{"id":122,"date":"2009-01-29T15:14:56","date_gmt":"2009-01-29T15:14:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lynnvsekulow\/2009\/01\/democrats-help-limbaugh.html"},"modified":"2009-01-29T15:14:56","modified_gmt":"2009-01-29T15:14:56","slug":"democrats-help-limbaugh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2009\/01\/democrats-help-limbaugh.html","title":{"rendered":"DEMOCRATS HELP LIMBAUGH"},"content":{"rendered":"

As you pointed out, Jay, earlier this week the Democrats handed Rush Limbaugh a major victory: they made him relevant again.  Of course, President Obama’s comment to the Republicans about not “listening” to Limbaugh was supposed to be ironic, as in, this is the wing of your party that is really out to lunch.  The DCCC “petition<\/a>” is just one more fundraising gimmick–and a bad one at that.  I’m sure that Limbaugh will be converting to the Democratic Party if just a few million people tell him they are upset with him.  (And, oh yes, a pig just flew by my window.)<\/p>\n

The broader point you attempt to make is that this is all prelude to some Democratic plot to quell right-wing talk radio.  And you invoke the dreaded “Fairness Doctrine<\/a>.”  During the time the “doctrine” was in place, it had very little positive effect and zero negative effect.  Here’s what it was and wasn’t.  It was not an “equal time” rule, requiring a balanced coverage of all issues by each show.  Indeed, it didn’t even cover specific shows, including shows by, say, Jay Sekulow<\/a> or Barry Lynn<\/a> (or that Limbaugh fellow).  It was designed to push local radio and television stations to present alternative views where an issue had become a local matter of controversy.  It was crafted under the unremarkable theory that since the electromagnetic spectrum is a finite resource and it was “sold” to certain people in the form of licenses to broadcast on specific frequencies, owners had some modicum of responsibility to serve the needs of a broadcast area. <\/p>\n

The Fairness Doctrine, in its entire history, was only partly responsible for two broadcasters<\/a>‘ failure to renew their licenses. The U.S. Supreme Court<\/a> has upheld the doctrine, and not even the ACLU saw it as a First Amendment problem.<\/p>\n

 
And by the way, Obama said<\/a> he doesn’t even support the Fairness Doctrine. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As you pointed out, Jay, earlier this week the Democrats handed Rush Limbaugh a major victory: they made him relevant again.  Of course, President Obama’s comment to the Republicans about not “listening” to Limbaugh was supposed to be ironic, as in, this is the wing of your party that is really out to lunch.  The DCCC…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":164,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,3,36],"tags":[60],"class_list":["post-122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress","category-election-08","category-free-speech","tag-fairness-doctrine-barack-obama-rush-limbaugh-radio-aclu"],"yoast_head":"\nDEMOCRATS HELP LIMBAUGH - Lynn v. Sekulow<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2009\/01\/democrats-help-limbaugh.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"DEMOCRATS HELP LIMBAUGH - Lynn v. 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Lynn","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/32b\/32b0f12cad840c65bff61ad01e2664aax96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/32b\/32b0f12cad840c65bff61ad01e2664aax96.jpg","caption":"Rev. Barry W. Lynn"},"description":"Since 1992, the Rev. Barry W. Lynn has served as executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington, D.C.-based organization dedicated to the preservation of the Constitution's religious liberty provisions (www.au.org). In addition to his work as a long-time activist and lawyer in the civil liberties field, Lynn is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, offering him a unique perspective on church-state issues. An accomplished speaker and lecturer, Lynn has appeared frequently on television and radio broadcasts to offer analysis of First Amendment issues. News programs on which Lynn has appeared include PBS's \"NewsHour,\" NBC's \"Today Show,\" Fox News Channel's \"O'Reilly Factor,\" ABC's \"Nightline,\" CNN's \"Crossfire,\" CBS's \"60 Minutes,\" MSNBC's \"Countdown with Keith Olbermann,\" Fox News Channel's \"Hannity & Colmes,\" ABC's \"Good Morning America,\" CNN's \"Larry King Live\" and the national nightly news on NBC, ABC and CBS. On the radio, Lynn serves as host of \"Culture Shocks,\" a daily look at various issues affecting society and the culture. In the 1990s he served for two years as regular co-host of \"Pat Buchanan and Company\" and after that did a weekly syndicated radio program, \"Review of the News,\" with Col. Oliver North. Lynn is a regular guest on nationally broadcast radio programs, including National Public Radio's \"All Things Considered,\" \"Morning Edition\" and \"Talk of the Nation,\" as well as having appeared on national networks such as CBS Radio, CNN Radio, ABC Radio and AP Radio. Lynn began his professional career working at the national office of the United Church of Christ, including a two-year stint as legislative counsel for the Church's Office of Church in Society in Washington, D.C. From 1984 to 1991 he was legislative counsel for the Washington office of the American Civil Liberties Union. In 2006, Lynn authored Piety & Politics: The Right-Wing Assault On Religious Freedom (Harmony Books). In 2008 he coauthored (with C. Welton Gaddy) First Freedom First: A Citizen's Guide to Protecting Religious Liberty and the Separation of Church and State (Beacon Press). Lynn writes frequently on religious liberty issues, and has had essays published in outlets such as USA Today, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Nation. Lynn also has op-eds published frequently by the McClatchy and Scripps-Howard newspaper chains. A member of the Washington, D.C. and U.S. Supreme Court bar, Lynn earned his law degree from Georgetown University Law Center in 1978. In addition, he received his theology degree from Boston University School of Theology in 1973. Lynn, who was born in Harrisburg, Pa., and raised in Bethlehem, Pa., lives in Chevy Chase, Md., with his family.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/author\/blynn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/164"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}