Mark Lloyd-Architect of the Fairness Doctrine?

Mark Lloyd-FCC Diversity Chief



That old bugaboo, the Fairness Doctrine, is still waiting in the wings. With Obama and the Democrats in power, only public vigilance is standing between us and the shutdown of conservative talk radio. Oh, the Henry Waxmans of the world will assure us that nothing is in the works...until, BAM! It's a done deal. Of course, they won't say that it's all about restoring balance to political talk radio. They have a more subtle way to get it done. It's called things like "localization" and "diversity". They are going to control licensing and who owns radio stations. They are going to hit private talk radio stations with so many regulations, they will all throw in the towel and switch to country music instead of talk shows. Enter Mark Lloyd, President Obama's new head of Diversity for the FCC.

Mark Lloyd comes right out of the Marxist playbook. He doesn't care a whit about freedom of speech. What Mr Lloyd cares about is the government controlling the dissemination of political thought over the airwaves.


Here is a clip (from the Glenn Beck Show on Fox News) showing Lloyd speaking at a conference in 2008, in which he sings the praises of Hugo Chavez and his handling of the media in Venezuela:

Did you catch the references to those evil property-owners in Venezuela and the US trying to oust Chavez? Does that give you some clues about Mr Lloyd's agenda?

Want more? Here is Lloyd commenting on the idea of freedom of speech in general:

“It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press,” he said. “This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.”

Prior to joining the White House, Lloyd was a senior fellow at the liberal think tank, Center for American Progress, established by Clinton Administration henchman, John Podesta. According to Wikipedia, here is what that outfit thinks about talk radio:

"The Center for American Progress was criticized by conservative commentators for its 2007 report titled "The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio."[15] The report states: "out of 257 news/talk stations owned by the top five commercial station owners reveals that 91 percent of the total weekday talk radio programming is conservative, and 9 percent is progressive." The report did not include analysis of the content of other radio providers, such as universities and public radio. The report suggests three steps to increase progressive radio voices in talk radio: restoring local and national caps on the ownership of commercial radio stations; ensuring greater local accountability over radio licensing; and require commercial owners who fail to abide by enforceable public interest obligations to pay a fee to support public broadcasting."

That is exactly what Mr Lloyd wants. He wants private outlets to pay to support that insipid, liberal, and publicly financed National Public Radio.

But you liberals, of course, have nothing to worry about. You will continue to have your MSNBC, AIR America, CNN and all your liberal newspapers. Those of you whose view of life has been shaped by David Letterman, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and Bill Maher will be just fine. But if I recall correctly, I used to hear liberals scream about freedom of speech not so many years ago. Do you really care about freedom of speech? Or only your speech? For those of you liberals who truly care about freedom of speech-for all-then you too should be concerned about what's coming down the pike. As for us conservatives, we need to stand up and scream just as loudly about this as we do about government health care.

Things are moving fast, folks.