The Last Alliance

Betsy Newmark has coverage of Congressman Henry "I Am The Walrus - Goo Goo G'joob" Waxman's thinking on a revival of the Fairness Doctrine.  Briefly, he wants to regulate everything:

Senior FCC staff working for acting Federal Communications Commissioner Michael Copps held meetings last week with policy and legislative advisers to House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman to discuss ways the committee can create openings for the FCC to put in place a form of the "Fairness Doctrine" without actually calling it such.

Waxman is also interested, say sources, in looking at how the Internet is being used for content and free speech purposes. "It's all about diversity in media," says a House Energy staffer, familiar with the meetings. "Does one radio station or one station group control four of the five most powerful outlets in one community? Do four stations in one region carry Rush Limbaugh, and nothing else during the same time slot? Does one heavily trafficked Internet site present one side of an issue and not link to sites that present alternative views? These are some of the questions the chairman is thinking about right now, and we are going to have an FCC that will finally have the people in place to answer them."

Regulate radio and the interwebs?  I wonder how our many friends among the Nutroots will welcome their new Imperial Overlords.

Well.  If Waxman's intrusions onto free speech are presented as a package I suspect many on the left will squawk while they are still free to do so.  On the other hand, if Waxman can present his ideas as an incremental process - regulate radio today and the interent tomorrow - I suspect many on the left will embrace Waxman's pretense of "fairness", secure in the knowledge that tomorrow will never come.

We should insist that Waxman show us his full package.  Of regulatory ideas.

[END OF FREE SPEECH AS WE KNOW IT]

Comments

[bad]

We should insist that Waxman show us his full package.

EWWWWWW

[centralcal]

eeeew. I don't wanna see Waxman's full package, aren't his cavenous nostrils enough?

If a flock of geese can take down a plane, maybe a swarm of files can take down Henry.

[kim]

We are kissing the enlightenment good-bye.
=========================================

[drjohn]

We should insist that Waxman show us his full package.

Ouch. No thanks!

[cathyf]

By the way, TM, http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2009/02/the-last-alliance.html?cid=x now points to the first page, not the last page. If you want a post to the last page, substitute

/comments/page/666/#comments

for

.html?cid=x

[bad]

cathyf, you are amazing.

[glasater]

cathf--666 looks pretty ominous.

[bio mom]

Just what kind of voters elect someone like Henry Waxman to represent them? It baffles me.

[kim]

Boris's ends of threads, with the page number in them, is highly useful to me, because I can simply change the page in order to read the whole thread. I realize my needs are generated at least partly from an antique computer and browser.
============================

[Carl]

"Just what kind of voters elect someone like Henry Waxman to represent them? It baffles me."

I grew up in WV, live in MD, and summer in MA. Guess you should not ask me.

[bad]

Sen. Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, railed against a provision that he said would undermine the independence of watchdog agencies within the government. The bill sets up a new panel, the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, which has the authority to request "that an inspector general conduct or refrain from conducting an audit or investigation."

"Any new limitation on the independence of inspectors general is dangerous," Grassley said.

PORKUS BILL contained billions for Inpectors General. Why are we paying them if the Recovery Accountability and Transparency (RAT) Board is going to hamstring them? LUN

[Topsecretk9]

Remember when they threatened ABC's broadcasting license if they showed a scene in a docu-drama about Clinton? They will silence everyone who says a word about them and it no lefty blog gives a damn cuz the truth is they are only for THEIR free speech.

[Rick Ballard]

Bad,

The IGs are meant to be political officers. They watch over the commissars responsible for dispensing largesse to party loyalists. They need to have the law behind them when they turn a blind eye to obvious fraud.

[kim]

Oh, bad, you have to ask? Pretty clearly, the IG's are going to be told what to do, in response to political objectives.

This is a putsch, folks. For how long, even kim doesn't know.
=====================================

[bad]

How transparent to write into law the intent to commit fraud.

[Captain Hate]

Henry "I Am The Walrus - Goo Goo G'joob"

Can we please stop with the Beatle references? They were dumb 30 years ago and just identify the user as a boomer wank.

[Ignatz Ratzkywatzky]

I believe you mean Waxulon-6 don't you TM?
I question his motives.

[Topsecretk9]

Obama's early pledges to extend new ethics rules to Capitol Hill, moreover, appear to have quickly fallen off the radar. Earlier this year, the administration's Change.gov and WhiteHouse.gov Web sites posted a multi-part ethics agenda that included plans to slash earmarks and push for "an independent watchdog agency to oversee the investigation of congressional ethics violations" on Capitol Hill.

But less than a day after Roll Call reported the details of that plan, the Web page describing them mysteriously disappeared. The ethics agenda link on WhiteHouse.gov now reads: "The ethics section is currently being revised" to reflect President Obama's Jan. 21 ethics executive order.

It's "interesting that these things were on the White House Web site and they just kind of disappeared," said Bill Allison, a senior fellow at the Sunlight Foundation. "I think George Orwell called it the 'memory hole.'" Allison added that "both parties seem to make their ethics rules to break them." The simmering Rangel and Murtha controversies make that increasingly clear.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/rg_20090217_2426.php

[ROA]

Andrew Breitbart discussed Waxman's district in a recent column: The True Face of Hollywood. LUN

[bad]

Gosh Tops, this adminisration is full of all kinds of holes. so to speak...

[vnjagvet]

bad, you are really bad. I am afraid that wins the thread, at least it does if you include Waxman in that category as well.

[bad]

Thanks Jim, you're the sweetest.

[Fresh Air]

I studied Journalism Law in 1987. Even then, the Fairness Doctrine was considered kaput due to technology rendering the concept of "spectrum scarcity" obsolete. Since 1987, we have the advent of 600-channel cable systems and web streaming. Meanwhile talk radio bumps along on the antiquated AM dial.

Limits on speech in this country are very, very hard to convert into law. They tend to operate in a post priori manner, where parties sue to enjoin people from saying things or to retract statements they have already made.

My recollection is that spectrum scarcity was ruled no longer valid not by Congress but by the courts as an acceptable limit on speech. If that's the case, Waxman's ideas are prima facie unconstitutional. As well as politically stupid to the nth degree.

BTW, is there an uglier person in Washington than Henry Waxman?

[Fresh Air]

post hoc manner. Jeez! Caffeine-powered wordchecker isn't fueled yet.

[MayBee]

He runs unopposed in a district that wants very little for itself. I imagine he has some wealthy donor that has set him off in this direction, but overall his district is pretty free-speechy.

[Extraneus]

Obama himself needs to be drawn out into this Fairness Doctrine thing. We know how Hannity in particular gets under his skin, and it seems apparent that the battle will really take place. It'd be a shame if Obama got away with hiding behind Waxman.

[bad]

Obama could get his porno loving lawyer to make the arguement for regulation of the internet. That could be fun...

[Sue]

BTW, is there an uglier person in Washington than Henry Waxman?

Why limit it to Washington? I don't think I've ever seen an uglier person. Period.

[Kevin B]

Seems to me there could be an opening for an entrepreneurial blogger here.

Set up a website called, oh something like, "Pink pretty flowers" or something, so that whenever a blogger feels like a venomous rant against the state of the world, at the end of his post he can link to an alternative view on our page.

The ad money could be huge.

(Though continuously playing "Everything is beatiful....In it's own way" on the site is discommended.)

[Old Lurker]

Sorry. I'm still stuck on not wanting to see Waxman's package under any circumstance.

[Pagar]

and push for "an independent watchdog agency to oversee the investigation of congressional ethics violations" on Capitol Hill.

Could it be that they were unable to find any people who had ethics that believed in what the Democrats believe in. Who would have ever believed that the Democrats could find no one to put in the Treasury position that didn't have tax problems. Surely there must be someone in their party who didn't; and yet they were unable to find that person.

[matt]

Waxman is a Fascist. He represents probably the most self centered constituency in the country. From the rich Iranians and Hollywood people in Beverly Hills to the rich, self entitled comrades of the People's Republic of Santa Monica to the ultra rich, ultra self entitled sybarites of Malibu, it's another gerrymandered congressional district where only dynamite or a giveaway of politically correct, organic, alar free mirrors at Fred Segal would get the constituents to look beyond their own noses. It's lockstep liberalism at its worst.And that is what you get....the Henry Waxmans and Nancy Pelosis of the world.Crackpots, jackanapes, charlatans and poseurs all.

[Dave in W-S]

Is italic the new thing?

[clarice]

Old Lurker took the words out of my mouth. It's enough that I have to see what's lurking in Waxman's sinus cavities due to the odd shape of his nose and huge nostrils. Seeing his entire package would...I..can't go there............

[bad]

I think we're only talking about minute hideousness...

[narciso]

Except for Murdoch, the majority owners like Wellstone, (CBS/Viacom), Immelt (GE/MSNBC/NBC)who ever runs Disney Iger? (ABC), are all liberals, Jack Welch was probably an exception.

Clarice ideas about ideological cross
/branding is great, I'm not sanguine about Kim's skepticism about the failure of the new Censorship doctrines.

[sbw]

The idea that a "Fairness Doctrine" could work is the height of hubris.

Any signal can travel by word of mouth and any message can mean the reverse of what is said:

"For Brutus is an honourable man."

[Andrew_M_Garland]

The late Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. wrote a short story "Harrison Bergeron" (1961) (Online Here) about forced equality under a government determined to make people equal in everything by handicapping them physically and mentally. Very funny, and spot on about the politically correct view of equality.

It was tragic, all right, but George and Hazel couldn’t think about it very hard. Hazel had a perfectly average intelligence, which meant she couldn’t think about anything except in short bursts. And George, while his intelligence was way above normal, had a little mental handicap radio in his ear. He was required by law to wear it at all times. It was tuned to a government transmitter. Every twenty seconds or so, the transmitter would send out some sharp noise to keep people like George from taking unfair advantage of their brains.

The real Fairness Doctrine would give us all a radio broadcasting the proper mix of daily ideas, with appropriate diversity built in.

[Neo]

First they came for Rush Limbaugh and I said ...

[clarice]

Per Fox--Obama is opposed to reviving the fairness doctrine.

"
President Obama opposes any move to bring back the so-called Fairness Doctrine, a spokesman told FOXNews.com Wednesday.

The statement is the first definitive stance the administration has taken since an aide told an industry publication last summer that Obama opposes the doctrine -- a long-abolished policy that would require broadcasters to provide opposing viewpoints on controversial issues.

"As the president stated during the campaign, he does not believe the Fairness Doctrine should be reinstated," White House spokesman Ben LaBolt said. "

[Pofarmer]

"As the president stated during the campaign, he does not believe the Fairness Doctrine should be reinstated," White House spokesman Ben LaBolt said. "

Which means that all the diversity verbage in the stimulus bill is????????