A Bailout For Newspapers Too? Part Two

Last month, I posted about the Newspaper Revitalization Act. At the time of that posting, few took seriously the possibility that such a bailout, i.e., government control, of the print media could gain traction. The bill, proposed by U.S. Senator Benjamin Cardin, had no sponsors at the point of that previous posting and was limited to preserving local newspapers, not for the purpose of bailing out the media conglomerates.

Now comes this story from Fox News (hat tip to Weasel Zippers):

Obama Appointee Suggests Radical Plan for Newspaper Bailout

Rosa Brooks, who has moved from the L.A. Times to the Pentagon, called for more "direct government support for public media" and government licensing of the news, which critics say would destroy the independent media.

Influential Los Angeles Times columnist Rosa Brooks has hung up her journalistic hat and joined the Obama administration, but not before penning a public proposal calling for some radical ideas to help bail out the failing news industry.

Brooks, who has taken up a post as an adviser at the Pentagon, advocated upping "direct government support for public media" and creating licenses to govern news operations.

"Years of foolish policies have left us with a choice: We can bail out journalism, using tax dollars and granting licenses in ways that encourage robust and independent reporting and commentary, or we can watch, wringing our hands, as more and more top journalists are laid off," she wrote in her parting column on April 9.

Brooks said this would help rescue the industry from a "death spiral"...

But critics say her proposal would spell an end to the independent media and make journalists reliant lapdogs...

Read the rest.

A stepping stone to control of the media as portrayed by George Orwell's dystopia in 1984 via the control of what information and terminology the public can find available in the mainstream media? Welcome to Pravda USA!

Bill O'Reilly on the topic of Rosa Brooks:



WE THE PEOPLE can have all the Tax Day Tea Parties we want, but if the government gains extensive control of the media, those Parties will be in vain, particularly if there is no overall plan to continue the momentum of such a grassroots movement.