ground....no such legislation is pending here.  



What about the fact that 85% of college professors voted for John Kerry in the last election? What about the fact that 90% of the newspapers in this country are liberal? What about the fact that 90% of television news is liberal? I don't see the left bitching about fairness there.

Conservative talk radio fills a vacuum that liberals themselves created by pushing conservatism out of everything else. If you go to college and write a conservative paper, you will get a lower grade than someone who writes a progressive paper. There is a war of idea going on here. And the progressives have the advantage in every medium except talk radio.

quote:


Again, this has not one iota to do with anything.   


Neither does the Scooter Libby pardon but that seems to be the only thing people want to talk about.

And Abu-Ghraib? Last I heard the people involved with that are in prison. And I don't mind Gitmo being open. Those terrorists down there at Gitmo are being treated better than Paris Hilton was.....



mnottertail -> RE: Freedom of the Press in danger? (7/6/2007 11:24:48 AM)

Taking the mantle of the pusillanimous myrmidon does not make anything that was said in any way factual.

 



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