http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/6820Restore Fairness, Return to Reality
by Patricia Goldsmith
Forget Imus. All this fuss will be just so much wasted outrage unless we use it to direct public attention to the big picture: the way the media information cartel has rigged journalism in this country. We need to agitate to break up and re-regulate the media, beginning with restoration of the fairness doctrine.
Ever since the fairness doctrine went down for good in 1986, hate and misinformation have taken over the airwaves, beginning with Rush Limbaugh on the radio and spreading to TV. As Rep. Louise Slaughter said in a 2004 interview with Bill Moyers, after fairness was defeated,
AM radio rose. It wasn't even gradual, Bill. I mean, almost immediately. And I should point out to you that when we tried to reinstate
again in '93, one of the reasons we couldn't was that Rush Limbaugh had organized this massive uprising against it, calling it "The Hush Rush Law."
(snip)
Welch told associates that he enlisted two members of the GE board to assist him in shaping the coverage of the election by other news organizations. . . . They quietly encouraged the executives of the mainstream media organizations to rethink the relationship between news divisions and business organizations.
(snip)
If you're still in doubt, please tune in to PBS on April 25 to see Bill Moyers lay out the Record of Iraq War Lies. David Swanson, who saw an advance copy of the program, writes, "Spending that 90 minutes on this will actually save you time, because you'll never watch television news again-not even on PBS, which comes in for its share of criticism."
edited to add link
Link to diary on Kos:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/4/21/17013/3139