“Eventually, government is going to have to be responsible to help and resolve these issues.” Congressman Henry Waxman, speaking to the Federal Trade Commission regarding the crisis in journalism.
What’s the government’s plan? Here’s what appears to be happening. Allow just enough freedom of the internet for bloggers such as TradeWithDave.com to weaken the conventional media such as local newspapers which continue to suffer under consolidations and bankruptcies. Eventually those old media channels will make a plea for help from the government. Then the regulators are able to present a solution based on a “new media” overseen by the government based on an “open society” model rather than a “free society.”
What would such a plan look like? Here’s a link to just such a plan: http://www.freepress.net/files/New_Public_Media.doc.pdf
A name like “public media” sounds friendly enough. What it should be called is “government-run media” which is exactly what it is. Bloggers, local newspapers and big media companies such as Comcast and NBC have more in common than you may think. They are all based on the constitutional guarantee that no law would be passed which would inhibit free speech or freedom of the press.
The same group that is writing a plan for the government’s takeover of media, also created the following website: http://www.stopbigmedia.com/=policy
Here is a link to a Washington Post Q & A video with Ben Scott of Free Press which is behind both the plan, the website and he is the author of a new book titled The Future of Media.
Be careful on how you study these potentially complex issues. What the “open media” folks are proposing is increasing government regulation under the threat that private businesses won’t be able or willing to protect consumers or to provide broadband internet in unprofitable rural areas. The “open media” promoters will present the argument as one that is esoteric and not fundamental while the truth is that the argument is so fundamental to our constitution that it was the First Ammendment in the Bill of Rights.
Ben Scott was recently appointed as a policy advisor for innovation at the U.S. State Department. They are promoting an agenda that they describe as “Transform Democracy.” In my opinion, that is simply code language for the promotion of a Marxist agenda. The Free Press organization is backed by the leading globalist and close friend of the White House, George Soros. http://www.soros.org/issues/media_arts
These ideas look good on the surface, but when you drill down into them you will find concepts such as “choice architects” and “behavior modification” and “involuntary organ donation” promoted by folks like Cass Sunstein who believe that other people know what is best for you.
Here’s a link to an excellent post on the subject from Dr. Jeffrey Folks for American Thinker: http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/07/future_of_the_news.html
Dr. Folks explains the government’s justification for stepping in to help the media because of the “public good.” In its recently published “staff discussion,” the FTC maintains that big-city newspapers and other traditional media (such as old-line network television) have seen their revenues declining and that, as a result, there have been “significant losses of news coverage.” Since news coverage serves a “public good,” it is up to the government to perpetuate these traditional media.
Here’s a link to the Federal Trade Commission’s staff discussions: http://www.scribd.com/doc/32171948/New-FTC-Staff-Discussion
Here’s a link to some previous blog posts on the subject of “government knows best”:
http://tradewithdave.com/?p=117
[...] If you can understand how irrelevant the future of wires are and how ubiquitous the future of wireless is, then you won’t get hoodwinked by this attack on net neutrality. Here’s a link to our previous blog entry on the subject. Make sure to watch the video interview of Ben Scott: http://tradewithdave.com/?p=1372 [...]