Safire: The Great Media Gulp; Bush Admin overides most of the political spectrum to allow cronies to control the spectrum

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Sat, 24 May 2003 12:07:38 -0700
> From: "Robert J. Berger" <rberger () ibd com>
>
> [If all ends and middle of the political spectrum from EFF, NRA, Consumer
> Federation of America, Ted Stevens, Olympia Snow,  and now William Safire,
> all believe Powell should not be allowed to enable media consolidation, why
> is it still happening? - Rob]
>
>
> May 22, 2003
> The Great Media Gulp
> By WILLIAM SAFIRE
> http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/22/opinion/22SAFI.html
>
>
> The future formation of American public opinion has fallen into the lap of
> an ambitious 36-year-old lawyer whose name you never heard. On June 2, after
> deliberations conducted behind closed doors, he will decide the fate of
> media large and small, print and broadcast. No other decision made in
> Washington will more directly affect how you will be informed, persuaded and
> entertained.
>
> His name is Kevin Martin. He and his wife, Catherine, now Vice President
> Dick Cheney's public affairs adviser, are the most puissant young "power
> couple" in the capital. He is one of three Republican members of the
> five-person Federal Communications Commission, and because he recently broke
> ranks with his chairman, Michael Powell (Colin's son), on a telecom
> controversy, this engaging North Carolinian has become the swing vote on the
> power play that has media moguls salivating.
>
> The F.C.C. proposal remains officially secret to avoid public comment but
> was forced into the open by the two commission Democrats. It would end the
> ban in most cities of cross-ownership of television stations and newspapers,
> allowing such companies as The New York Times, Washington Post and Chicago
> Tribune to gobble up ever more electronic outlets. It would permit Viacom,
> Disney and AOL Time Warner to control TV stations with nearly half the
> national audience. In the largest cities, it would allow owners of "only"
> two TV stations to buy a third.
>
> We've already seen what happened when the F.C.C. allowed the monopolization
> of local radio: today three companies own half the stations in America,
> delivering a homogenized product that neglects local news coverage and
> dictates music sales.
>
> And the F.C.C. has abdicated enforcement of the "public interest"
> requirement in issuing licenses. Time was, broadcasters had to regularly
> reapply and show public-interest programming to earn continuance; now they
> mail the F.C.C. a postcard every eight years that nobody reads.
>
> Ah, but aren't viewers and readers now blessed with a whole new world of hot
> competition through cable and the Internet? That's the
> shucks-we're-no-monopolists line that Rupert Murdoch will take today in
> testimony before the pussycats of John McCain's Senate Commerce Committee.
>
> The answer is no. Many artists, consumers, musicians and journalists know
> that such protestations of cable and Internet competition by the huge
> dominators of content and communication are malarkey. The overwhelming
> amount of news and entertainment comes via broadcast and print. Putting
> those outlets in fewer and bigger hands profits the few at the cost of the
> many.
>
> Does that sound un-conservative? Not to me. The concentration of power ‹
> political, corporate, media, cultural ‹ should be anathema to conservatives.
> The diffusion of power through local control, thereby encouraging individual
> participation, is the essence of federalism and the greatest expression of
> democracy.
>
> Why do we have more channels but fewer real choices today? Because the
> ownership of our means of communication is shrinking. Moguls glory in
> amalgamation, but more individuals than they realize resent the loss of
> local control and community identity.
>
> We opponents of megamergers and cross-ownership are afflicted with what
> sociologists call "pluralistic ignorance." Libertarians pop off from what we
> assume to be the fringes of the left and right wings, but do not yet realize
> that we outnumber the exponents of the new collectivist efficiency.
>
> That's why I march uncomfortably alongside CodePink Women for Peace and the
> National Rifle Association, between liberal Olympia Snowe and conservative
> Ted Stevens under the banner of "localism, competition and diversity of
> views." That's why, too, we resent the conflicted refusal of most networks,
> stations and their putative purchasers to report fully and in prime time on
> their owners' power grab scheduled for June 2.
>
> Must broadcasters of news act only on behalf of the powerful broadcast
> lobby? Are they not obligated, in the long-forgotten "public interest," to
> call to the attention of viewers and readers the arrogance of a regulatory
> commission that will not hold extended public hearings on the most
> controversial decision in its history?
>
> So much of our lives should not be in the hands of one swing-vote
> commissioner. Let's debate this out in the open, take polls, get the
> president on the record and turn up the heat.
>
> --
> Robert J. Berger - Internet Bandwidth Development, LLC.
> Voice: 408-882-4755 eFax: +1-408-490-2868
> http://www.ibd.com


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