Mommy, Make the Bad Men Stop Saying All That Mean STUFF . . .

(via Drudge)

[The embedded version that was above has been taken down, but the content seems to still be available at the "video presentation" link I've added below]


Take with a grain of salt. At Breitbart.tv they've got a video presentation of a John and Ken (libertarian leaning (and not social conservative) right wing talk show hosts who have the primo drive time slot at KFI 640am in Los Angeles) segment with Sen. James Inhofe where he claims to have overheard Sen. Clinton and Sen. Boxer agreeing to try and administer a 'legislative fix' for the scourge of the vast conspiratorial right wing talk radio.

Think Progress is pushing this idea after a report (pdf at link) from the pretentiously titled THE CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS AND FREE PRESS.

Think Progress is a rather ironic name for that website as the ideas put forth require little thought and the 'progressive' ideology they advocate is remarkably primitive and collective.

Another front in the battle between individualist versus collectivist.

I'm no fan of the stuff, though I do like some of the voices on the radio, Tammy Bruce, Larry Elder, Dennis Miller, and Al Rantel come to mind as 'right wingers' who are good at what they do. Any legislative fix would chill not just the Rushs and Hannitys and Michael Savages of the world, but would attack the smaller fish who offer up a non-sanitized NPR approved 'voice of reason'.

One of the complaints in the report is that talk radio ownership is too white, too conservative, and too male. Let's look at the authors of this piece, there's John Halpin, James Heidbreder (probably the same guy as the fella with the bad hair cut in these pictures), Mark Lloyd, and Paul Woodhull.

After an unprecedented survey of all the people with authorship credit for this report, I've come to determine that nearly 100% of the authors are male, and at least 75% of them are white. Though it couldn't be confirmed from the initial survey, I suspect that 100% of those involved in this study would be best described as politically 'progressive'. Shocking results, I know.

One of my favorite suggestions from this bulky 40 page document is that stations that don't meet enforceable goals on viewpoint diversity must be required to pay a penalty to local public radio stations, since everybody knows public radio is a bastion of fair minded, unbiased and completely viewpoint neutral reportage.

But why stop with radio, I say all future surveys that involve political and sociological issues must be required to balance the make up of the authorship of the studies. The truth is viewpoint neutral, afterall, so if the truth is what they're after, then the good folks at THE CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS AND FREE PRESS wouldn't mind the folks at the Manhattan Institute sending some folks with like areas of expertise over and help co-author any future reports. It's the only fair thing to do. That's there only goal afterall, they say so over and over again. They're not interested in stiffling conservative voices, they just want to bring balance back to the airwaves. I'm all for balance, but let's start small with the think tanks, then we'll worry about radio and TV.

UPDATE: Flacks for both Senator Clinton and Senator Boxer deny the conversation having taken place. But, a statement issued through a flack isn't a direct denial, and Sen. Inhofe stands by his claim. The denial isn't a complete denial anyway. They don't say a new 'fairness doctrine' is a bad idea that they'd never support. They only say the conversation, as outlined by Sen. Inhofe didn't take place. I was already skeptical of the initial report in the first place, so I don't want to engage in 'fake but accurate' thinking. But, I think it's telling that in their denial they don't mention anything regarding the merits of a new 'fairness doctrine'. They may be testing the wind to see how adamant 'progressives' are about killing right wing talk radio, they may also put feelers out to Republicans like Trent Lott who have no love for a medium he views as out of control. One thing Congress seems capable of finding bi-partisan agreement on is limiting people's access to their decisionmaking and limiting the venues where criticism can be voiced. I wouldn't be surprised to see a bill that attacks radio and blogs in the works. The congressional Goliath hates all these Davids running around, and they may work across party lines to do something about it.