Obama Declares War on Conservative Talk Radio
By Jim Boulet, Jr.
Nov 17,2008: Barack Obama sought to silence his critics during his 2008 campaign. Now, with the ink barely dry on this November’s ballots, Obama has begun a war against conservative talk radio.
Obama is on record as saying he does not plan an exhumation of the now-dead “Fairness Doctrine”. Instead, Obama’s attack on free speech will be far less understood by the general public and accordingly, far more dangerous.
The late community organizer Saul Alinsky taught his followers to strike hard from an unexpected direction, an approach known as Alinsky jujitsu.
Obama himself not only worked as an organizer for an Alinsky offshoot organization, Chicago’s Developing Communities Project, but would go on to teach classes in Alinsky’s beliefs and methods.
“Alinsky jujitsu” as applied to conservative talk radio means using vague rules already on the books to threaten any station which dares to air conservative programs with the loss of its valuable broadcast license.
Team Obama and the “localism” weapon
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rule in question is called “localism.” Radio and television stations are required to serve the interests of their local community as a condition of keeping their broadcast licenses.
Obama needs only three votes from the five-member FCC to define localism in such a way that no radio station would dare air any syndicated conservative programming.
Localism is one of the rare issues on which Obama himself has been outspoken.
On September 20, 2007, Obama submitted a pro-localism written statement to an FCC hearing held at the Chicago headquarters of Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.’s Operation Push.
Furthermore, the Obama transition team knows all about the potential of localism as a means of silencing conservative dissent. The head of the Obama transition team is John Podesta, President and CEO of the Center for American Progress.
In 2007, the Center for American Progress issued a report, The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio. This report complained that there was too much conservative talk on the radio because of “the absence of localism in American radio markets” and urged the FCC to “[e]nsure greater local accountability over radio licensing.
Podesta’s choice as head of the Federal Communications Commission’s transition team is Henry Rivera.
Since 1994, Rivera has been chairman of the Minority Media Telecommunications Council. This organization has specific ideas about localism: ( Full Story )
About the Author: Lan Lamphere - Eighteen year vet as a photojournalist and now the host of the syndicated talk show Overnight AM- aka The Lan Lamphere Radio Show. Lan set this blog up to reach those looking for the news that matters most and which the mainstream media has failed to report. To have a voice in the wilderness and to take advantage of the last refuge of freedom of speech in our country.
jks | Nov 20, 2008 | Reply
This whole fairness doctrine business is rediculous.This is a gateway to even more radical agendas that this guy wants to inflict on the american people. This is even more disturbing when you take into account that europe is tring to censor the internet. The liberal left has the most outlets of media by far than the conservatives ever could. The only difference is that the conservative outlets are more successful than the liberal ones. We now must do all we can to stop the united states from becoming europe and destroying our constitution.