March 5, 2015
Dear Liberty,
On February 26, 2015, the FCC captured our last real frontier of freedom while the majority of Americans cheered and celebrated its surrender. They supported a non-elected panel of five people accept 302 pages of regulations, which they refused to let the American people see until after the vote.
Utopian promises and glowing claims of cheaper costs, better service and less restrictions captivated many unsuspecting followers like Michael Moore to a jelly donut. Unfortunately people didn’t hear the similar rhythm of another song and dance performed regarding another bill that needed to pass before we could see what was in it. “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.” “If you like your plan, you can keep your plan.” “Healthcare costs will go down, saving families $2500.” “Services will be much better.” Well, we found out what was in it and it was even worse than was warned about.
Government regulation rarely if ever saves money. That’s just economics 101. Proponents claimed it would allow less regulation on the Internet. However, the Internet was already an open platform without regulation. The Internet was the freest market America had seen since Woodrow Wilson began to chip away at freedom. Anyone who has an idea and the motivation can start a web business. That will all end quickly when the FCC requires applications and licenses for each new business. Along with fees, other FCC requirements, and application denials by bureaucrats, small businesses will be squashed all over the country.
But that’s just the beginning. Opponents warning of content freedom being suppressed were mocked and ridiculed by supporters. It took only the weekend after it passed for the truth to start coming out. The details of the FCC package were finally reviewed and revealed to the American public. Those demanding and cheering this power grab are now becoming worried that the freedom they professed would remain is in fact eroding. Google confirmed content control warnings as they already try to get search results regulated. They want the most factual sites to come up first instead of the most popular. But who decides that? My letters are extensively researched for authenticity. I have spoken out strongly against evolution (see Sleeping Beauty, The Science Is Settled, Is There Any Intelligent Life Out There?, Leap Of Faith, and Evolution Explodes), global warming (see The Science Is Settled, Part II, and Actions Speak Louder Than Words), gay marriage (see We Reserve The Right To Refuse Service, What Is Love?, and Separation Of Church And State), liberalism, Obama (see Glass Houses, Robbin' Hood: The Prince Of Thieves and Wolves In Sheep's Clothing), government overreach and Islamic radicalism (see Family Feud, COEXIST, Washington, Adams, And Mohammad: Our Founding Fathers, Holocaust: Then & Now, I Am Garland, A Crusade For The Truth, To The Shores Of Tripoli). Since all these stances go against the government, will my opposition be enough for my letters be considered less factual than the “accepted” view to the powers that be? Google already does such things for the Chinese government. How long until it is labeled “hate speech?”
As they said in All the President’s Men, “Follow the Money”. Who is behind the scenes pushing and funding this FCC control? The list is a who’s who of socialist organizations and people: Media Matters, Open Society Foundations (George Soros), Ford Foundation, Center for American Progress, Free Press, Mark Lloyd, formerly of the FCC, and the White House, to name just a few. Together Soros and the Ford Foundation gave $196 million to groups supporting the measure. Most of the driving force can be traced back to extreme Liberal groups, many who follow Saul Alinsky’s Socialist and Communist teachings, pushing for “public” control of the media. It sounds good. Yet when socialists use the word “public” it means “government”, as in public sector vs private sector. To urge public ownership sounds like citizens are allowed to control it. However, that is the very definition of free private markets. Public means the government controls it and the people lose their rights to it. Socialists constantly pervert the language to mislead. As Hitler said, “By the skillful and sustained use of propaganda, one can make a people see even heaven as hell or an extremely wretched life as paradise.”
One of the supporters of Net Neutrality is Free Press founder and former editor of Monthly Review, An Independent Socialist Magazine, Robert McChesney. McChesney’s tactics mimic Lenin who used the Russian paper, Pravda, ironically meaning “truth”, to push his Communist agenda. Lenin exerted editorial control over the paper using it as an indoctrination tool for the communist revolution. (see Communism's Rise) Robert also uses his publications for propaganda. The erroneously named Free Press was a main driving force of Net Neutrality. Proclaiming capitalism killed journalism due to the industrialization of the media, he believes owners of papers controlled the information released. He believes that information belongs to the public. What is his definition of public? He wants the government managing the news instead of free citizens, just like Lenin. This is why he has no problem with the intimidation, threats and even jailing of journalists by this administration. Socialists can never allow journalists to report honestly on their actions. Only the free and private Internet reporters have been able to openly reveal and warn the American people of the true actions of our government.
Mark Lloyd, a former Center for American Progress employee, was appointed FCC Chief Diversity Officer in 2009. Completely open about his advocacy for public media, he reveled in the position created just for him at the FCC. After Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez began financially choking groups critical of his regime and revoking over 200 radio licenses, Lloyd praised Chavez’s success in taking control of news outlets critical of his policies. Lloyd has been intimately involved in championing Net Neutrality for the FCC, claiming individual Internet freedom for the people while praising dictatorial government domination.
Sharyl Attkisson, former CBS News reporter, exposed that major, damning stories were ignored by CBS news executives. Her reports were buried, including a highly incriminating Benghazi investigation. She watched as her computer was hacked and valuable research was targeted and erased. The President of CBS News, who is conveniently the brother of a top Obama Official, repeatedly covered up damaging reports by Sharyl and others. Now Sharyl is a free private reporter and is exposing the truth of our government. Thanks to McChesney and Lloyd, Net Neutrality just gave government the power to discredit, shut down and silence those “unofficial” private journalists like Attkisson.
The future of Net Neutrality can be plainly seen by looking at the history of the FCC, radio and television broadcasting. Until the creation of the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) in 1926, people could transmit private radio programs from their own home on the AM band. Anything could be aired. When the FRC was created it was given the authority to regulate and assign frequency levels and approve or reject broadcaster’s licenses. This power gave bureaucrats control over content. Groups claiming commercial media dominated programing insisted that there must be equality in programming through regulation, overriding free market demand. Quality and advancement was stifled as the government implemented more and more regulations, allowing politics to dictate the media's behavior. The Radio Act of 1927 mandated stations give equal opportunities for all political candidates, suppressing political freedom. To avoid the problem, AM radio was eventually reduced to cooking, repair and other unpopular shows. Even today the FCC continues to flex its muscles by threatening broadcasting licenses over programming choices.
The FCC is comprised of five members, each representing a geographical radio zone. The 1928 David Amendment to the Radio Act required each of these zones to have the same number of licenses, operation times, station power, and wavelength. As a result, qualified applicants were denied licenses because it would violate the zone’s quota. Heavily populated areas were forced to tolerate the same number of stations as the sparsely populated regions. Instead of letting free market demand dictate station supply, “fairness” and “equality” was enforced.
In 1934, the FRC was replaced by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which instituted the Fairness Doctrine for both radio and television in 1949. It required both mediums to offer opposing views without insisting on equal time for those presentations. What’s to stop the FCC from implementing the same “fairness” and “equality” requirements with individual Internet sites? As the media outlets became more and more liberal, whole segments would be devoted to their agenda with only a simple statement of contrast given as the counter, usually in the last paragraph. Due to government control there were no options for conservative or libertarian alternatives.
This policy remained intact until its dismantling by the 1987 FCC panel. The Democratic controlled Congress passed a law to keep the Fairness Doctrine in place but President Reagan vetoed it. With a freer market back in play, consumers thirsting for their voices to be represented sent Rush Limbaugh to the top of the ratings charts. FoxNews was overwhelmingly received by citizens, filling a much neglected void for the American people.
As the Internet became an impactful information vehicle in the mid-1990’s, the Clinton White House wrote a memo warning of the influence and damage this unregulated medium could pose to their news monopoly. Once Matt Drudge exposed President Clinton’s sexual relationship with an intern in 1998, all their fears became a reality. The strictly controlled media monopoly was in serious jeopardy. Washington elitists, both Democrats and some Republicans, secretly desired to limit the Internet. Mainstream media and liberals began their attack on unlicensed, unrestricted and uninhibited writers and still claims Fox News is not really news. Sarah Palin said it best, “The real reason they feared him (Drudge) was because he wasn’t beholden to the old media’s machine and the Thought Police. Unshackled, he was free.”
Furious that radio personalities such as Rush, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck and others dominated talk radio, Nancy Pelosi tried again in 2009 to revive the Fairness Doctrine. After the liberal Air America failed to gain any sort of following, Nancy insisted on government regulation to ensure “fairness” over the airwaves. Apparently forcing you to consume their viewpoint would “level the playing field.” Net Neutrality is just the Fairness Doctrine for the Internet.
By giving the government the power to pick winners and losers, people like William Randolph Hearst are chosen to control the information that actually reaches the masses. Practicing a type of reporting dubbed “yellow journalism”, Hearst used sensational headlines and fabricated stories to manipulate public opinion and sell his newspaper. He became so powerful, he was able to boldly tell his artist, “You furnish the pictures and I’ll furnish the war.” (see Yellow Journalism: The Birth Of Fake News)
In 1968, because there was no accountability through alternative media due to the Fairness Doctrine, Walter Cronkite reported that the Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War was a defeat for South Vietnam and America. With no one willing or able to contradict Cronkite, the most respected man in television news, the lie flourished becoming a turning point for American support for the war. Some say he single-handedly lost a war America had already won. The power of such propaganda is so strong that to this day most people still believe we lost the Tet Offensive. The truth was it was a complete disaster for North Vietnam. Cronkite’s reporting turned an overwhelming American victory into an embarrassing defeat. Hitler maintained, “If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.” This can only be achieved with government control of the media as Lenin, Alinsky, McChesney, Lloyd, and Obama believe.
Knowing that regulation of content would be impossible to garner wide support by the people, those like McChesney and Lloyd argued that if we got rid of the Net Neutrality concept, the Internet would fall apart. Net Neutrality was critical to the future of the Internet and government regulation was the only fix. At the forefront was the Comcast-Netflix argument. Netflix, a favorite online streaming service, began dominating Comcast's available bandwidth forcing other Comcast customers to suffer. To keep production up Comcast decided Netflix should pay their fair share, which was why Netflix started pushing for regulation. They didn’t want to pay their fair share for a product they are using. People adamant in ensuring nothing would interrupt their video streaming of The Walking Dead, jumped on board Netflix’s cause. However, the free market allowed Netflix to negotiate with Comcast and the two companies came to an agreement resolving the issue without government interference. Having the government force Comcast to provide a service for a fixed cost regardless of client usage, which this regulation promises to do, is hardly free market. The truth is nothing was in danger until the FCC bill was passed.
Another Net Neutrality argument was it would prevent monopolies, keeping big businesses from demanding higher prices and reducing service to the consumer. Unfortunately, big businesses like Netflix and Comcast are already in bed with the government. Many of them even had input in the Net Neutrality package. If this was truly about preventing monopolies, then why is the FCC still likely to pass several impactful mergers including Comcast and Time Warner, allowing them to become one major monopoly?
That’s my 2 cents.
Love,
Mom
NET NEUTRALITY:
THE TIE THAT BINDS
