Anybody who is listening or reading knows that a President Barack Obama would yank America toward socialism by the largest margin since FDR’s New Deal. Thanks to Joe the plumber, we know Obama wants to redistribute wealth, spread it around like it belongs to the government instead of the people who earned it.
Draconian tax increases are just the tip of the socialistic agenda Obama has waiting for us. Obama’s cheerleaders, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and other leftists, plan an all-out assault on the First Amendment. Sadly, that doesn’t mean that they’re going to cease the unending gaseous gaffes. Instead, it means they want to go back to pre-Ronald Reagan days when the government controlled what was said on radio and TV.
The Democrats, as they did in 1934 prompted by FDR, want to re-enact the Fairness Doctrine, which has nothing to do with fairness in communication. This doctrine simply allows the government to decide whose speech is free and whose isn’t. It forced broadcasters to give equal time to what the government deemed were opposing views.
President Ronald Reagan saw the evil behind the Fairness Doctrine and vetoed a bill in 1987 that would have made it law. The bellyaching from the far left has persisted since then, especially since my friend Rush Limbaugh saved AM radio with his style of talk radio. Thin-skinned liberals can’t take Rush’s straight talk, so they want to shut him down. That’s why some call the latest push for the doctrine the Hush Rush law.
I know this sounds like something from Nazi Germany or Castro’s Cuba, but it’s already in the hopper. New Mexico Sen. Jeff Bingaman let the cat out of the bag about the left’s plans to silence its dissenters, according to Brian Maloney of Radio Equalizer.
“With the possibility of a Democratic Party supermajority after the upcoming elections, Jeff Bingaman may soon get his wish to quash dissenting viewpoints,” Maloney reports. ”During an interview with KKOB Albuquerque host Jim Villanucci, Bingaman overtly stated his full support for imposing Fairness Doctrine restrictions on free speech which would effectively shut down talk radio as we know it today.”
If the leftists succeed under the nightmare scenario with Obama in the White House, this time it won’t just be about radio and TV, but could include content on the Internet. You got it – the jackbooted thugs from the left will monitor what you and I write on the Web and let us have it if they don’t think it’s “fair.”
Jeff Poor of NewsBusters wrote about this scary socialistic scheme, reporting that FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell ventured that the feds under the governmental Democratic trifecta (presidency and both houses of Congress) could thrust itself into regulating speech on the Internet.
“He told the Business & Media Institute there’s a possibility the next Congress and administration might attempt to package the renewal of the Fairness Doctrine with Net neutrality regulation,” Poor wrote.
“‘I think the fear is that somehow large corporations will censor their content, their points of view,’ McDowell said, suggesting some conservatives might support Net neutrality legislation based on corporate censorship fears. ‘I think the bigger concern for them should be if you have government dictating content policy, which by the way would have a big First Amendment problem.
“‘Then, whoever is in charge of government is going to determine what is fair, under a so-called “Fairness Doctrine,” which won’t be called that – it’ll be called something else,’ McDowell said. ‘So, will websites, will bloggers have to give equal time or equal space on their website to opposing views rather than letting the marketplace of ideas determine that?'”
The Democrats, who look more and more like neo-communists, should tread lightly here. I don’t just say that because I’ve made my living on talk radio. This is truly a First Amendment issue, so Pelosi and the rest of her minions better break out that Constitution they swore to protect and read up.
The Supreme Court did rule in an earlier day that the previous incarnation of the Fairness Doctrine was constitutional. But the Supreme Court concluded in another case that the doctrine “inescapably dampens the vigor and limits the variety of public debate (Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241),” according to an article at the Heritage Foundation.
Obama and the Democrats’ new deal is a bad deal for every American who believes in the Constitution and the First Amendment. It is a dangerous step to the left that will stifle free expression and, ultimately, democracy.
