Pressing for Reform — Critics Say First Amendment Loses in Media Consolidation, Focus on Stock Prices

By Michael Lollar / lollar@commercialappealcom

It was 2001 when Josh Silver turned on the 5 o’clock news and decided something was fishy about the news media in America.

“There were some serious issues going on in the world – things like Darfur, the buildup of what’s going on in Iraq, Iran and North Korea. I was in Washington, D.C., and the top story on that day was about the rising cost of lobster.

“I saw that story and thought, ‘The media is really bankrupt in this country, and, as a result, the public doesn’t know what’s going on in the world.’”

Silver telephoned two acquaintances, and together they set in motion what they would call “The National Conference For Media Reform,” a nonprofit effort to promote what they felt was the original intent of the First Amendment while arguing against the unbridled quest for more and bigger profits for corporate media owners. Silver, as executive director of Free Press, and his co- founders have staged two previous conferences and open the third, with more than 200 workshops on everything from radio and TV news to newspapers and the movie industry, here Friday at the Memphis Cook Convention Center.

Free Press was just getting started when one of the nation’s best- known media personalities was feeling the effect of corporate-run big media in 2002. Phil Donahue, who helped invent daytime TV talk shows, had begun a new talk show on MSNBC and invited several anti- war activists to talk about why the United States should not invade Iraq.

“I can’t get over how nave I was. I was on the air in the weeks and months preceding the invasion of Iraq, and the drumbeats for war were huge,” says Donahue. He says he saw himself as part of a media intended to be “the guard dogs, the people snipping at the heels of the powerful” and questioning the motives of those intent on going to war.

MSNBC required him to have two conservative guests for every liberal on the show, he says. His ratings were less than stellar, far behind Fox TV, the conservative bastion of the airwaves.

“What can be said is that the Donahue show led the entire night for MSNBC. We didn’t deserve to be canceled,” says the former host, who also says owner NBC offered “no support for the show, no promotion.”

Just before Christmas 2002, Donahue was canceled, leaving primarily comedians from Jon Stewart to Bill Maher as TV voices opposed to war.

“I guess a spoonful of laughter helps the medicine go down,” says Donahue, who agreed to be a panelist at the Memphis convention to lend his voice to anyone willing to support the idea that “corporate media is undermining American democracy. Too much media power is in the hands of too few people. These are bottom-line people who go to bed thinking about stock prices and wake up thinking about stock prices.”

For Silver, a former development director for the Smithsonian Institution, the same concerns became part of a mission. Free Press and its media reform efforts became a rallying cry for anyone concerned about growing consolidation of news media in the hands of a few corporations and journalism linked to stock prices. “You see stories about media conglomerates buying up newspapers and slashing newsrooms . . . If you’re a media owner and your only concern is making a profit, like GE and NBC or Viacom and CBS, you’re going to lay off employees and you’re going to avoid angering advertisers.”

In the process, Silver says, “Issues are getting short shrift while you can learn everything you want to know about ‘Brangelina’ and the fight between Donald Trump and Rosie O’Donnell.”

The media reform conferences have their share of celebrities with Academy Award-winning actresses Jane Fonda and Geena Davis as panelists, along with actor Danny Glover.

Free Press co-founder John Nichols, a political writer for The Nation magazine, says Fonda’s interest stems in part from “how the media portrays women and how difficult it is for women to get into ownership positions.” Other performers, from musicians to actors, are concerned about shrinking radio formats and movies filmed strictly for profit-making potential. “Actors and actresses say, ‘Sometime before I die I’d like to be in a movie I can be proud of,’ ” Nichols says.

The media conferences were intended to involve citizens.

“If citizens get involved and if the creative people make a noise, we hope that we can tip the balance a little bit,” Nichols says. “We’re not going to create nirvana, but we are going to put back a little something that has been lost. That is the free market.”

The war in Iraq helped crystallize growing concerns about and mistrust of the media, says Nichols, because many former supporters of the war felt betrayed when they learned there were no “weapons of mass destruction” once the United States invaded. That was in 2003 at a time when the Federal Communications Commission was considering loosening the rules to allow even further media consolidation in the country.

FCC commissioner Jonathan Adelstein says a former FCC chairman helped push what would have been “the most destructive rollback of media ownership rules in American history.” The FCC approved the rollback in a 3-2 vote, with Republicans voting for it and Democrats against it, he says.

In response, more than 3 million protests were filed by citizens, and a lawsuit challenging the FCC was upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals.

The media reform conference is what Adelstein calls “the Super Bowl of the media reform movement. What we (the FCC) do today matters. Those gathering in Memphis can make a big difference by going back to their communities and organizing.”

Lax FCC rulings in the past have allowed some companies, like Clear Channel, to acquire roughly 1,200 U.S. radio stations with as many as eight stations in some markets, says Nichols. “Before 1996, no one could own more than two stations in a single market, and nationwide, no more than 50.”

Once stations are acquired they are grandfathered in as part of a conglomerate and can’t normally be targeted for divestiture. For FCC commissioner Mike Copps, the “mess” of media ownership is overdue for an overhaul. “A number of presidents felt like the marketplace could solve all problems, and I think what this has proven is that that is demonstrably wrong. Public-interest obligations have gotten eviscerated. This is not just a business. It goes to the heart of what we are as a country.”

PBS-TV commentator David Brancaccio, host of the series “Now,” will moderate a panel discussion on the future of public television, but one of his primary interests is the state of the media generally.

“It is a fact that the news media in our country are broken,” he says. Surveys show more and more people cite local TV newscasts as a primary source of news. “A lot of them (local TV newscasts) stink. I find it heartening that people are asking, ‘Where are we getting our information?’ ” says Brancaccio.

Some are turning to the Internet for news, and Brancaccio says many confuse “commentary and blogging with real journalism. Real journalism is expensive. It’s a real challenge.”

For Memphian D’Army Bailey, a Circuit Court judge and civil rights activist who is on a panel at the conference, the media have become less receptive “to the voices of dissidents.” He hopes the Memphis conference “will leave a sense of strategy and commitment in this community . . . I’d like to see a strong coalition formed of blacks, particularly, from community to community across the country to put communications as a No. 1 priority for civil rights action. We’ve lost the media that we had in the ’60s. They don’t pay any attention to the underlying causes of poverty and racism in most cities, including our own. Now the whole news is corporate business. News is simply the hook to sell ads. We’ve got to reclaim the responsibility of the media, particularly electronic media.”

For panelist and media critic Ben Bagdikian, dean emeritus of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley, there are three reasons for the significance of the Memphis conference.

“News media, especially newspapers, have been pressured by Wall Street to raise their stock values, not because the papers weren’t profitable. Contrary to popular opinion, dailies make 20 to 25 percent profit a year. But they are in big con glomerates and Wall Street wants shares at big prices with mergers and cost cuts. So news has suffered.”

In addition, Bagdikian says the media need to keep the issue of torture – “the first time our highest officials have permitted torture” – on the public agenda and to be on guard against erosion of First Amendment freedoms in the post-Sept. 11 atmosphere.

-Michael Lollar: 529-2793

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MEDIA CONFERENCE

What: The National Conference for Media Reform

When: Friday 9:30 a.m.-11 p.m.; Saturday 8 a.m.-10:30 p.m.; Sunday 8 a.m.-1 p.m. For full schedule, visit the Web site: freepress.net

Where: Memphis Cook Convention Center

Sponsor: Free Press, a nonprofit media reform group based in Northampton, Mass., and Washington

Admission: Based on an “honor system,” it is $250 for supporters, $195 general admission and $75 for students or low-income activists. Registration is for the full three-day conference.

For more information: Visit the Web site freepress.net, or call Free Press at 866-666-1533 or 202-265-1490.

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“Issues are getting short shrift while you can learn everything you want to know about ‘Brangelina’ . . . “

Josh Silver

executive director, Free Press

“Too much media power is in the hands of too few people.”

Phil Donahue

former talk show host

“I find it heartening that people are asking, ‘Where are we getting our information?’ “

David Brancaccio

PBS-TV commentator

“Public-interest obligations have gotten eviscerated. This is not just a business.”

Mike Copps

FCC commissioner

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(c) 2007 Commercial Appeal, The. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.