Embarrasment of the Riches

John Edwards sees the prospect of losing me to Chris Dodd, raises me a letter to the FCC about the other massive giveaway to corporate America revealed yesterday:

Dear (FCC) Chairman Martin:

I urge you to cease your efforts to radically rewrite the rules preventing excessive media consolidation. You and your fellow commissioners have the responsibility to ensure that our nation's media is open, democratic and as diverse as the American people, and not – like too much of our economy and our political system today – dominated by the wealthiest Americans, large corporations and their lobbyists. Rewriting the ownership rules in the manner you propose is contrary to that responsibility.

For decades, administrations of both parties and the FCC have tolerated and even encouraged the extreme consolidation of our media. In just the two years after telecommunications deregulation in 1996, the ownership of nearly half of America's radio stations changed, and by 2000, one media company had acquired over 1,100 radio stations. Eight business conglomerates now control the majority of media content in America, and two-thirds of all independently-owned newspapers have shut down since 1975.

Any benefits to consumers from vertical integration have been overwhelmed by the threats to competition, fair pricing and journalistic independence. The result of all this over-concentration, Mr. Chairman, is a poorer democracy, with a few loud corporate voices drowning out independent perspectives and local participation.

High levels of media consolidation threaten free speech, they tilt the public dialogue towards corporate priorities and away from local concerns, and they make it increasingly difficult for women and people of color to own meaningful stakes in our nation's media. Rather than further weakening efforts to ensure a diverse media, as you now propose, the FCC should instead be strengthening media ownership and concentration limits so that a few huge multinational corporations are not in charge of shaping our democracy.

When your predecessor Chairman Powell made a similar attempt, nearly 3 million highly diverse Americans wrote to the FCC to express their grave concerns. I hope that you and your fellow commissioners can find the will to continue to deny the ambitions of a small number of media executives and their lobbyists, in the interest of advancing a fuller, fairer democracy.

Yours sincerely,

John Edwards

The fight against Michael Powell's efforts to loosen media ownership rules was one of the first people-powered movements. It would be repeated 10 times over if Martin continues with this nonsense. We need to be making those ownership rules more restrictive, not less, and we should be encouraging media diversity, not agglomeration.

Edwards and Dodd are running campaigns the right way - by showing leadership instead of talking about it. I hear Joe Biden is signing on to Dodd's hold on the awful telecom immunity bill; that's good too, and it shows how leadership is contagious. Our problem in the Democratic Party right now is a dearth of true leadership, combined with the fact that the person running away with the primary has no interest in taking that mantle. Which is why I think an outpouring of support for leaders like Dodd and Edwards may force her to take notice.

UPDATE: Like I said, leadership is contagious. Obama wants the head of the Voting Rights Division at the Justice Department fired. How about putting a hold on the Mukasey confirmation until that happens, Barack?

In a letter today, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) urged the acting attorney general to fire voting rights section chief John Tanner. Citing Tanner's remarks earlier this month that "minorities don't become elderly the way white people do: They die first," Obama wrote that "Through his inexcusable comments, Mr. Tanner has clearly demonstrated that he possesses neither the character nor the judgment to be heading the Voting Rights Section." He concluded: "For that reason, I respectfully request that you remove him from his position."