Why Trump’s threats against MSNBC carry more weight than if he attacked CNN
And, Senator Ernst disappoints
It’s easy to become numb to Donald Trump’s rantings but those who care about the First Amendment and freedom of the press should pay attention to his rant this week about MSNBC.
Trump posted on social media, in part, “MSNBC (MSDNC) uses FREE government airwaves. And yet it is nothing but a 24 hour hit job on Donald J. Trump and the Republican party for purposes of ELECTION INTERFERENCE.” And here’s the scary part: “It is the world’s biggest political contribution to the Radical Left Democrats who, by the way, are destroying our Country. Our so-called ‘government’ should come down hard on them and make them pay for their illegal political activity.”
First of all, what school did the stable genius go to where he did not learn how to type a simple sentence without all caps, or capitalizing the wrong words? My word processor nearly melted down offering grammatical suggestions to Trump’s sentences as I typed them.
Secondly, he’s wrong. I know. Shocking. MSNBC does not use public airwaves. It’s a CABLE network. (Oh, God, I did it, too. It’s contagious!) The word cable should give him some idea of how MSNBC is delivered into viewers’ homes.
It’s an important distinction. The nation’s television and radio stations are, indeed, licensed by the federal government to use the public airwaves. It makes sense to have the government bringing order to the airwaves. It keeps stations on the same frequency far enough apart geographically so their signals don’t interfere with each other. Those stations do not pay for that license. A federal broadcast license is a valuable commodity – the most valuable commodity a broadcaster owns. And it can be taken away by the government.
In addition to keeping stations off one another’s frequencies, the Federal Communications Commission has many other requirements of broadcasters. They must demonstrate serving the public interest. They must provide a certain number of programs each week aimed at children. They must prove they recruit employees from a variety of diverse communities. And broadcasters cannot use obscene language or show sexually explicit content.
That’s why Bill Maher on HBO’s Real Time can drop 20 F-bombs per minute, while Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel can’t. Cable and satellite operators are outside the reach of the FCC because they don’t use public airwaves.
Broadcast licenses can be yanked
Broadcasters must prove every eight years at license renewal time that they’ve obeyed all the FCC guidelines. Otherwise, the government can yank their license and give it someone else.
And that’s what makes Trump’s threat against MSNBC so dangerous. Because, although MSNBC is a cable network, it is owned by NBC, which also owns a bunch of local television stations that use the public airwaves.
Most NBC affiliates around the country are owned by other private companies, like WHO-TV in Des Moines, owned by Nexstar out of Texas, which contracts with NBC to run its programming. But all the major broadcast networks own stations in many of the biggest markets. They’re called “owned and operated” stations, or “O&O’s” for short. CBS owns the local CBS stations in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and eleven other big cities. Same for ABC, Fox, and NBC.
And that’s how a Trump-dominated FCC could punish MSNBC, by going after its parent company, which owns local stations using public airwaves. But if the government pulls their licenses they lose millions of dollars in revenue.
The same cannot be said of CNN, which is another frequent target of Trump. He can’t threaten them financially like he can MSNBC.
The scary part out loud
It’s hard to believe an American president would threaten a news organization because he or she disagrees with its news content. Isn’t that what dictators do in other countries?
Trump burnishes his credentials by attacking the news media. He calls reporters “the enemy of the people”. I get that. But we shouldn’t dismiss his words as idle threats. He’s proved time and again that he says the scary part out loud.
The guy who gets out of bed in the morning complaining about the weaponization of the government has no qualms about weaponizing the government for his own purposes. We should take him at his word.
Senator Ernst disappoints
I was really concerned when I saw the headline that Senator Joni Ernst had choked on some food and was rescued by Senator Rand Paul performing the Heimlich maneuver on her. I don’t agree with any of her policies, but I spent some time with her in 2014 when she first ran for the Senate, and I liked her personally. She has a firm handshake, and a direct gaze. She listens. Seems smart. Friends who worked with her in the Iowa Senate said she’s genuinely a nice person.
We’ve all had that moment when some food gets stuck and we think, is this it? It’s a scary moment. I was concerned for her.
Then I read her tweet afterwards: “Can’t help but choke on the woke policies Dems are forcing down our throats. Thanks, Dr. @RandPaul!” Wow.
Washington changes a person, I suppose. I felt like a fool. Can’t even let my political guard down for a moment to feel genuine concern for another human being without getting punched in the gut. What a disappointment.
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I agree with you about Joni Ernst. I foolishly thought she would thank Rand Paul then say something about what a great opportunity it was to remind people that learning about life saving measures is so important. That someone with that knowledge literally saved her life. Gave her way too much credit. Lesson learned.
I had the same reaction to Ernst. Disgusted by turning a life saving moment into a political crack. So tired of it.