FAIRNESS FOLLIES….For months conservatives have been nattering obsessively about how Democrats want to put their talk radio stars out of business by bringing back the Fairness Doctrine. It’s ridiculous. Barack Obama says he’s against it, there’s no serious legislation pending, and there’s no chance at all of any legislation passing. Given all that, then, it’s pretty annoying to hear Bill Clinton hand the talking heads some free ammunition on the subject. Here’s the Big Dog a couple of days ago:
Well, you either ought to have the Fairness Doctrine or we ought to have more balance on the other side, because essentially there’s always been a lot of big money to support the right wing talk shows and let face it, you know, Rush Limbaugh is fairly entertaining even when he is saying things that I think are ridiculous….
I don’t get it. Is there some kind of subtle three-cushion bank shot stategerizing going on here? Are we just trying to keep conservatives off balance over trivia? Or what? Because unless there’s some serious movement afoot to repeal the Fairness Doctrine — and I don’t think there is — Dems with big microphones really ought to just shut up about it.