General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: McClatchy reporter: 'Alarming power grab' of GOP by 'misguided group of extremists' [View all]fasttense
(17,301 posts)Though your evaluation of which stories the news went with is very good I think 2 other factors also played a role.
1. Equal time. Though the fairness doctrine didn't have the overwhelming control RepubliCONS like to claim it did, what it really did was offer the other side equal time to present their case if they wanted to. If for example Walter Cronkite had a story describing the unethical and immoral behavior of Nixon. The station had to turn around and offer equal time to RepubliCONS to present a differing opinion. But frequently the other side didn't take them up on the offer and/or the rebuttal was not advertised or given the same prime time.
2. Separation of commercial and news. News was only carried because the station, in exchange for having access to the people of the United States, had to show some public service and news was how they did it. Most stations did not expect to make money off their news programs. Not like the money they made off sports and beauty pageants. Most stations offered news as a way to meet the public good requirement of the fairness doctrine. Unfortunately Raygun did away with any public good requirement and now news shows are there to make money not report the truth.
Thank deregulation for yet another problem.