FCC to "monitor" news stations - wow!

[djAdvocate]

Feb 22, 2014 19:13:23 GMT -5 pappyjohn99 said:

And they should never be. If they are, they should be fearful every single moment of every single day.

"The Tree of Liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants"

Thomas Jefferson

your standard of tyranny is a bit different than mine.  but if you are armed and ready for the rebellion, i would happily place you right out in front. 

edit: love that Jefferson quote, by the way.  but i like this one better:

"...I have sworn upon the altar of god eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

it is the largest and most prominent in the memorial.  and one of the most forgotten, apparently.

[pappyjohn99]

Washington has tapped the phones of the AP. They went after the reporter from Fox. The NSA is collecting e-mails and phone numbers. Where do you think we should draw the line sir?

[pappyjohn99]

Take a look at the news. Ask the people from Kiev, Bangcock, or Carracas if they think  "Political Officers" are a joke.

[kent]

Feb 22, 2014 20:24:30 GMT -5 pappyjohn99 said:

Take a look at the news. Ask the people from Kiev, Bangcock, or Carracas if they think  "Political Officers" are a joke.

Pappy, you have to understand that, unless it's reported by a far left website or "news" station, nothing anyone else brings up can possibly be true.  That's just the way it is.

Likewise, the concept of "Political Officers" and the like only rings a bell with those that have actually read a few history books, observed the world and/or have experienced this type of thing first hand.  In other words, those that don't get all their information from the aforementioned far left sites.

Rest assured, this entire thing will die on the vine.  Information of this nature gets "leaked" so as to create a "trial balloon" and then when the defecation hits the rotary oscillator it gets "reviewed" and subsequently fades into the background.  When that happens, all the naysayers get on their soapboxes and start screaming, "I told you it wasn't true."  I have no idea what they would/will say if something analogous actually comes to pass but I suspect it will be pure silence.

[pappyjohn99]

There is a saying, "The way you eat an Elephant is one bite at a time." Washington just keeps chewing.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 22, 2014 20:10:49 GMT -5 pappyjohn99 said:

Washington has tapped the phones of the AP. They went after the reporter from Fox. The NSA is collecting e-mails and phone numbers. Where do you think we should draw the line sir?

i already made the comparison of the FCC and the NSA earlier in the thread.  you might want to review that before you frame me as a suckup for warrantless spying, bro.

edit: page 1, to save you some trouble.  i made at least 3 posts on the subject.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 22, 2014 20:24:30 GMT -5 pappyjohn99 said:

Take a look at the news. Ask the people from Kiev, Bangcock, or Carracas if they think  "Political Officers" are a joke.

i think Venezuela's press is vastly superior to our own in terms of open-ness.  i know it is fashionable to mock them, but they go after their officials tooth and nail down there in a way that has not been seen in the US since the second golden age of muckraking.

bonus points to anyone who can tell us when that was without Googling it.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 22, 2014 20:58:48 GMT -5 kent said:

Feb 22, 2014 20:24:30 GMT -5 pappyjohn99 said:

Take a look at the news. Ask the people from Kiev, Bangcock, or Carracas if they think  "Political Officers" are a joke.

Pappy, you have to understand that, unless it's reported by a far left website or "news" station, nothing anyone else brings up can possibly be true.  That's just the way it is.

far left news station?  who would that be?

Likewise, the concept of "Political Officers" and the like only rings a bell with those that have actually read a few history books, observed the world and/or have experienced this type of thing first hand.  In other words, those that don't get all their information from the aforementioned far left sites.

oh goodie.  the ignorance card.  it is so fun to get into discussions with know-it-alls.

Rest assured, this entire thing will die on the vine.  Information of this nature gets "leaked" so as to create a "trial balloon" and then when the defecation hits the rotary oscillator it gets "reviewed" and subsequently fades into the background.  When that happens, all the naysayers get on their soapboxes and start screaming, "I told you it wasn't true."  I have no idea what they would/will say if something analogous actually comes to pass but I suspect it will be pure silence.

no, it will not die.  do you know why?

oh, never mind.  you probably are not even interested.  carry on.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 21, 2014 16:18:39 GMT -5 @xmascookie said:

Have not seen much of a defense yet, doubt it.

Thanks for clarifying though.

no, but there is plenty of outrage, that is for sure.  i often worry when an argument is this lopsided, no matter which side i am on.  but i guess that is just me.

[marvholly]

DJ
I am scared of ANY gov agency 'monitoring' w/o legislative/judicial mandate. I am worried that the next step will be 'suggestions' on when/what/how to report news items the congress/white house/any agency has a stake/bias regarding.

[zibazinski]

We already have HUGE bias in the media as it is. The far right tries to combat the far left which totally outnumbers them. Consequently, we get very little totally truthful reporting.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 23, 2014 6:04:53 GMT -5 marvholly said:

DJ
I am scared of ANY gov agency 'monitoring' w/o legislative/judicial mandate. I am worried that the next step will be 'suggestions' on when/what/how to report news items the congress/white house/any agency has a stake/bias regarding.

i gathered that- and you are not alone in that fear.  but here is the thing: if the FCC is not monitoring the media, then who is?  us?

forgive me for saying so, but we are not very diligent.  the runup to the Iraq War is all the proof one would need.

institutions need monitoring, imo.  especially ones as crucial to the republic as the press, and especially as control of that press gets narrower and narrower.  if you think otherwise, i would be interested in hearing why.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 23, 2014 7:28:36 GMT -5 zibazinski said:

We already have HUGE bias in the media as it is.

true.  the commercial bias is a huge bias, and a huge problem. 

The far right tries to combat the far left which totally outnumbers them.

the far right and far left are really only present on blogs.  most reporters are moderate.  when their actual views are surveyed, rather than their voting patters, what we discover is that their views are actually slightly right of the American center.

Consequently, we get very little totally truthful reporting.

we get very little truthful reporting because we don't value it.  when who got splattered all over the freeway, and what movie stars were recently arrested for are leading items, we can't help but be ill informed on matters of substance.  but there are many many many STRUCTURAL defects in commercial media which add to the problem.  the FCC study actually had a shot at throwing some light on those.  but apparently, we are all going to have a hysterical reaction about it, and make a bunch of extraordinarily lurid assumptions rather that calming down and thinking about it.  predictable, yet sad.

[Virgil Showlion]

institutions need monitoring, imo. especially ones as crucial to the republic as the press, and especially as control of that press gets narrower and narrower.

DJ: Perhaps you can give us a top-to-bottom overview, in your own words, of how newsroom monitoring by the FCC (possibly combined with regulatory pressure/action by the FCC) would mean a fairer, less biased newsmedia, including who would define "fair" and "unbiased", and what powers they would have to remedy "unfairness".

I personally can come up with no such overview. I abhor the FCC monitoring newsrooms because I consider it to be a gross violation of press freedoms (and a terrible idea to boot), not because I believe the current MSM is just peachy.

If you want to bring me and like-minded people onside, give us your vision of what a fairer, less biased FCC-monitored newsmedia looks like.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 23, 2014 12:11:26 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

institutions need monitoring, imo. especially ones as crucial to the republic as the press, and especially as control of that press gets narrower and narrower.

DJ: Perhaps you can give us a top-to-bottom overview, in your own words, of how newsroom monitoring by the FCC (possibly combined with regulatory pressure/action by the FCC) would mean a fairer, less biased newsmedia, including who would define "fair" and "unbiased", and what powers they would have to remedy "unfairness".

i am not going to engage in a fairness argument with you or anyone else here. 

regarding the bias question, you could absolutely determine bias by observing how news was vetted.  this would lead to certain conclusions about the media, which might lead to media that is less biased.  however, i don't think the FCC would have any duty to enforce that, only to observe and report it.  i presume you could see the value in that.  personally, i am fascinated by it.

edit: i don't the FCC would need to exert any regulatory pressure.  if they listed recommendations, and reported on whether media responded to them, the public pressure would doubtless drive change.  but without knowing that, say, stories are selected for their lurid detail rather than their importance to the electorate (which is no doubt true, and justifiable for a commercial enterprise), we will just have to guess about story selection.  there are some subtleties in vetting which i think are really interesting that are basically unknown.  i am sure that the media don't want them observed because it is how they differentiate their "product", and because the bias shown would be unflattering.  that is where the real backlash is coming from, not from backwater boards like this one.

I personally can come up with no such overview. I abhor the FCC monitoring newsrooms because I consider it to be a gross violation of press freedoms (and a terrible idea to boot), not because I believe the current MSM is just peachy.

i don't think observing anything is a violation of anything, other than possibly privacy.  science very much depends on observation, so i am generally supportive of observation, particularly of public institutions, which ultimately have to answer to the people.

If you want to bring me and like-minded people onside, give us your vision of what a fairer, less biased FCC-monitored newsmedia looks like.

i am totally uninterested in fairness as a topic, but i have no problem with having diverse monitoring, whatsoever.

[Deleted]

"whose head are you suggesting should be slammed to the floor"

former chairman Julius Genachowski and interim chairwoman Mignon Clyburn

Head bashing might be a little severe but you can start with these two.

"if the FCC is not monitoring the media, then who is? us?"

umm, yes

[djAdvocate]

Virgil: i think that what people worry about with the guv'mint and the media is that they will suppress stories that are unfavorable to the guv'mint.  but what is interesting is that the media already does that, all on it's own, without any "enforcement" whatsoever.  it is a combination of instilled values an access that bring on that corruption, and i would love to see it fixed, but i don't think that is very likely.

what the FCC and the FD actually propose is something quite different.  they propose that a wider diversity of views be expressed by the media, which is more in line with the institutional value of a free press in a democratic republic: to inform voters.  i think you can see how a very narrow set of viewpoints (which i do, indeed, think we have here in the US.  i am shocked when i see how news is done even in Canada compared to the US) would lead to a less informed electorate than a wider perspective would.  i like the idea of competing opinion.  my place in this thread is living commitment to that principle (as far as i know, NOBODY has sided with my centrism, here- rather i have been accused of defending the indefensible).  we, as citizen owners of the airwaves, absolutely have the right to diversity of opinion.  and if it costs a bit more to get it, then commercial media will have to absorb that.  sorry.  the needs of society are more important than the needs of the media.  honestly, it would take SO LITTLE to offer that diversity, that i find i have very little patience for those that claim it would be an excessive burden. 

the US media worries me, actually.  i see opinion getting narrower and narrower along the lines of Mussolini's vision.  i see fewer and fewer media competitors in the MSM.  and i see less and less oversight and action on the part of the people.  so, i think we both share concern about "freedom of the press"- but i am worried about keeping it free from PRIVATE interests, an you are worried about keeping it free from PUBLIC interests.  framing it that way makes it look ridiculous, doesn't it?- but that is how i see this debate.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 23, 2014 12:44:43 GMT -5 @xmascookie said:

"whose head are you suggesting should be slammed to the floor"

former chairman Julius Genachowski and interim chairwoman Mignon Clyburn

Head bashing might be a little severe but you can start with these two.

"if the FCC is not monitoring the media, then who is? us?"

umm, yes

what if the media is not actually supplying news?  what if it is supplying PR flack for corporations?  don't you think that citizens should have the right to know that?  do you think that the media would volunteer that?  and if not, how would you find out?

i think the argument really boils down to this: do you think that the press is just a conveyance medium for goods and services, or does it have a civic obligation to be something more?

[Virgil Showlion]

DJ, in reading your last few replies, I think our differences of opinion would boil down to:

1. You don't consider FCC newsroom monitoring as a step in the wrong direction privacy-wise, and you're not gravely concerned about potential abuse. I do consider the monitoring to be a step in the wrong direction, and I am gravely concerned about potential abuse. In fact, I don't think there would be anything "potential" about it.
   
   
2. You believe (correct me if I'm wrong) that an "observation-only" FCC report on bias in the media could meaningfully impact the way Americans select news sources. I'm extremely skeptical that an FCC report on media bias would even wind up "on the radar" of 99.9% of Americans when all was said and done, and I have no faith whatsoever that the few Americans who did notice it (and care about it) would care enough to amend their viewing habits.
   
   
3. You seem to believe that exposing corporate bias, etc. in the newsmedia is something that should be handed to people. In my view, such an exercise is useless. A government cannot simply cannot "compensate" for a public's unwillingness to corroborate or validate its news. You of all people would have to agree with me that if a man has a genuine interest in determining how biased his news sources are, and if he is willing to accept the conclusion that his favourite station X is biased towards Y on issues P, Q, and R, the information is out there for him to make that determination.
   

There's no denying that the big media are beholden to powerful interests. That said, passive FCC newsroom monitoring is useless (not to mention risky, and a bad precedent), and FCC monitoring with the eventual intent of "fixing" the situation accomplishes nothing more than enthralling the MSM to yet another powerful suppressive interest.

MSM viewership is bleeding away precisely because people are discovering that to get substantive news, they need to turn to foreign media, or the Internet, or independent journalists, or a panorama of news sources. What remains on "the tube" is what a particular demographic wants: infotainment. Clean. Prepackaged. Hand-delivered. Familiar. Entertaining. Factual accuracy optional. This is what those media sources provide them; this is what these consumers want; this is what pays the bills in a capitalist, demand-driven system.

It's not a great system, but it's the best we have for now. Accept that.

[djAdvocate]

Feb 23, 2014 13:59:09 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

DJ, in reading your last few replies, I think our differences of opinion would boil down to:

1. You don't consider FCC newsroom monitoring as a step in the wrong direction privacy-wise, and you're not gravely concerned about potential abuse. I do consider the monitoring to be a step in the wrong direction, and I am gravely concerned about potential abuse. In fact, I don't think there would be anything "potential" about it.
   
   
2. You believe (correct me if I'm wrong) that an "observation-only" FCC report on bias in the media could meaningfully impact the way Americans select news sources. I'm extremely skeptical that an FCC report on media bias would even wind up "on the radar" of 99.9% of Americans when all was said and done, and I have no faith whatsoever that the few Americans who did notice it (and care about it) would care enough to amend their viewing habits.
   
   
3. You seem to believe that exposing corporate bias, etc. in the newsmedia is something that should be handed to people. In my view, such an exercise is useless. A government cannot simply cannot "compensate" for a public's unwillingness to corroborate or validate its news. You of all people would have to agree with me that if a man has a genuine interest in determining how biased his news sources are, and if he is willing to accept the conclusion that his favourite station X is biased towards Y on issues P, Q, and R, the information is out there for him to make that determination.
   

There's no denying that the big media are beholden to powerful interests. That said, passive FCC newsroom monitoring is useless (not to mention risky, and a bad precedent), and FCC monitoring with the eventual intent of "fixing" the situation accomplishes nothing more than enthralling the MSM to yet another powerful suppressive interest.

MSM viewership is bleeding away precisely because people are discovering that to get substantive news, they need to turn to foreign media, or the Internet, or independent journalists, or a panorama of news sources. What remains on "the tube" is what a particular demographic wants: infotainment. Clean. Prepackaged. Hand-delivered. Familiar. Entertaining. Factual accuracy optional. This is what those media sources provide them; this is what these consumers want; this is what pays the bills in a capitalist, demand-driven system.

It's not a great system, but it's the best we have for now. Accept that.

first of all, the image you present of the FCC hanging out like vultures in the news room from now until the end of time is not really how i saw this.  the study would be a one shot thing.  it would do it's thing, then be over.  so any inconvenience it presented would be temporary.

i actually agree with most of the rest of what you said, tho.  i think you have grasped my position fairly well.  it is not quite accurate, but it never will be.  you know how these things go.  i have to hand it to you for at least making the effort.  most wouldn't.  so thanks for trying.

where we disagree is that i think that people would be appalled if they new how the news was made- what the considerations are.  how they would ever come across that information is a matter for discussion.  the FCC doesn't have a good mechanism for promoting it's work, so showing off the dirty laundry would inevitably fall to the same agency that is being monitored.

i don't really hold out a lot of hope for the for-profit news media for that reason.  and i think that weakens our republic considerably.

but fortunately, there are alternatives.  i hope they prevail.

[Spellbound454]

does it have a civic obligation to be something more?

I don't think there is much difference between heavily biased infotainment in the US....and state sponsored media in North Korea telling everyone they are the land of opportunity for the superior race.

Both are bullsh1t.

Intelligent Americans have to shop around for their news sources and good investigative journalism......because they can't believe their news sources are impartial, or they are getting a true picture.
Thank goodness for the internet.

[truthbound]

Feb 23, 2014 12:59:19 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Feb 23, 2014 12:44:43 GMT -5 @xmascookie said:

"whose head are you suggesting should be slammed to the floor"

former chairman Julius Genachowski and interim chairwoman Mignon Clyburn

Head bashing might be a little severe but you can start with these two.

"if the FCC is not monitoring the media, then who is? us?"

umm, yes

what if the media is not actually supplying news?  what if it is supplying PR flack for corporations?  don't you think that citizens should have the right to know that?  do you think that the media would volunteer that?  and if not, how would you find out?

i think the argument really boils down to this: do you think that the press is just a conveyance medium for goods and services, or does it have a civic obligation to be something more?

The media has not been supplying news for years. But that is beside the point. No one is going to be monitoring anything.

[djAdvocate]

Mar 2, 2014 5:34:17 GMT -5 truthbound said:

Feb 23, 2014 12:59:19 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

what if the media is not actually supplying news?  what if it is supplying PR flack for corporations?  don't you think that citizens should have the right to know that?  do you think that the media would volunteer that?  and if not, how would you find out?

i think the argument really boils down to this: do you think that the press is just a conveyance medium for goods and services, or does it have a civic obligation to be something more?

The media has not been supplying news for years. But that is beside the point. No one is going to be monitoring anything.

i disagree.  they are being monitored constantly.  but they won't be doing it in the newsroom any time soon.