A think tank headed by John Podesta, co-chairman of Obama's transition team, mapped out a strategy in 2007 for clamping down on talk radio using language that has since been parroted by both the Obama campaign and the new administration's White House website.
In June of 2007, Podesta's Center for American Progress released a report titled "The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio," detailing the conservative viewpoint's dominance on the airwaves and proposing steps for leveling the playing field.
"Our conclusion is that the gap between conservative and progressive talk radio is the result of multiple structural problems in the U.S. regulatory system," the report reads, "particularly the complete breakdown of the public trustee concept of broadcast, the elimination of clear public interest requirements for broadcasting, and the relaxation of ownership rules including the requirement of local participation in management."
The report then demonstrates how radio stations owned locally, or operated by female and minority owners, are statistically more likely to carry liberal political talk shows.
Therefore, the report concludes, the answer to getting equal time for "progressives" lies in mandating "localism" and "diversity" without ever needing to mention the "Fairness Doctrine."
To accomplish the strategy, the report recommends legislating local and national caps on ownership of commercial radio stations and demanding radio stations regularly prove to the FCC that they are "operating on behalf of the public interest" to maintain their broadcasting license.
And if stations are unwilling to abide by the FCC's new regulatory standards, the report recommends, they should pay spectrum-use fees directly to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting "with clear mandates to support local news and public affairs programming and to cover controversial and political issues in a fair and balanced manner."
In this way, the report concludes, between $100 million and $250 million could be raised for public radio, which will be compelled to broadcast via the old standards established by the "Fairness Doctrine."
Since the report's release in 2007, the Obama camp has twice gone on record advocating positions identical to Podesta's think tank.
Last summer, in denying the presidential candidate's support of the "Fairness Doctrine," Obama's press secretary said, "Sen. Obama supports media-ownership caps, network neutrality, public broadcasting, as well as increasing minority ownership of broadcasting and print outlets."
Further, the White House website lists on its technology agenda page that the president plans to "encourage diversity in the ownership of broadcast media, promote the development of new media outlets for expression of diverse viewpoints, and clarify the public interest obligations of broadcasters who occupy the nation's spectrum."
The backdoor approach to the "Fairness Doctrine"
