U.S. Senate
See Full Big Line
(D) J. Hickenlooper*
(R) Somebody
80%
20%
Governor
See Full Big Line
(D) Phil Weiser
(D) Joe Neguse
(D) Michael Bennet
50%
50%
50%
Att. General
See Full Big Line
(D) M. Dougherty
(D) Jena Griswold
(D) Brian Mason
60%↑
30%↑
20%↓
Sec. of State
See Full Big Line
(D) A. Gonzalez
(D) George Stern
(R) Sheri Davis
50%↑
40%
30%
State Treasurer
See Full Big Line
(D) Brianna Titone
(R) Kevin Grantham
(D) Jerry DiTullio
60%↑
30%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
See Full Big Line
(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(R) Jeff Hurd*
(D) Somebody
80%
40%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert*
(D) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank*
(D) Somebody
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen*
(R) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(R) Gabe Evans*
(D) Manny Rutinel
(D) Yadira Caraveo
45%↓
40%↑
30%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
February 16, 2009 04:46 PM UTC
62 Comments
Hey, LB, have a great time in Mexico. I can’t wait on posting this, even tho you are not around to refute it with the latest repub tp. Why we need the Fairness Doctrine:
FIRST, WE MUST HAVE real debate:
This blog is an excellent example of First Amendment and free speech. These are the pro factors for participation.
1) Equal access
2) No censorship based on content
3) No limit on how much or how many times one can post
4) If someone posts something you don’t like or consider false, you can can refute it immediately.
5) No points off for bad spelling.
6) No limit to the medium…in other words, there are not a finite number of websites.
7) There is therefore no government regulation.
8) NO ONE CAN HAVE A MONOPOLY ON THE WEB.
These are the con factors, which limit participation.
1) You have to be literate in English.
2) You have to register, so you are not anonymous.
3) You have to have access to a computer and the Internet, usually an outlay of a couple hundred dollars and then a monthly service charge.
4) You have to have to the time and space to read and reply.
SECOND; WHY RADIO NEEDS THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE;
1) Radio is a limited medium.
2) The airwaves belong to the people of America and as the airwaves are a finite resource, there is government regulation.
3) The government has not legislated to prohibit monopoly control.
4) One party, the republicans, control the content of the majority of talk radio programs.
5) Access for opposing viewpoints and access to correct factual errors is extremely limited; this creates a virtual censorship.
Why Radio is so important a medium:
1) It is cheap. Once you buy the receiver, there is no more cost.
2) It is portable, you can hear it all the time, it is mobile, you do not have to stop and use time and space, to the exclusion of other activites, to listen.
3) You don’t have to be literate.
4) Because of its scope, range and universality, it is a powerful tool in creating public opinion.
What is happening now:
1) The hate speech on talk radio is increasing in violent tone, falsehood, and viciousness against the Democratic party and its constituents.
2) There has not been the opportunity for honest debate on the public airwaves on economic issues of grave importance on which there can be real differences of opinion as well as fact.
3) The strategy of republicans to stonewall the administration is enhanced by their ability to limit debate on talk radio and consolidate their public.
So far, in the last 24 hours, I have heard the following falsehoods”
1) General Electric, owner of NBC and MSNBC received $140 BILLION dollars in the bailout.
2) Lawyers who file suit seeking Obama’s personal information will suffer “financial sanctions.”
I have also heard the spurious:
1) Instead of First Lady, Michelle Obama has been labeled “First Overbite.”
2) Black History month has been attacked.
3) And, the ubiquitous, Obama is not a legitimate president.
Finally, god only knows what the consequence will be of talk radio bully hosts targeting kids for ridicule for reporting seeing “guns” in a high school…..anyone in law enforcement or anyone in the school security system will tell you that the safety our kids depends on other kids feeling it is safe enough to come forward…
and this is just too much for me to process right now. Can’t we talk about something simpler, yet relevant, like Jessica Simpson’s weight?
I get my celebrity news by reading the covers in the check-out line. I saw the headline and the 2 pictures and I thought at first it was concern at how thin she was in the one picture. Foolish me…
I didn’t even know Bart had a sister named Jessica.
is that Bart Simpson is now older than many of my students. They can’t even imagine what life was like when it wasn’t mandatory to use a Simpsons quote in every conversation lasting longer than 2 minutes.
Another funny thing for those who don’t follow much celebrity news: “Antichrist Television Blues” was written about Jessica Simpson’s dad. It’s true, look it up.
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maybe I’d be more supportive.
But I suspect this is more about taking affirmative action on behalf of the poor, disadvantaged Democratic Party.
Unless you show me otherwise, I assume there is no “fairness” that the doctrine plans to extend to the American Constitution Party, for example.
…………
Why not a “fairness doctrine” for newspapers, so that conservatives can reach the progressives who read the New York Times ?
……..
Democrats don’t need a law to grant them access to the airwaves, paid for by their political opponents.
Take some of that $1 Billion that Obama raised and buy your own darn station.
If people like what you have to say, they will support your advertisers.
But if your station can’t sell advertising because, well, because people don’t like your message, then isn’t it “fair” if you go off the air ?
I really don’t think you’d be happy if things were really fair.
If they were, I would be able to get the pro-American message of my party out on the same basis as the Democratic message of “vote for us because we aren’t George Bush.”
If things were really fair,
both the GOP and the Dems would go out of business.
See, we may not agree on what’s fair.
But I don’t think you want “fair;”
I think you want “advantage.”
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It’s about ideas. If one person wants to express an opinion, there should be time for someone else to express an opposing opinion. Has nothing to do with having a Republican and a Democrat on all the time. (It’s only since one TV station turned into the propaganda arm of the Republican party that this confusion has arisen.)
Whether you agree with the fairness doctrine or not, at least be honest about what it always meant.
Are you agreeing or not agreeing with me?
The issue has been joined since one party began to dominate the public airwaves, basically radio. Reagan got rid of the Fairness Doctrine and Clinton got rid of a lot of regulation about how many stations one corporation could own. Limbaugh’s emergence on the public airwaves conincides with republican wins in 94, and 2000 forward. I think that Obama won because he did an end run around radio with his internet network and cellphone.
It is not about ideas. For example, when we had a Fairness Doctrine, if you had one political candidate on a radio show, then you had to give equal time to every other candidate. Same thing for ballot issues. But ideas…the fuel of talk radio….welfare queens, abortion, gun control, commie pinkos…..were not subject to the Fairness Doctrine.
IMHO. It is about power. and right now, the way to political power is through the political parties. And right now, the repubs are using talk radio to build up their power base,
I like the fairness doctrine, though as long as we (finally!) have people like Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow on TV, I don’t feel as oppressed as I used to in the 90s. So I think that’s why there’s not a huge groundswell in support of reinstating it.
But I think you’re wrong about what it actually means. The fairness doctrine is about controversial issues; the equal time rule concerns political candidates and is still in effect.
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just like, the Constitution doesn’t spell out that we’ll have a 2-party system.
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Believe me, I understand the frustration of being in a third party. But still, at some point you have to engage in a debate based on what’s actually true. The fairness doctrine is not what you and dwyer seem to think it is.
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that’s so much harder, and a lot less fun.
sorry, I wrote that hours ago and left before posting. It was on the screen, ready to be posted, when I got back. I didn’t realize how much the discussion may have changed in the intervening hours.
but you’ve gotta admit, it’s a common practice to do what I was doing. So common, it even has a name.
My Dad can beat up your Dad.
–Anon.
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1) I think the American Constitution Party should be able to access the airwaves. The doctrine hasn’t been written yet…I am advocating a way to let more people access the public airwaves. I think I voted for the American Constitution Party in 1998. Would that have been possible?
2) Democratic party affirmative action: I don’t like the idea of a democratic party monopoly either. I am advocating equal access, not one party monopoly.
3) Newspapers: The government does not have the right to regulate newspapers. Theoretically, newsprint and printing presses are in infinite supply and available to anyone. The medium is not a public commodity. PLUS.
Freedom of the press is written right into the First Amendment. As a member of the American Constitution Party, you ought to know that.
4) Buy your own station: The airwaves are public. The government awards licenses to use the airwaves. I cannot afford to buy a license. Corporations are perfectly able to subsidize radio programing in order to get their message out. Clear Channel is on hard times. It had layoffs. Did any “on air” jocks lose their jobs? Did the message change?
5) Advertising and the market place: I am all for the free market place of ideas. But, we don’t have a free market on the public airwaves because we have virtual monopoly, which as you know, renders a free market inoperable.
I would like to see the repubs and the dems, and you and anyone else, move to Satallite Radio…..people would have to pay, a small fee, to hear the radio ; but, because the medium does not use public airwaves and there is no limit, anyone could play. There, if the message wasn’t popular, the show would go off the air. That would work.
5) My happiness: Is none of your gd business.
6) I would envision some kind of parity – so if you had an hour of crap from the right side; immediately following you would have an hour of crap from the left….same place on your radio dial. Lies would not be tolerated, and if any fact were challenged, immediate access would have to be given to refutation. People could petition if they were denied access, either as a caller or a talker, or subject to
verbal violence. It would make talk radio dull as dishwater, and probably save the Republic. See *5
I am encouraged that in LB’s absence, republican tps will still find a home here.
for pursuing this concept. It appears as though you have identified Rush Limbaugh as the poster boy. I just hope that you’ll be expanding your strategy to save humanity from talk radio.
Any insights on the bigger LT strategy. I am sure players like Clear Channel, 710, 630, 760 are interested in just how they’ll implement compliance. I guess hiring the lamest contra to their key talent will allow the key talent to succeed by being the brains out of the meticulously stupid contra talent.
We’re just looking out for him.
on Fox radio (if there is such as thing) or XM radio.
Maybe this is the radio guys strategy … break up bi-partisan pairs, then they’ll create more majority-minority shows and thus comply with the direction you promote.
One technical question, how does this fairness doctorine apply to XM satelite or internet radio based … I assume there is a solution to avoid a loop holes here. Maybe net neutrality? Your thoughts please.
from midnight to 4am. I don’t know what network feed it is, but I doubt that it’s Fox radio.
As to the “Fairness Doctrine” or whatever cover name they want to put on it this week, it would be better to make changes in laws regarding corporate ownership of stations. When you have the government telling people what they can or cannot say regarding politics in any public venue, people start thinking censorship. When you talk about ending a corporate monopoly in order to promote competition in ideas, they become much more receptive.
I would support efforts to limit station ownership in each market. That way if someone want’s to put a lefty station on they would have an easier time of it. I would oppose anything that smacks of restrictions on freedom of speech, even speech I don’t agree with.
Dwyer’s main argument for it is that he doesn’t like what some people are saying so he wants to make it illegal for them to say it. It’s wrong and wrong-headed.
I agree that controlling speech is bad, even in the case of airwaves which are both limited and publically owned.
But the idea of breaking up media ownership so we have a thousand voices – that is a great way to accomplish the goal without controlling anything.
Clear Channel’s virtual monopoly in Colorado isn’t helping anyone interested in fairness.
I think you basically summed up my opinion.
I would suggest that anyone who takes umbrage with something that a talk show host says should try to boycott the show’s sponsors, write letters, or do whatever you can to put pressure on them to change their tune. Legislating what can and can’t be said on air is not the way to go about it.
Right wing radio talks to its constituency. The left wing little radio, blogs, etc. talk to its constituency. This is polarizing.
People become more and more set in their opinions and prejudices because they are not hearing the other side.
The power of radio to indoctrinate is a threat to democracy. As this country faces its worst fill in the blank, people are scared and angry. This is fuel for political fires. This is where history tells us that some are targeted and become scapegoats. Panic becomes a possibility…One way to break the cycle is to shut down the monolithic megaphone. ….let a lot of voices talk…to each other…on the other side.
I’d like to hear Barron X take on Caplis. Not every day, but from time to time. I liked to know that that access was available.
He wants to require that opposing sides are represented. You may not support that idea either, and that’s fine, but don’t try to twist it into some straw man.
Also, at the end of the day I think there could be serious holes in the FD issue. XM radio and internet radio are mediums that need inclusion; I assume the FD covers TV (satelite, OTA and cable).
Without inclusion of all we have to be afraid that unintended winners and losers will be created.
dwyer wants it to be illegal for someone to say something on the radio.
Requiring more speech is not the same as banning speech.
I see what you are writing, but don’t see the nuance you claim he is promoting.
Look. Currently, there are talk show hosts who identify themselves as Republicans. ….those dominate the public airwaves…..there are also talk show hosts who identify as democratics. Both use the public airwaves to promote their respective political parties. I want parity so that each party or all parties get equal time. What is going on now is not healthy for a democracy. We have to be able to have free and open discourse for ALL citizens….
I remember back in the 80s when talk radio was dominated by so-called lefties…and also all local.. I don’t remember both sides of the abortion issue getting equal time. So I am not sure about the “idea” part of the Fairness Doctrine.
YO. Satellite radio would NOT be part of a radio Fairness Doctrine because satellite radio does not run on public airwaves. Ditto for cable. The government is only able to regulate PUBLIC airwaves, because they belong to all of us, not just Clear Channel.
I do not think that anyone should be able to use the public airwaves to lie. I think lying should have real penalities…but only for lying, knowingly, and perhaps continuing to broadcast the same lie, on the public airwaves. If you want to lie, BLOG.
If it’s broadcast through the air then it’s using public airwaves. No way around it.
I made that statement as if I knew what the hell I was talking about. I don’t. However, my understanding of the law is that the technology which uses radio and I guess TV waves is public, because the frequencies are finite.
Satellite and cable technology is different and not subject to
the same kind of regulation.
Signals from the satellite are radio waves – same technology, same limited spectrum.
Cable is different because it travels through cable. So it doesn’t use any of the spectrum.
Thanks for the physics lesson. I am being sincere.
Satellite radio is not regulated by the FCC for content. You can say things on satellite which cannot be said on regular radio. Do you know why? I had presumed it was a function of which technology the FCC was able to regulate.
I am too damm tired to google; so I will have to postpone my research. I am still employed. However, we had massive layoffs..and the work load of the remaining has really increased…..i feel grateful, guilty and exhausted all at once…
just like being a parent…
But I digress. The Fairness Doctrine and the equal time provisions both are based on the right of the government to regulate finite means of broadcasting. I will get something definite on what that covers.
— and the First Amendment be damned!
Lying under oath is perjury, a felony. Lying about someone is slander; printing lies is libel. Verbal assault is a form of child abuse and punishable by fines and imprisonment. Giving false witness is against one of the commandments for god’s sake…literally.
Doesn’t Colorado have some kind of law which prevents lying in political ads??
There are all kinds of laws against hate speech, which I don’t agree with, BTW.
There ought to be a way to remedy lies when they are told on public airwaves.
is not only a time-honored tradition but protected by the Constitution. The way to remedy lies on the public airwaves is to answer them in the public square or boycott advertisers or write letters or get a bigger megaphone. It’s not to bring the weight of prosecution to bear on political speech, no matter how much you might be offended by it or disagree with its accuracy. That’s one incredibly slippery slope you’re advocating there, dwyer.
1) Absolutely agree with you on lying in political speech…it is up to the opponents to refute it…I was just citing what I believe is an exiting colorado law, with which I disagree.
2)I am not advocating prosecution of lying political speech.,..
for gods sake..where did you get that??
3) the remedy you propose is inadequate, for the following reasons:
-what public square? KOA broadcasts to 38 states 24/7 and I do what? hold a sign on the state capital steps???? There is no guaranteed access to a radio show to refute a lie, let alone express a different opinion.
-“boycott advertisers?” I don’t ride motorcycles. I don’t need a loan….and I don’t buy cars from Rocky’s. To make a boycott effective you need to engage a lot of people…you need to be able to reach them…like, on radio…OH. never mind.
-write letters. to whom?
-get a bigger megaphone? I couldn’t buy a radio license, even if I had the money.
Equal access on the public airwaves is a slippery slope. I don’t think so.
here:
How do you achieve that if not by prosecution, either civilly or criminally? If you think the massive FCC fine had a chilling effect on accidental nipple exposure, what do you think “real penalties” will have on political speech?
seems to get them accidentally exposed more, doesn’t it?
That consequence should involve the license which the FCC
controls. If a license holder refuses to correct a lie, then the license should be suspended or revoked. Do you call that prosecution????
Nor does Glenn Beck. I’d guess neither does Sean Hannity. They’re all independents.
So I think I may have found a flaw in your reasoning.
There are those hosts which identify as Republicans or Democrats. I think that they provide an easier way to begin with an equal time provision. I don’t listen to either Hannity or Beck; were they neutral during the last presidential election? I don’t think so.
Do you think it fair that Republican state legislators have free time on KOA with Beauprez…fifteen hours at night last week….and Dems do not?
and if anyone tries to call them Republicans or even conservatives, they’ll find this one time they disagreed with George W. Bush (usually about immigration or something) as a counterexample. They just don’t make it that easy.
As for KOA and Beauprez, I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Follow me on this re: Beauprez and KOA. Every week night from seven to ten, Gunny Bob, a radical right winger, has a talk show. that is 15 hours a week. (followed by the Independent Institute’s Caldera for another three hours a night.)
Gunny Bob was not on the radio last week. The guest host was Bob Beauprez. Bob Beaprez had Republicans from the state legislature on. They promoted their legislation and attacked the dems. The dems did not have equal time. And it would have to be with a neutral or democratic host.
As for Hannity,etc…they are on cable TV…that is not the public airwaves…they would not be subject to any Fairness provision except those imposed by their private owner….I don’t give a flying f(@&*what they do on cable. Cable is not the issue.
I talking radio. You have to listen. I suggest you catch KOA on the weekends. Then let me know what you think.
Is it just me or did our political discourse suddenly get really stupid in the late 80s? Sure there was silly local news (as satirized in Network), but things like Inside Edition and Hard Copy seem to be the catalyst to turn all news into stupid shit (the full transition didn’t take place until the release of the Starr report ten years later).
So did the repeal of the fairness doctrine allow the news to turn stupid? And if so, would the reinstatement of it make the news smart again, or at least tolerable? If so, I’d support it, but I’d want to see some evidence or at least argument for that.
Certainly you’re not going to make stupid people smart; after all Reagan was elected by huge numbers of people who didn’t care that he never had the slightest idea what he was talking about. So I have to wonder if the fairness doctrine is even worthwhile.
Rush listeners wouldn’t suddenly start having a clue if Rush shared a show with Sam Seder. They’d just turn it off and come up with crazy shit on their own, then go shoot a bunch of people. Maybe it’s better that they can be monitored.
Celebrating a loss as a win may make people feel better, but it also leads people to continue down the same road of failure. It requires facing up to your mistakes and losses to figure out what needs changing to win the next time.
When Churchill spoke after Dunkirk he closed the speech by saying wars are not won by retreats. In other words he celebrated what they salvaged, but then spoke honestly about what it really meant.
Apparently the House GOP has decided to stay in fantasyland where loosing is celebrated and there is no need to change.
All partisanship aside, the title card fades out too fast, the panning on the text is too fast. And if you go to the url displayed at the end, the video of Eric Cantor looks like the camera was held by someone with the DT’s.
Seriously, get yourself “back in the saddle”, ride over to Best Buy and cough up $50 for a copy of Sony Vegas for Dummies and a freakin’ tripod.
sure went away fast. I wonder what the next outrageous rumor will be.
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just you wait.
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Where the political cowards hide their identity like the KKK uses the sheet.
Colorado Pols is losing credibility rapidly for tolerating intolerance.
Just check out Barron X’s answer. Pagliacci (Lb–the crying clown) would be whinng too saying “Oh Please just because we advocate against minorities dosn’t mean that we are intolerant”
And of course Jason is scared silly about having to have had to post his name as the LLC member on the SOS site.
Im going to ask Morris Dees to have this site monitored for intolerance from the SPLC.
For removing any doubt that you’re part of the skankore/nancy/whatever sybill.
That’s so many helping verbs, you’d think that’d count a ways toward fighting intolerance by itself.
from DailyKOS
Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 2/9-12. All adults. MoE 2% (1/5-8 results)
but it’s better than 61% unfavorable for the Republican Party, and 19/69 for Congressional Republicans!
Doesn’t Congress as a whole usually have pretty poor ratings, while people’s own reps are rated higher?
and yet somehow, after this week full of unrewarding chest pounding by Republicans like Boehner and Cantor, moronic journalists in DC like Cokie Roberts claim that the Cons won the week. When will these morons ever get it right?
Maybe they can go somewhere foreign and exotic like Hawaii.
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Dan Willis helpfully started a Diary on Obama’s visit this coming Tuesday.
But he unhelpfully placed it on the competing website “Denver Pols.”
They are a lot pickier over at that site.
So I’m posting this in case people have thoughts on tomorrow’s event.
….
on a different note,
who thinks I’m being disrespectful by calling the new Prez by his surname, without his earned title ?
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on ColoradoPols too not just DenverPols. I have the honor of attending the event at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. “An Address on the Economy by President Barack Obama”
By the way, Ascent Solar will be locating their new world headquarters in Thornton Colorado in 2009! Ascent Solar will also be expanding their manufacturing and research. Bringing approx. 300 new jobs. The relocation of Ascent Solar to Thornton, Co is a cooperative effort between Thornton,Adams County and State of Colorado. Ascent Solars decision to expand here re-affirms Thornton’s, Adams County’s and Colorado’s committment to renewable energy and quality jobs.
I am excited to hear President Obama’s Address on the Economy. This Recovery Act should help our State bring in jobs and help with transportation infrastructure and education. We have schools, like Mapleton School district, that really need this Recovery Act. I sure hope there will be funds in the Recovery Act that might assist with the complete buildout of FasTracks also.
It’s the topic right below this thread:
http://www.coloradopols.com/sh…
…from the rest of Colorado. Another diabolic plan foiled.
Ok, so we all (me included) ping Ritter & the legislature for not coming up with anything extraordinary to fix the big problems in this state.
But they have managed to take us through this economic crash about as well as possible, and with the constraints of TABOR. Unlike California and now Kansas.
I appreciate the debate on talk radio and fairness doctrine.
It has been an invigorating 24 hours. I learned some things.
This exchange is precisely what could NEVER happen on talk radio. That is a shame and that is what I would like to see changed.