Saturday, May 15, 2010



The First Amendment doesn’t need a bailout

We read:
"The FCC’s proceeding is premised on the assumption that the news media in the United States faces a bleak future unless government acts to save it from disruptive market forces. In reality, however, the marketplace of ideas and information has never been more vibrant, diverse or accessible. The only fundamental threat to the future of media is an overreaching federal government that attempts to dictate winners and losers in the journalistic enterprise.

“A ‘bailout for the First Amendment’ is inappropriate policy, even if its advocates' purported goals are merely to make us all enlightened citizens,” wrote Crews. “FCC calls this project reboot.fcc.gov. It would more appropriately be shutdown.fcc.gov when it comes to an obsolete FCC grasping for a role to play. Appropriations for these counter-democratic campaigns should be revoked.”

Source

5 comments:

We The People said...

This is simply an attempt by a leftist government to subsidize the MSM, which has become nothing more than the governments propaganda agency. The leftist media (TV and print) knows it's dying, thanks to the internet, and wants the tax payers, the very people it lies to every day, to bail it out. And this govt. will find some way to do it. Without the MSM's "willing" participation, the govt. cannot lie to the people.

Bobby said...

We already subsidize PBS and look at what disaster that TV station is. Other than Frontline, most of their shows are British, so basically, the taxpayer is subsidizing British soap operas and British comedies. So the idea of bailing out newspapers that deserve to die is extremely odious.

I'm already pissed off with GM, their latest outrage is that they hired a Chief Marketing Officer and they're gonna pay the guy $750,000 a year plus stock options. He used to work for Hyundai and then Nissan (lasted 4 weeks at Nissan until GM made him a better offer). I don't mind private companies paying him a huge salary because apparently the guy is some kind of genius who resurrected Hyundai, but since GM belongs to the government is outrageous to use public money to pay him a higher salary than what Obama makes in a year.
You can read his story here:
http://adage.com/article?article_id=143776

Anonymous said...

I get your point Bobby, but there may have been some rational motive behind hiring the guy. While he was at Hyundai, their cars went from basically being a joke, to now being rated #1 in their class. (Consumer Reports)

BTW, The PBS show Frontline is owned by the NY Times, which should explain it's leftist undertones.

Bobby said...

"I get your point Bobby, but there may have been some rational motive behind hiring the guy. While he was at Hyundai, their cars went from basically being a joke, to now being rated #1 in their class. "

----Well, that is a great point. What I hate about this situation is that GM should have never been bought by the taxpayers, it is extremely unfair that while Toyota, Nissan and Honda build plants in America and employ Americans companies like GM get to spend much more on a CMO than Nissan did. Let's face it, this guy didn't go to GM out of patriotism, he went there because GM offered him more money and agreed to his demands for less layers of bureaucracy (according to the article).

Frankly, I don't like GM, these people have run deceptive advertising where they claimed to have paid their loans when in reality they simply moved federal money from one account to another. It's like you lending me $10, then giving me $20, and then I give you $10 and ran an add saying I have paid you back.

Anonymous said...

"Bailout." Such a crock. What the f*ck happened to personal accountability and responsibility?