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By Bernie Sanders
In These Times
WASHINGTON, D.C., May 10, 2005 —
In his 2004 inaugural address, President Bush spoke repeatedly about
the need to bring freedom and liberty to the world. In fact, he was so
focused on the concept that he referenced the word "freedom" a whopping
27 times during the 21-minute speech. I’m happy the president is
embracing the concept of freedom. Now if we could only get him to start
practicing what he preaches.
Since his inauguration address, President Bush and his right-wing
colleagues in Congress have launched a full-scale effort to limit and
control the programming Americans are able to see and hear over the
airwaves and the Internet. In short, they’re going after your
computer, your radio and your remote control.
In March, the House passed legislation to dramatically raise
"indecency" fines for broadcast television imposed by the Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) to $500,000. Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas),
chairman of the House Commerce Committee, heralded the high fines,
saying, “This legislation makes great strides in making it safe
for families to come back into their living room.”
Emboldened by this success, conservative leaders like Barton and Sen.
Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) are threatening to go even further. For the
first time, they want to apply indecency standards to cable, to
satellite and even to the Internet.
"We put restrictions on the over-the-air signals," Stevens, chair of
the Senate Commerce Committee, said in March, while speaking to the
National Association of Broadcasters annual state leadership
conference. "Cable is a greater violator in the indecency arena.
… I think we can put restrictions on cable itself. At least I
intend to do my best to push that."
And Barton told reporters, "In the foreseeable future, you are going to
see a convergence [of standards]. I stand by that. … The impact
[of indecency programming] is going to be the same in the home.
It’s irrelevant what the ownership or the origination of it is."
If Stevens and Barton have their way, it means goodbye to "The
Sopranos," goodbye to Jon Stewart's "Daily Show," goodbye to the boys
of "South Park," goodbye to "Deadwood," goodbye to Dave Chappelle and
goodbye to many other shows enjoyed by millions. Faced with strict FCC
censorship rules, all of these programs will be removed from television
altogether, substantially rewritten, or banished to late night.
Let’s keep in mind that these are not shows broadcast on public
airwaves but rather on cable programs that consumers select and pay
for. Apparently the right-wing ideologues believe they know best what
programs Americans should be allowed to purchase and view. If these
regulations are imposed on paid cable and satellite networks, it will
have a chilling impact on freedom of expression in America. Today, they
are going after Howard Stern and Tony Soprano. Tomorrow, who will be
their target? Will it become "indecent" to criticize the president?
These effects have already been seen on broadcast television. Given the
looser rules governing cable and satellite, the change to paid
programming will be even more drastic under FCC oversight.
Controversial or cutting-edge shows will become increasingly rare as
programmers become more and more limited in the types of topics they
are willing to explore and the kinds of guests they will invite.
Sadly, this is not the only effort currently under way by the right to
determine what material is appropriate for the American public to see,
hear and read. The effort to censor cable becomes even more ominous
when viewed as part of the larger attempt by the Bush administration
and its allies to limit public discussion of minority opinions.
In recent years, the Republican leadership has used unprecedented
measures to crush dissent in Congress. During the recent passage of the
Bankruptcy Bill, for example, no opposition amendments were allowed on
the floor of the House — effectively silencing public debate of
the bill.
Perhaps the most blatant example of intolerance for dissenting
viewpoints, however, comes from Bush himself, who is currently
traveling the country holding "town meetings" on his Social Security
privatization plan. Despite the fact that these ostensibly public
meetings are paid for by taxpayers, American citizens who disagree with
Bush are not allowed to attend.
It is in this context of an overall attack on dissenting opinions that
the effort to censor cable and satellite TV becomes truly frightening.
This is not simply about cleaning up offensive content; it is about the
extreme right wing pushing to limit the free exchange of ideas. The
time has come for all Americans who love freedom to let the government
know that they don’t want Uncle Sam turning into Big Brother.
— Bernie Sanders is Vermont's Independent Representative to the U.S. House
of Representatives. His homepage is bernie.house.gov.
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