-By John Armor
I have enjoyed Oprah Winfrey’s work on television since she showed up as the second banana on People are Talking with Richard Scher on WJZ in Baltimore, four decades ago. Now, she is the leading talk show host in the known universe. Although her audience has decreased from nearly 9 million in 2005 to 7.3 million in 2008, she is still the top of her profession.
Oprah’s success demonstrates that several efforts of the current Administration to restrict both freedom of the press, and freedom of speech are both wrong and unconstitutional. There is a proposed bill in Congress which would institute government controls on contents on the Internet. The FCC is pursuing two efforts, called respectively “diversity” and “localism.”
For the details of these proposals, see www.SaveRadioFreeAmerica.org and the connected websites. As a full revelation, along with colleagues, I wrote many of the articles found on these websites. The intent of “diversity” is to use threats to the continued licenses to current owners to produce more female and “persons of color” as owners of radio and TV stations.
This effort is based on an assumption that only women can talk about matters that concern women, and likewise “persons of color” all think alike And no one else has anything to offer to members of these groups. Those are sexist and racist assumptions, that no government should be engaging in.
The other effort is to make sure that local communities are “fair” in what they broadcast, This would be determined by local “community boards” who would decide whether programming “serves” the communities. This demonstrates that the current government has no use for what Thomas Jefferson called “the free market of ideas.” Ordinary citizens should not be allowed to determine what they prefer to hear and see, by using the dials on their radios and TVs.
Now, consider the truths that Oprah Winfrey exhibits. Do all women think alike, and all “persons of color”? The Winfrey answer is no. Most of her listeners are white women, with a fair number of white men included.
Does Oprah depend on black-owned, or female-owned stations to carry her program? Absolutely not. Any program that seeks media success tries to get syndicated on the dominant station in each market, and then to become the dominant show in that time period. Since the goal is commercial success, each participant – station owners down to program hosts – seek the biggest audience, to attract maximum advertising dollars. Race and sex have nothing to do with this. That is exactly how the Winfrey Show has built its success.
The Administration’s efforts are posed in terms of “fairness.” But its ideas of ‘fairness” include telling the free press what it can, and cannot, broadcast to audiences freely choose. The Oprah Winfrey Solution is to let free people determine their own media choices freely. It was also Jefferson’s solution for “the marketplace of ideas.”
It is also the constitutional solution. But apparently the Administration officials either haven’t read the First Amendment lately, or do not take it seriously.
By agreeing publicly that the Fairness Doctrine is dead, and acquiescing in an amendment in Congress said the same thing, the Administration pretends to have no interest in censorship, especially in talk radio. But its other actions, and certain internal documents never intended to become public, reveal an intent to replace the Fairness Doctrine of other forms of censorship.
Not many people in the talk show community are aware of the threats to them and their listeners. But as the pressure from the Administration on all fronts increases, you can expect this subject to achieve front-page status on radio and TV. It will also become a lively debate in Congress, where all but 19 Senators voted for the DeMint Amendment against reestablishment of the Fairness Doctrine. Once the American people realize that their “freedom to listen” is at issue, as Justice Scalia called it in a recent argument before the Supreme Court, the subject will light up on talk radio, and then in the halls of Congress.
It may be sufficient to kill the new forms of censorship, without going to the courts, where recent cases indicate the forms will die if they get there.
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John Armor is a graduate of Yale, and Maryland Law School, and has 33 years practice at law in the US Supreme Court. Mr. Armor has authored seven books and over 750 articles. Armor happily lives on a mountaintop in the Blue Ridge. He can be reached at: John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
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