Quote:
Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
The Red Lion Broadcasting rationale for FCC regulation of content of "airwaves" as a public good is only tenuously connected with the rationale for regulating cable content. I'm not an FCC lawyer, but as I understand it the Red Lion rules are waning as applied to cable; it's just a gradual process.
|
Put alternatively, though, the emergence of cable undermines significantly the reasoning of Red Lion. That case, from the 60s (or sometime well before most cable) relied on teh allocation of scarce spectrum to justify fair and balanced political coverage. That doesn't hold much water any more, and applies not at all to obscenity.
Even if it does--we can ask more of broadcasters who were given free licenses--it seems thin at best: We're not saying "give a little back, in the form of required fair coverage, in exchange for your license" we're saying "you can't use certain words on broadcast tv." But the rationale is not an NEA/golden rule matter of "if you want the gov't handout you can say only x". Rather, it's protection of hte viewing public. Given that's the rationale, why doesn't it apply to
allregulated broadcasting (whether OTA or otherwise) entities?
