American Taliban

Dust off your burkas, folks, as we witness some more idiocy from the GOP on the issue of indecency. The FCC's right to regulate over-the-air programming for indecent, obscene, and profane material stems from the fact that the air belongs to "the people".

"Most viewers do not differentiate between traditional TV and cable, so they do not know when they might be exposed to objectionable programming, Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, the head of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, told the National Association of Broadcasters in Washington. 'In this country, there has to be some standards of decency,' said Stevens, who said he would push for such legislation. The National Cable and Telecommunications Association, a trade group, said that people choose to pay for channels and, as part of their subscription, are able to block programming they do not want seen in their homes. Because of that, the group said, any legislation would face an uphill battle in court."

So, not content with levying fines for fart jokes (they are indecent because they describe an excretory function), this cretin from Alaska wants the FCC's reach to expand not just to basic cable, like Comedy Central, but even to pay cable, like HBO. And pay radio, like XM/Sirius. I'm sure nobody in the red states digs "6 Feet Under" or "Sopranos" or "Sex & the City". I'm sure this effort will go down real well. The point of indecency is to protect the children. It's easy for kids to get a radio or watch over-the-air TV. But unless children have a credit card, a cable TV account, and/or satellite radio in their own name, and they can pay the $75 nut each month on their own, the government shouldn't be regulating speech at all on these outlets. And since neither satellite radio nor TV nor cable TV use over-the-air broadcast frequencies that belong to the "people", they're free to do whatever the heckity heck they want.