Posted on 01/24/2006 4:34:29 AM PST by unionblue83
The rise of alternative media—political talk radio in the eighties, cable news in the nineties, and the blogosphere in the new millennium—has broken the liberal monopoly over news and opinion outlets. The Left understands acutely the implications of this revolution, blaming much of the Democratic Party’s current electoral trouble on the influence of the new media’s vigorous conservative voices. Instead of fighting back with ideas, however, today’s liberals quietly, relentlessly, and illiberally are working to smother this flourishing universe of political discourse under a tangle of campaign-finance and media regulations. Their campaign represents the most sustained attack on free political speech in the United States since the 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts. Though Republicans have the most to lose in the short run, all Americans who care about our most fundamental rights and the civic health of our democracy need to understand what’s going on—and resist it.
(Excerpt) Read more at frontpagemag.com ...
Today's lead editorial in The Wall Street Journal has encouraging word that"a unanimous Supreme Court ordered a lower court to reexamine a key challenge to the McCain-Feingold campaign restrictions. . . . this could be a first step toward rolling back a 'reform' that has served little purpose other than to muzzle the political speech of Americans."Possibly the substitution of Alito for O'Connor will mean that this McCain-Feingold travesty will finally be brought to book. McCain-Feingold makes the owner and editor of an establishment journalism outlet explicitly superior in rights to the rest of us, even though the difference in principle between us is that I have not started a newspaper yet.McCain-Feingold should never have been passed, never have ben signed, never have been approved by the court.
I don't think anybody involved has quite gotten his head wrapped around the idea that it's damn near impossible to regulate the internet as it's currently set up. What was that obscenity-on-the-internet regulation they passed a few years back that the Supremes knocked down? I was all poised to have a friend overseas register a domain to his name for me to post naughty words on.
McCain-Feingold: Shame on John McCain (there may not be enough shame in this world to cover this guy up) and shame on President Bush for signing this putrid legislation. Let's hope for an opportunity for the "next" Supreme Court to take this up and flush it down the tubes.
Radio is the focus of only one of the five senses. A listener has to really tune in to the subject matter and focus on the content of the ideas - - one reason, among others, why so-called "liberal" talk radio has been and is a failure in the free market.
Television is a combination of sensory focus and it is far easier to distract and misdirect viewer attention from essential topics presented.
Considering that 90% of people tend to be more influenced by the visual, television has become a new religion. It is analogous to Plato’s cave allegory and the pagan Oracle of Delphi. Television as a propaganda tool helps create visual phantasms or fantastical images of the brain.
There are three ways people are influenced according to the school of behavioral psychology - - visual (sight), auditory (sound), kinesthetic (emotion). The kinesthetic or ‘feeling’ is also based on olfactory and tactile sense, just like Pavlov’s salivating dogs.
Visual images and sound portrayed can be used to anchor emotional and/or conditioned responses desired by those that present them, which in the case of television, is the Leftist television media, actors who create phantastical images in film, and Leftist politicians who pander to ‘symbolism over substance’ (like Rush Limbaugh always says about them).
The print media somewhat also uses the visual aspects of that phenomenon. Interactive talk radio requires thought; television does not and relies on this as a means to influence viewers. One should also notice the emphasis on interactive talk radio, something "public radio" is careful to avoid; unlike most commercial talk radio programming.
Part of this is the promotion of "public radio." The government funded NPR and other "public radio" non-profit Leftist garbage is not making it. While I am not enamoured with some of the canned music formats of much commercial radio, I am no fan of the Leftist non-profit NPR-like stations that play third world, grass skirt, bone-in-the-nose pagan voodoo music either, with the touchy-feely, multi-cultural, anti-USA Leftist commentary of the hosts. These insipid people actually think they are clever with the sedate, monotone presentations (neuro-linguistic programming).
[Observe when in public places, at your workplace or in other community activities (i.e., restaurants, retail stores, gas stations, etc.) the pervasive presence of some exposure to music or television. This is because many people are actually terrified of being alone with their own thoughts or at the prospect of it (neuro-linguistic programming).Try an experiment, turn radios off at work, request as a customer patronizing private businesses that music or television is unplugged so you can have some personal tranquility with your family, friends, associates, etc. You will find a great resistance, even hostility to such a request. Ask yourself why, then consider what thoughts such people have they are so afraid of, if they are capable of or desire to have any of their own.]
Also part of this is the loss of broadcasting licenses by "public radio" stations to a company that is buying licenses to broadcast Christian programming. This is pushing many Leftist public radio stations off the air. There is more to this issue than most people realize and it is not exclusive to the attack on talk radio. The recent moves to prevent more deregulation of FCC broadcasting and ownership rules in the Congress are the latest Leftist attempts to kill free speech. (President Bush has threatened a veto.)
Like the necromancy of the late Senator Paul Wellstone’s funeral rally, or "funerally" (see the Steven Plaut article, The Rise Of Tikkun Olam Paganism, Arutz Sheva: December 27, 2002, in reference to the Wellstone brand of Judaism), the use of Martin Luther King Day, or constantly invoking the "spirit of the ‘60’s," the Left attempts to raise spirits of the dead as a totem for worship.
Comrade, don't you know that "War is peace", "freedom is slavery", and "Love is hate"? Trust in the Ministry of Truth to conscientiously administer the "Fairness" Doctrine and all will be well. That way the march of the Jacobins will be led by the NY Times, Newsweek, PBS, ABCCBSNBCCNN, The Washington Post, AP, Reuters, BBC, and their minions. Soon, free expression of opinion on sites such as Free Republic, would become mere memories, and we could resume our march to coerced virtue in Dystopia. There, one's ideas won't have to compete for support. The power of the state will enforce egalitarian gauranty of results rather than of opportunity. The ideas of Bill Buckley and Howard Dean will warrant the exact same attention regardless of merit. A dug-out canoe will be lauded as "equal" in design to a nuclear submarine. Everything will be perfect; perfectly bad.
The First Amendment has been in trouble for a long time. The only thing that finally protects it is the 2nd.
These people (the libs) better wake up to the fact of which side of us owns all of the guns.
Don't ever surrender your weapons. It's the last defense against tyrannical government we have.
Nice post.
"Radio is the focus of only one of the five senses"
The only reason we have conservative AM radio is because we were shut out of the MSM and had to set up a parralel venue to promote the free exchange of ideas. Small wonder that the Left wants to shut down radio & internet speech.
Bush would not be President if sites like FR, LGF, and Powerline hadn't debunked CBS so quickly.
"I can shush O'Reiley"
Me too. Do it every night. Can't stand that pompus windbag. Last night he was equating the Left smear attack on the WashPost with conservative blogs... click!
Excellent commentary!
AMEN!!!!!! Media bias bump.
Liberalism is just arrogance - the idea that cheap talk is better than action, that if you don't have facts on your side the only important question is whether or not you can change the subject.The First Amendment in particular, and the Constitution in general, are predicated on equality of citizens under law. That's not good enough for the liberal; liberals are better than you and me.
Isn't it amazing how easily they rationalize their efforts to control information by denying the entire population of this nation the First Amendment Rights they so eagerly and frequently invoke?
They should be stopped in Congress from even trying to place un-Constitutional limits on free speech, in ads, on websites, in blogs, or anywhere else.
I know Rush has addressed this seriously on occasion; amd otherwise made 'reference' ; but really does not go there too often.
I call it "Loopholes Are For Me Not You". May McCain-Feingold fade into the dustbin of history along with its namesakes.
We can hope...
Pity. They could have tightened it up considerably.
The liberal view of 1st amendment rights applies to only prurient speech. Only pornography and obscenity are deserving of Constitutional protection. Their goal is to destroy and subvert all cultural, institutional and religious values (see Gramsci). Conservative political speech is known as hate speech. In Europe and in Canada liberals have managed to make expressing opposition to abortion, sodomy and even immigration a hate crime. This is the exact opposite of the intent of the first amendment here, which was to protect political speech, or speech of consequence.
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