[BC] Fairness doctrine by another name? aka censorship?

[Ernie Belanger]

I recall getting a ticket for speeding when I lived in San Diego. I went 
to a driving school for a 8 hour class. It was taught by a comedian from 
one of the Stand Up clubs in Los Angles. Back then a lot of folks was up 
in arms that comedy clubs were running legitimate defensive driving 
classes and they were trying to pass a law which would limit these 
classes to be taught only by standard "driving schools."

Guess what. The presentation was done, for the most part, in a comedic 
way. But I learned and retained more from that class than I ever had 
going to any conventional "Driving Class" that puts you to sleep 
teaching rules and laws. This guy taught the same stuff,  but in a 
compelling way such that you wanted to pay attention, you didn't day 
dream, you retained the information and you actually learned something 
valuable and took it away from the class with you and you got the points 
removed from your license in the process.

That is what is lacking from liberal talk radio... it's not entertaining.

Al Franken was a real funny guy on Saturday Night Live and when he did 
stand up, but on Air America he forgot apparently how to be 
entertaining  In fact that seems to be Air America's biggest problem 
isn't the message.... it's the presentation.

So the first problem is that Liberal Talk shows need to learn how to be 
entertaining to compel people to listen, regardless of the message.  
(Don't we have this same compelling programming argument just about 
monthly concerning HD and why it won't work... its the programming)

The sad thing about the post on the fairness doctrine is that you don't 
get to see all the comments in context. Just those quotes the reporter 
or editor choose to use. We all know that things get skewed based on bias.

BUT  even more threatening is the possibility that oversight boards are 
being discussed and that content regulation is being discussed both on 
Radio and TV and the internet.

IF the report is accurate regarding some of the comments, (even 
partially accurate)things are getting very scary in DC because these 
folks don't seem to have a clue about how the infrastructure works.

Case in point:  Anyone can build a web site and anyone can stream 
whatever they want to. There is no limit, as in over the air broadcast. 
So there is no need for someone to be force feed web pages with opposing 
view points. IF someone want opposing view points they just have to 
search them. 

Perhaps the Government would be better off teaching individuals, it 
believes have compelling content, how to use META Tags to get more hits 
and rank higher in the search engines. OR better yet, like broadcast, 
teach folks how to provide content in a compelling way so that people 
want to view it.

my $.02
Ernie