It’s been a busy day, but it’s great to blog here on Larry Lessig’s blog.
I’ll be writing all week, but if there’s a day I can’t make it, Joe Trippi, my campaign manager, will fill in for me. Thank you Professor Lessig for inviting me.
The Internet might soon be the last place where open dialogue occurs. One of the most dangerous things that has happened in the past few years is the deregulation of media ownership rules that began in 1996. Michael Powell and the Bush FCC are continuing that assault today (see the June 2nd ruling).
The danger of relaxing media ownership rules became clear to me when I saw what happened with the Dixie Chicks. But there’s an even bigger danger in the future, on the Internet. The FCC recently ruled that cable and phone based broadband providers be classified as information rather than telecommunications services. This is the first step in a process that could allow Internet providers to arbitrarily limit the content that users can access. The phone and cable industries could have the power to discriminate against content that they don’t control or-- even worse-- simply don’t like.
The media conglomerates now dominate almost half of the markets around the country, meaning Americans get less independent and frequently less dependable news, views and information. James Madison and Thomas Jefferson spoke of the fear that economic power would one day try to seize political power. No consolidated economic power has more opportunity to do this than the consolidated power of media
{You can read the post and comment at Lawrence Lessig's blog by clicking
here.--MG}
Posted by Howard Dean at 06:31 PM
http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/000683.html...
I scorn all polls except those that support my views. According to this week's Pew Research poll about the F.C.C. plan (to break the ownership barrier and permit media crossover), "By roughly 10 to one (70%-6%), those who have heard a lot about the rules change say its impact will be negative." Nearly half of those polled had heard about this issue, despite conflicted media coverage.
This growing grass-roots grumbling against giantism is getting through to legislators ordinarily cowed by network-owned station managers or wowed by big-media campaign contributions. Unfortunately, the any-merger-goes F.C.C. chairman, Michael Powell, has derided objections to his diktat as "garbage," and the White House strategist Karl Rove dismisses the depth of voter resentment that Democrats will be able to exploit next year.
Catch the way the liberal Representative David Obey of Wisconsin, who put forward the Appropriations measure that passed yesterday, reaches out to social conservatives. He complained about the way prime-time network programming forced local affiliates to air film of Victoria's Secret models in their less-than-full regalia, a sight he does not consider suitable for his 7-year-old. Obey & Co. is stealing traditionalist Republican clothes, scanties and all, and many G.O.P. candidates don't want to offend a core constituency.
...
But public opinion is on the march. Some in-house pollster should awaken President Bush to a bipartisan sleeper issue that could blindside him next year.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/17/opinion/17SAFI.html?n=Top%2FOpinion%2FEditorials%20and%20Op-Ed%2FOp-Ed%2FColumnists%2FWilliam%20Safire
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