Democrats Determined to Reimpose Fairness Doctrine

From http://www.infowars.com/?p=6605


Democrats Determined to Reimpose Fairness Doctrine
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars
December 17, 2008

Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.)
It seems the Democrats are determined to reimpose the Fairness Doctrine. Earlier this week, Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said she would work on bringing back the federal regulation. “I’ll work on bringing it back. I still believe in it,” Eshoo told the Daily Post in Palo Alto. Eshoo said she would recommend the doctrine be applied not only to radio and TV broadcasts, but also to cable and satellite services. “It should and will affect everyone,” she promised.

“The so-called ‘Fairness Doctrine’ would restrict free speech on the public airwaves, stifling dissent at a time when an open national dialogue about our country’s future is essential,” House Republican Leader John Boehner (Ohio) said in response. “The American people do not believe the federal government should be in the business of dictating or restricting the content of political speech. I’m troubled by Rep. Eshoo’s comments, and my hope is that President-elect Obama will speak out against efforts by members of his party to use their majority power to limit free speech and dissent.”
During the election campaign, Democrats attempted to stifle free speech when they threatened to go after those who opposed Obama. The Obama campaign encouraged libel prosecutions against Obama’s political opposition in Missouri. In St. Louis, County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch and City Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce, backed up by a local sheriff and encouraged by the Obama campaign, warned members of the public daring to speak out against Obama during the campaign’s crucial final weeks that they would be prosecuted for exercising the First Amendment.
A d v e r t i s e m e n t

And then there was the blacklisting of a reporter in Florida who refused to play softball with Joe Biden and the intimidation campaign against radio and TV stations that interviewed authors critical of Obama. When author Stanley Kurtz, who has documented Obama’s ties with domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, was ready to appear on a Chicago TV program, the Obama campaign had supporters deluge the station with calls and emails demanding it not to give airtime to Kurtz.
Barack Obama transition team chief John Podesta’s Center for American Progress went even further. In a published report entitled The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio, it was argued that the Fairness Doctrine is not an “effective tool to ensure the fair discussion of important issues.” The Center for American Progress suggests new FCC regulations requiring radio broadcasters to operate “on behalf of the public interest,” that is to say in the interest of Democrats irked by talk radio.

Considering these intimidation tactics and attempts to silence critics, it is unlikely Obama will back up the First Amendment and refuse to support Democrats as they march to reimpose the Fairness Doctrine or even more draconian FCC regulations. In fact, it is fair to say he will enthusiastically back any effort to shut down talk radio or hobble it with regulations demanding “fairness.”

“We all have First Amendment rights. And I am a constitutional lawyer and strongly believe in free speech, but as a culture, we really have to do some soul-searching to think about what kind of toxic information are we feeding our kids,” Obama told ABC New in April, 2007, in response to the Don Imus affair.

Is it possible this “soul-searching” will turn into a law regulating or eliminating outright information the Democrats consider “toxic”? No doubt we will find out early next year as the Democrats take control of the executive and Congress.