Liberals Urged to Take on 'Right-Wing Nuts' on Talk Radio

As reported here, "Rep. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt.) challenged liberals attending the "Take Back America" conference to take on the "right-wing nuts" on talk radio and demand that local radio stations and newspapers provide "alternative points of view.""

First of all, just who does he think he is, calling conservative talk radio hosts "right wing nuts"? Secondly, local media is saturated with "progressive points of view", with an even higher percentage of national media being "progressive" (read liberal), yet he wants liberals to "demand" that even more liberal points of view be heard. But Mr. Sanders wasn't content to just call conservative talk radio hosts "right wing nuts". He goes on to add this little nugget:

""If you have a right-wing station in your community, you've got to go up to those people and say, 'You've got to give us alternative points of view,'" he stated. "If you have a newspaper in your community that does not allow columnists from a progressive perspective, you've got to go challenge those people."" The last time I looked, Mr. Sanders, people in this country were allowed to run their companies in whatever way they see fit to, as long as it's within the law, so why should a conservative media outlet be made to provide a liberal alternative to existing programming? If that is the case, then wouldn't liberal media outlets have to allow conservative points of view to be heard as well? I mean, fair is fair, right? But that is not what Mr. Sanders wants at all, of course.

Mr. Sanders also goes on to decry "corporate control" of the media, but as Tim Carney with the free market-based Competitive Enterprise Institute says, ""It's fine for the congressman to worry about corporate ownership of the media, but it's dishonest of him to equate 'corporate' with 'right-wing,'"", adding, ""Sanders knows very well that big businesses are no free market swashbucklers or conservative crusaders - or maybe he's never heard of Ted Turner and George Soros.""

Also, " Michael Harrison, publisher of "Talkers magazine," disagreed with many of Sanders' other points.

"What he's saying doesn't fit within the First Amendment," Harrison told Cybercast News Service. "First of all, he's characterizing people he doesn't agree with as nuts, but they have legitimate points of view, just as the left has a legitimate point of view.

"And even nuts have the right to speak in this country," Harrison added.

Regarding conservative talk radio, Harrison said that "there's nothing wrong with somebody being successful and having a following. There's nothing illegal about it, either.

"There are other kinds of radio, too, as evidenced by the fact that Air America is out there, and we have National Public Radio" plus a wide variety of other formats, Harrison said.

In addition, "I think newspapers have the right to be whatever they want to be," Harrison said. "If you don't like it, start your own newspaper or don't frequent the advertisers.""

The fact that there is a certain segment of media pundits out there who happen to disagree with Mr. Sanders point of view - and are getting more attention than he is - doesn't make them "nuts". What is does make them is, Americans citizens exercising their rights to speak freely, just as Mr. Sanders felt free to express his "nutty" opinions.