Still on the subject of Fighting for Air: The Battle to Control America’s Media by Eric Klinenberg

Dating back to 1975 the FCC had a cross-ownership ban in place that stated that one entity could not own cross own broadcast and newspaper companies in the same market. In 2000, the FCC revisited this ban. It was determined that if the ban were lifted the American people would suffer because there would be a lack of view point diversity. (This lack of diversity began to take hold of radio with the Telecommunications Act in 1996). The Tribune Company fought this with (as you may guess) MONEY. It went on a spending spree for lobbyist from 2000 to 2003. They tripled their spending during this time. It worked. in 2003 the ban was lifted to such a degree that one company could own 45% of a NATIONAL audience. (press release from 2003 http://money.cnn.com/2003/06/02/news/companies/fcc_rules/ )

Fortunately, to some degree, this was revisited in 2011 and Federal Courts urged the FCC to old cross-ownership ban. The some degree lies in the fact that even though changes were made the damage had already been done. Companies that seized the opportunity and gobbled up markets were “grandfathered in” and allowed to stay as one entity. (link to article regarding the courts and FCC http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/3rd-circuit-tells-fcc-to-rewrite-media-ownership-rules).

The FCC failed Americans in those (approx) 8 years. There is no turning back from the media conglomerates created during the years the ban was lifted. My question is, how is the being “grandfathered in” allowed to happen? The South had tried this with limiting Black votes with the Grandfather Clause. Is it just me that believes they are one in the same?

notjustmythoughts