Two members of the FCC (Adelstein and Copps) came to Asheville for a town hall meeting, along with Josh Silver of FreePress. This was also hosted by League of Women Voters. On the panel that talked first was Wally Bowen (director of Mountain Area Information Network and WPVM), Jim Goodman (Capitol Broadcasting Company), Ken Salyer (Clear Channel), Gustavo Silva (Afrotina), and Virgil Smith (President of the Asheville Citizen Times).
The funniest one was Virgil Smith. He asked rhetorical questions of the audience and got the answers he DIDN’T expect. Then he proceeded to tell the 400+ people in the audience that we were wrong. It was pretty darn funny. My friend Clare said “I guess he didn’t know who we was dealing with here” which is a pretty telling statement. The president and publisher of the ONLY local daily paper does not know what kind of audience would come to a town hall meeting about media issues. I will post a transcript of this later, if it is available. Personally, I don’t feel the papers here locally are the problem; it is the ONLY local TV station and the local radio stations (some of them) that are the problem. The ones that are bad are always the ones owned and run by some big corporation from out of town.
Here is what I had to say in my two minutes, late in the evening, in front of the FCC:
In 2004, I wrote a 16-page report on Sinclair Broadcasting and sent it to the FCC via certified mail and never received any acknowledgement. That made me angry. Today, I see evidence that the US Government is making propaganda and passing it off as news and that makes me angry.
But what really has made me furious is how the US government and the military-industrial complex joined with the corporate media to start an illegal and immoral war of aggression. I saw them vilify the few dissenting voices that managed to break through; I saw them suppress information that contradicted the lies. The corporate media, along with their government lackeys, enabled this war to proceed by keeping Americans ignorant. They failed America. And they did it for profits, big huge bloody profits. And while Clear Channel, Sinclair Broadcasting and Gannett representatives here today claim they do cover local stories, I can assure you that dissenting voices did not make it over public airways at all and only saw print on the letters page.
(At this point, the guy from the Clear Channel station WWNC spoke up uninvited and said that his Clear Channel station did not do this. I responded that they vilified the Dixie Chicks for expressing their opinion, and he responded by saying that he played Dixie Chicks songs on his radio show. I think he clearly showed how they stifle dissent and vilify alternate opinions, even in the face of overwhelming evidence. It is clear to everyone that Clear Channel vilified the Dixie Chicks and it was a nation-wide campaign, prior to the start of the war.)
What I also did not see on the corporate media was the stories of the people who suffered because of this illegal war. Their voices were also silenced.
Today, I see the corporate media still ignoring dissenting and knowledgeable voices, while I see advertisements for Lockheed Martin and Boeing and other military hardware manufacturers on the public airways.
May God forgive the corporate media particularly Clear Channel and Sinclair Broadcasting and their government lackeys for the thousands of silenced innocents who died in this war and may God forgive them for the thousands of screams of agony that they ignored and may God forgive them for the future violence that will be visited on our homeland as the consequence of this war.
Like the Dixie Chicks, I am not ready to back down, I am not ready to make nice, I am mad as hell, and I don’t have time to go round and round and round. I don’t have time to write 16-page reports that are just ignored either. And as long as I have breath, I will speak for all those permanently silenced voices from this war of aggression. And as long as I have memory, I will not forget how the US corporate media and their government lackeys promoted and profited from this war.
I want to see media consolidation reduced significantly. I want to see diversity and local control on our media. I want the internet to stay democratic, with equal access to all sites and all information for all people. And since We the People believe that all people are created equal, I want to see all media franchises required to provide equal access to all citizens in all areas, not just to the wealthy and powerful. I believe the purpose of the FCC is to serve the public interest, not to make huge media corporations more profitable.
[I did not get to read this part, because I ran out of time. I timed my presentation ahead of time, so I can only assume I ran out of time because of the Clear Channel guy’s interruption and distraction.]
And lastly, I have one final wish for every corporate media person and the government lackeys at the FCC who enabled them. I wish they would have dreams every night of their lives for as long as they live, dreams where they hear the words, the songs, the laughter, and the cries of those that they have permanently silenced. And most importantly, I wish they would hear the blood curdling screams of the innocents as American bombs were dropped, and still being dropped, on their homes and loved ones.
UPDATE: The following was taken from the recorded post of the FCC meeting.
More on my presentation to FCC, concerning the interruption from a Clear Channel employee during my 2 minute speech.
Susan: for example, Dixie Chicks and Clear Channel…
MM: I played Dixie Chicks then
Susan: Well, they banned them and they urged people to burn them – not you but your employer did
MM: unclear what he said
Susan: No, your employer did that. (The moderator then said we should get back on track)
Back to script: I saw them suppress ……
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