politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
Back in the Cronkite Era, the US government had a 'Fairness Doctrine' that granted all opposing views an equal amount of time to rebut an editorial. No one company could own more than two radio stations in a town.
After Watergate the Right saw how dangerous that kind of press was and did everything they could to destroy it.
Ronald Reagan started it, and the GOP Congress finished the job in 1996.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but am genuinely curious how "fairness" was counted. I feel we have a thing right now where one side will present a well reasoned, data driven, argument. And the other side will hastily throw together something based on vibes that mostly doesn't address the issue at all. But out of a sense of fairness our current media feels like it has to present both as though they're two equally effective tradeoffs when actually one is empty noise.
So I'd be very curious if this system has a way of preserving true fairness without devolving into false equality in some way. Obviously nothing is perfect, but I'm curious.
You could talk to people who were alive at the time.
I've seen tapes of those editorials. Usually the station would be fairly bland in it's presentation, and the opposition would respond in kind.
imho it was the 'Right To Life' movement that broke the old decorum. They could call their foes 'baby killers' with impunity.
If you're interested in the history of politics, look up Jerry Falwell and his Moral Majority. He was a preacher who mobilized others on the religious Right to organize. One of their most powerful tactics was to overwhelm the GOP stalwarts on their home turf. If the establishment folks expected 20 people at the monthly meeting, the Moral Majority folks would bring fifty. Pretty soon they had a lot of local sheriffs and county clerks in their pockets; it was a small step to get Congress members elected.