As if half, or I'd suggest more, aren't already allowing that! But put that aside for now...This is apparently Obama's effort to resurrect the aptly ironic-named Fairness Doctrine via his executive pen...executing another unconstitutional assault on Americans, yet again, as with other lawless pursuits, towards the First Amendment.
Mr. Constitutional Professor, my @$$...
HotAir: The better question is this — why should the FCC care what editors at TV stations and especially newspapers are thinking? More than a week ago, FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai blew the whistle on the commission’s proposed study of editorial bias in news rooms, even though the FCC has no jurisdiction on broadcast news content, and no jurisdiction whatsoever on newspapers. Fox News began covering this yesterday:Howard Kurtz wrote a piece this morning explaining why the FCC should keep its nose out of TV newsrooms...Kurtz's first question: What on earth is the FCC thinking?
The last thing we need is the government mucking around with news content.They're thinking this would serve as yet another totalitarian effort by the regime...or as Krauthammer put it, "As if the IRS and the EPA and the NLRB haven't done enough damage, the FCC has to trample on what rights are remaining."
The title of this Big Brother-ish effort by the Federal Communications Commission sounds innocuous enough: “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs.” But it’s a Trojan horse that puts federal officials in the newsroom, precisely where they shouldn’t be.
Don’t take my word for it. The FCC says it wants to examine “the process by which stories are selected,” as well as “perceived station bias” and “perceived responsiveness to underserved populations.”
Perceived station bias? Are you kidding me? Government bureaucrats are going to decide whether a newsroom is being fair?
Although, I wouldn't put it past certain newsrooms (uh hum, MSLSD!) to welcome the Obama regime into their so-called journalistic confines, as Rush explained this morning...
Still, such an outrageous move doesn't bode well for our genuine constitutional rights (the real ones, not the made up ones that the left constantly create on a whim).
Related links: CHILLING: Obama admin wants access to newsrooms to ‘investigate’ how they decide what to cover
INSANE: Obama Regime Putting Government Monitors In Newsrooms
FCC official, others warn agency study could stifle freedom of the press
UPDATE I: Byron York reports more on this story, revealing not only how this initiative tramples First Amendment protections, but that the program is being run by Democratic Rep. James Clyburn's daughter...
UPDATE II: So apparently, the Obama administration has felt the heat over the past few days; so much so that the FCC is supposedly backing off the newsroom study...for now, anyway...WashingtonExaminer: The First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” But under the Obama administration, the Federal Communications Commission is planning to send government contractors into the nation’s newsrooms to determine whether journalists are producing articles, television reports, Internet content, and commentary that meets the public’s “critical information needs.” Those “needs” will be defined by the administration, and news outlets that do not comply with the government’s standards could face an uncertain future. It’s hard to imagine a project more at odds with the First Amendment.
The initiative, known around the agency as “the CIN Study” (pronounced “sin”), is a bit of a mystery even to insiders. “This has never been put to an FCC vote, it was just announced,” says Ajit Pai, one of the FCC’s five commissioners (and one of its two Republicans). “I’ve never had any input into the process,” adds Pai, who brought the story to the public’s attention in a Wall Street Journal column last week.
Advocates promote the project with Obama-esque rhetoric. “This study begins the charting of a course to a more effective delivery of necessary information to all citizens,” said FCC commissioner Mignon Clyburn in 2012. Clyburn, daughter of powerful House Democratic Rep. James Clyburn, was appointed to the FCC by President Obama and served as acting chair for part of last year. The FCC, Clyburn said, “must emphatically insist that we leave no American behind when it comes to meeting the needs of those in varied and vibrant communities of our nation — be they native born, immigrant, disabled, non-English speaking, low-income, or other.” (The FCC decided to test the program with a trial run in Ms. Clyburn’s home state, South Carolina.)
FoxNews: The Federal Communications Commission announced Friday that it was putting on hold a controversial study of American newsrooms, after complaints from Republican lawmakers and media groups that the project was too intrusive....in other words, we're unable to trample your rights this blatantly without resistance right now, so look for a resurrection of such suppressive policies towards the end of Obama's reign.
FCC spokeswoman Shannon Gilson said Chairman Tom Wheeler agreed with critics that some of the study's proposed questions for reporters and news directors "overstepped the bounds of what is required."
Related link: Watch: Greta Van Susteren Answers Proposed FCC Questionnaire for Newsrooms – and Nails It
