Political Talk

As a new addition to the site we will have a "Coffee Talk" dedicated specifically to politics. This week we will replace the normal "Coffee Talk," but next week we will do both.

This weeks discussion is great for our first ever 'Political Talk' and was based on this article on Politico.com about the 'Fairness Doctrine.' To summarize, the article talks about the old FCC regulation that required all political opinion on the airwaves be balanced out with an equal amount of time for the opposing viewpoint. This was because there were only 3 networks at the time that controlled all of the airwaves. The claim is that this regulation was not necessary once cable and many viewpoints came into the television network and thus Ronald Reagan helped to remove this in 1987. Thereafter, the airwaves were free to the marketplace. Since the networks put mostly liberal ideas on television, conservative views took over the radio airwaves.

What makes this interesting is the politics behind the bill that is currently in the House and the Senate to re-instate this doctrine. In theory, it should work that if you have a liberal or conservative view, you would need to balance it out with the opposing viewpoint.

The bills are supported by an Independant (Sen. Bernard Sanders-VT) and a Democrat (Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich-OH) in Democratically controlled Congress. In an article written by Steve Rendell called "The Fairness Doctrine : How We Lost it and Why We Need it Back", Steve mentions just like Derek Hunter did in his article that the main reason it needs to be brought back is claims by the liberals that there is no off-set to the obviously conservative radiowaves.

Our questions are, what do you think about a regulation by the FCC to control and "create balance" in viewpoints? How much do you think the radiowaves are influenced by the television airwaves? How do the ideas and opinions presented on the television affect the ideas and the opinions presented on the radiowaves?

Talk amongst yourselves. Please!