Thomas Jefferson, author of our Declaration of Independence stated, “our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”
Well the first amendment freedom enshrined in our Constitution – like just about everything else about our fundamental principles – means nothing to President Obama and his administration.
I hope you’re sitting down while reading this. The Obama Administration has developed a formula of what it believes the free press should cover, and is going to send government monitors into newsrooms across America to stand over the shoulders of the press as they make editorial decisions. As reported by Red State, the FCC has apparently already selected eight categories of “critical information” “that it believes local newscasters should cover.”
I truly wish this were a “tinfoil hat story,” but the Obama Administration’s Federal Communication Commission (FCC) is poised to place government monitors in newsrooms across the country which Red State calls an “absurdly draconian attempt to intimidate and control the media.”
In fact, it’s so absurdly draconian, even FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai fears the program could be used in “pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories.” As Commissioner Pai explains in the Wall Street Journal:
Last May the FCC proposed an initiative to thrust the federal government into newsrooms across the country. With its “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,” or CIN, the agency plans to send researchers to grill reporters, editors and station owners about how they decide which stories to run. A field test in Columbia, S.C., is scheduled to begin this spring. The purpose of the CIN, according to the FCC, is to ferret out information from television and radio broadcasters about “the process by which stories are selected” and how often stations cover “critical information needs,” along with “perceived station bias” and “perceived responsiveness to underserved populations.
The abject discomfort and disdain exemplified by President Obama during his Fox News interview with Bill O’Reilly was in full flower as Obama constantly blames Fox News for his travails. He evidently feels he is above reproach when it comes to being questioned on his policy and actions.
But the federal government has absolutely no business determining what stories should and should not be run, what is critical for the American public and what is not, whether it perceives a bias, and whose interests are or are not being served by the free press. But there’s no retribution when he summons liberal media personalities to the White House who then parrot his talking points. This is Orwellian beyond belief! In this universe of deceit, truth will indeed be a revolutionary act.
The progressive socialists have been down this road before, trying to force the Fairness Doctrine (truly oxymoronic) on talk radio where conservatives dominate. Now it seems there must be a government Kommissar controlling the news.
As Matthew Clark writes in Red State, “Imagine a government monitor telling Fox News it needed to cover stories in the same way as MSNBC or Al Jazeera. Imagine an Obama Administration official walking in to the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal and telling it that the American public would be better served if it stopped reporting on the IRS scandal or maybe that reporting on ObamaCare “glitches” is driving down enrollment.”
The fact this is even being considered should send chills down the spine of every American — well, at least those of us who believe in our Constitution. I dare any liberal progressive to support this endeavor. If you do, you are indeed an enemy of this Republic. Freedom-loving Americans who want to take action can go to the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) website and join the ACLJ to take a stand. Sign the ACLJ’s Petition to Stop the Obama FCC’s Free Speech Monitors.
This, my friends, is unconscionable and obviously part of the “fundamental transformation” of our America. This is FUBAR!
