WILL THE TELEVISION AND INTERNET PRESS BE SUBSERVIENT TO THE POLITICAL AGENDAS OF THE GOVERNMENT?
That would be the result of a proposal now pending before the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC revoked a similar Fairness Doctrine in 1987 because despite its benign label, the result in practice was to deter news coverage, suppress news, chill speech, reduce diversity and prevent opposing views.
The government is now considering a “Localism” Doctrine, which would have similar results. Television news would have to be produced and satisfy FCC criteria for what was newsworthy and appropriate in the opinion of a majority of five commissioners appointed by the president, three of whom would be from the president’s own party. Non-compliance would warrant loss of the license to broadcast.
In addition, a local control board would be appointed for each station and its members would monitor and decide if news programming conformed to FCC policy and, if not, would have to recommend that the station’s license to broadcast be terminated. It has not been made public who would appoint members of the control boards.
The Chief of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Prof. Cass R. Sunstein, appointed by the president, has long urged that government regulate news to advance its own social and political agendas. He claims this would help the American “system of free expression.” In 2011, the chairman of the FCC, Julius Genachowski, was urged by FCC staff to end the “Localism” proceeding as violating the public interest, but he has refused.
My book Government Control of News clearly illustrates how government interference can keep vital information from the public. Broadcast history shows political administrations will use the power to censor. The Kennedy administration used the Fairness Doctrine to drive conservative spokesmen off the air. The Nixon administration used it to threaten the television networks for their unfavorable coverage and attack station licenses. The book is a timely reminder of the need for a press free of government interference as print, cable, broadcast and satellite news move onto the information superhighway and as the President, Congress and the FCC and act to transfer the television broadcast spectrum away from its present broadcast use to mobile and other uses on the Internet.
