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From: matt@brl-tgr.ARPA (Matthew Rosenblatt )
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: McIntyre and the Fairness Doctrine
Message-ID: <1376@brl-tgr.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 9-Jan-86 09:22:20 EST
Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.1376
Posted: Thu Jan  9 09:22:20 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jan-86 11:45:45 EST
References: <510@enmasse.UUCP> <2002@akgua.UUCP> <1073@brl-tgr.ARPA>, <462@whuts.UUCP> <296@pyuxii.UUCP>
Organization: Ballistic Research Lab
Lines: 57

> To begin, the so-called fairness doctrine was put to rest by the
> FCC several years ago in an effort to get the government off the
> private sector's back.  The only real control the FCC maintains
> is the regulation of frequency allocation in order to keep down
> the overriding of stations.  [TOM WHEELER]

Huh???  That's news to me!  The fairness doctrine has the backing of the
U.S. Supreme Court (the Red Lion case), and the FCC can't abolish it even
if it wants to.  The day the FCC goes back to its proper function of
regulating frequencies and interference will a day long prayed for by
broadcasters -- but it hasn't happened yet.

>			  In your argument against the Rev
> Mac., you fail to mention the other side of the coin in that
> radio station WBAI in New York kept its license although they
> were under the gun for exactly the same infractions of the rules,
> but from the other side.  [T. WHEELER]

There's no question that WBAI is "60's Marxist radio in the NY Metropolitan
Area."  But BAI's foray into anti-Semitism, to my knowledge, was a one-time
affair on the Julius Lester show, where the poem with the lines

	"Hey there, Jew boy, with the yarmulke on your head,
         You pale-faced Jew boy, I wish you were dead"

was read with approval over the air.  If WBAI (which counts Jews and WHRB
alumni among its staff) were to be so foolish as to allow repeated anti-
Semitism over its airwaves, all its support from trendy uptown liberals,
funky Village types, Guardian readers, and the Gay Community would not save
its license -- or at least, I hope not.  WBAI (and its sister Pacifica
stations KPFA, KPFB, KPFK) are living examples of freedom of speech in the
U.S. capitalist system.  Can you imagine a Marxist state allowing 
independently-owned radio stations to preach capitalism?

>			  That action leaves me to wonder why
> everything the current administration does is labeled facist
> by Sevener, yet the self same administration cut the legs from
> under Rev Mac., yet only gave WBAI, a supposed commie front,
> was given the green light?  [T. WHEELER]

Again, Huh???  When Rev. McIntyre lost his station, Ronald Reagan was
Governor of California, or something like that.  It was YEARS AGO.
Yeah, BAI is a "commie front," but the whole point of a free society
is that even a commie front can present its views, as long as it
doesn't openly incite to robbery, rape, riot, rebellion or revolution.
Broadcasting communist propaganda is a secular threat against which
the rest of us (by simply not believing the propaganda) can protect
ourselves.  Broadcasting virulent anti-Semitism brings with it the
risk of Divine destruction of our society -- the only way we can hope
to protect ourselves against such destruction is to suppress the 
broadcaster.  And it's a shame, because when it comes to being a man
of integrity with regard for real peace, freedom, and the dignity of
man, I'd stack the Rev. McIntyre up any time against the 60's leftists
who run BAI.

				-- Matt Rosenblatt
				(matt@amsaa.ARPA)