Talk Radio's Last Stand?
By Rory O'Connor, AlterNet
Posted on June 11, 2008, Printed on June 12, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/87825/
Editor's note: Make sure to check out Rory O'Connor's new book, "Shock
Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio" (AlterNet Books, 2008).
***
The email alert read "Breaking from Newsmax.com," the conservative
online news site that also publishes Newsmax Magazine. One item in
particular caught my attention -- "Special: Will President Obama Ban
O'Reilly, Rush?"
One click, however, reveals this "breaking" news is simply old wine
poured into a "special" new anti-Obama bottle: a ridiculous recycled
re****t titled "Talk Radio's Last Stand," offered with a subscription
to Newsmax magazine and a "Dynamo Emergency World Band Radio" -- all
for just $35!
Leading hard-right conservatives, led by their talk radio "shock jock"
troops, have been worrying aloud about the supposed return of the long-
defunct Fairness Doctrine ever since their stunning success last year
in defeating bipartisan immigration reform. The latest salvo is the
Newsmax re****t, headlined "Battle for Talk Radio: Powerful Foes Want
to End the Gabfest," which cleverly combines the usual talk radio
tropes of pugnacity and victimization. The text of the "special offer"
supplies the details:
"The 2008 election has yet to be decided, but one thing is clear: If
the Democrats win the White House, expect an all-out attack on talk
radio. Political talk, as we know it, could end. If they win, Rush,
Imus, Savage, Beck, and dozens of other major hosts will be muzzled by
using federal regulations to control political talk. So, what's their
plan of attack?"
As Newsmax sees it, "leading liberals in Congress, the Democratic
presidential candidates, and even some Republicans speak openly of
their plans to end conservative talk radio using federal regulations.
Their weapon: a revived Fairness Doctrine, which would once again
require stations to air divergent points of view -- a clever ruse that
makes station owners leery of airing controversial talk-radio hosts,
fearing lawsuits and federal sanctions. With a new Fairness Doctrine,
you could see many top conservative radio hosts canned."
As further evidence, Newsmax offers "an exclusive interview with Fox
News host Bill O'Reilly," assuring us there is "no question" a plan is
being hatched. "The far-left kooks will try, but they will fail,"
O'Reilly says.
Well, the far-right kooks like O'Reilly are certainly succeeding once
again in ginning up outrage and false controversy -- while
simultaneously pu****ng up their ratings. As detailed in my new book,
"Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio," this putative threat to the
First Amendment simply isn't real -- nor is the far-right's
existential fear that conservative talk radio will somehow be wiped
from the media landscape.
What is real is that the Reagan-era demise of the doctrine was in fact
"the decision that launched a thousand lips," as Los Angeles Times
re****ter Jim Puzzanghera once phrased it. "The move is widely credited
with triggering the explosive growth of political talk radio." But
when a handful of politicians mused about its reinstatement "after
conservative talk show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and
Michael Savage helped torpedo a major immigration bill," Puzzanghera
noted, the result was an "armada of opposition on the airwaves,
Internet blogs and in Wa****ngton, where broadcasters have joined with
Republicans to fight what they call an attempt to zip their lips."
Most progressives are of course suspicious of the right's newfound
"issue," and many, like radio talk show host Ed Schultz, rightly
characterize talk of a reinstated Fairness Doctrine as a "straw man"
invented by conservatives. "They have 450 right-wing talkers in
America," Schultz says. "They all read off the same talking points."
As the trade journal Broadcasting and Cable noted, the Fairness
Doctrine had "long been the province of communications-law texts and
history books." The original doctrine required broadcasters -- who
must obtain a license to use the publicly owned airwaves -- to present
issues of public im****tance in a balanced manner. Since the doctrine
was an attempt to ensure that coverage of controversial issues by
broadcasters be balanced and fair, and since it hadn't been enforced
in two decades, the sudden and fervent talk show opposition to it
seemed odd at first blush. After all, don't conservatives regularly
claim an interest in being "fair and balanced"?
Nevertheless, merely the perceived possibility of bringing back the
Fairness Doctrine has led many conservative commentators to paint that
possibility in near-apocalyptic terms. Former House Speaker Newt
Gingrich, for example, called it "an assault on the First Amendment"
and accused Democrats of wanting to wipe out conservative talk radio.
"They want to kill it because every time we have an extended
conversation with the American people, liberalism falls apart and its
ideas collapse," Gingrich explained. Limbaugh, America's No. 1 radio
talker, went so far as to suggest that, instead of imposing a
"Fairness Doctrine," perhaps a "Truth Doctrine" should be imposed to
control all news outlets other than talk radio.
Other conservative voices, such as Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily.com,
followed Limbaugh's lead and began warning explicitly of an impending
"war on talk radio." In an article in the August 2007 issue of WND's
Whistleblower magazine, Farah wrote, "Though most Americans aren't yet
aware of it, talk radio -- from Rush Limbaugh to the local talker in
small-town America -- is under major attack." Farah drew a direct link
between talk radio's success in mobilizing opinion against the
immigration bill and what he and other conservatives saw as a frontal
assault on their main medium of expression. "And no wonder: Last month
radio talkers presided over a minor American revolution when they
urged millions of citizens to successfully oppose the immigration/
amnesty bill that the president and both political parties had been
pu****ng relentlessly," Farah wrote. "It went down in flames -- a
devastating blow to the political establishment."
"Now it's revenge time," Farah concluded, articulating the
conventional conservative wisdom. "If radio talkers, in conjunction
with the Internet, can mobilize Americans to oppose the political
elite with regard to immigration, what kind of effect might they have
on voters during the critically im****tant November 2008 presidential
election just around the corner? The fact is, powerful forces in and
out of politics feel extremely threatened by this one part of the mass
media that overwhelmingly champions traditional American values. They
want talk radio crippled before it does any more 'damage.'"
Now that Barack Obama is set to be the Democratic nominee,
conservatives are trying to pin the allegedly impending "assault" on
talk radio directly on him. But even a cursory look at the elements of
the Newsmax "special re****t" demonstrates that this supposedly current
"controversy" is comprised mostly of leftovers such as "the Don Imus
controversy" and is focused more on Hillary Clinton ("Laura Ingraham's
dire forecast about a Hillary Clinton presidency") than Barack Obama:
Why the Don Imus controversy was the first skirmish in a bigger war
Hillary Clinton's secret role in getting Imus fired
Why Imus calls Hillary "Satan" and vows revenge
Talker Glenn Beck's chilling prediction for freedom of speech
Why liberals can't win ratings in radio -- but conservatives do
Naming names: powerful Democrats who favor the Fairness Doctrine
Media Matters' "blacklist" of conservative talkers
National Public Radio's tilt to the left
Talk radio and the "new McCarthyism"
GOP Rep. Mike Pence's campaign to stop the Fairness Doctrine
Clear Channel's strategic moves to "appease" Democrats
The supposed adversary that saved Air America
The lawsuit that threatens political talk radio
How Democrats can re-impose the Doctrine -- without congressional
action
Not surprisingly, this concerted conservative focus on the possible
return of the Fairness Doctrine seems more devoted to stirring up the
base than combating any real danger. Most informed political observers
believe there is scant possibility that the fusty doctrine will ever
be re-imposed -- and even less chance that if it were, talk radio
would be "eliminated." But to conservatives such as Limbaugh, Farah
and the Newsmax team, the battle for talk radio is actually
existential, about everything, or at least everything that matters:
"America is short on leader****p right now," Farah says. "Radio talk
show hosts, who every day belt out the truth that no one else in the
broadcast world dares to speak, are the closest thing today's
Americans have to real leader****p. Eliminate talk radio, and America
goes down the tubes."
Filmmaker and journalist Rory O'Connor is the author of "Shock Jocks:
Hate Speech and Talk Radio" (AlterNet Books, 2008). O'Connor also
writes the Media Is a Plural blog.
=A9 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
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