Source:
Mediaweek
http://www.mediaweek.com/
Feds Probe "Fake News" at 77 Stations
http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/recent_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002986110
Todd Shields
AUGUST 14, 2006
Federal regulators are asking scores of broadcasters whether
they failed to tell
viewers about the sponsors behind corporate video releases
presented as news, a
practice criticized by watchdog groups who say showing "fake
news" is an illegal
breach of trust with local communities.
The Federal Communications Commission has issued 42 formal
letters of inquiry to
holders of 77 broadcast licenses, the office of Commissioner
Jonathan Adelstein
said Monday.
"The public has a legal right to know who seeks to persuade
them so they can
make up their own minds about the credibility of the
information presented,"
Adelstein said. "Shoddy practices make it difficult for
viewers to tell the
difference between news and propaganda."
In April, Free Press and the Center for Media and Democracy
filed a complaint
with the FCC after the center conducted a study finding
unattributed video news
releases had been aired at 77 stations. It said owners of
those stations
included Sinclair Broadcast Group, News Corp.'s Fox
Television Stations, Clear
Channel Communications, Tribune Co. and Viacom/CBS. The
non-profit groups said
the practice "has infiltrated broadcast news programming
across the country."
The FCC did not immediately release who received its
letters, which Reuters
reported were to have been sent on Friday.
-------------------------------------
FPF: ALSO BIG BROTHER 'HATES OUR FREEDOM'?
Who's Watching?
By ERIC PETERS
Big Brother will be watching you for sure by 2008 -- the
year a proposed requirement that Event Data Recorders (EDRs)
become mandatory standard equipment in all new cars and
trucks will become law unless public outrage puts the kibosh
on it somehow.
EDRs are "black boxes" -- just like airplanes have. They can
record a wide variety of things -- including how fast you
drive and whether you "buckle-up for safety." The National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) wants EDRs to
be installed in every new vehicle beginning with model year
2008 -- on the theory that the information will help crash
investigators more accurately determine the hows and whys of
accidents.
BUT EDRS COULD -- AND LIKELY WILL BE -- USED FOR OTHER
PURPOSES AS WELL.
Tied into GPS navigation computers, EDRs could give
interested parties -- your local cash-hungry sheriff, for
example -- the ability to take automated ticketing to the
next level. Since the data recorders can continuously
monitor most of the operating parameters of a vehicle as it
travels -- and the GPS unit can precisely locate the vehicle
in "real time," wherever it happens to be at any given
moment -- any and all incidents of "speeding" could be
immediately detected and a piece of paying paper issued to
the offender faster than he could tap the brake. That's even
if he knew he was in the crosshairs, which of course he
wouldn't. Probably they'll just erect an electronic debiting
system of some sort that ties directly into your checking
account -- since the paperwork could not keep up with the
massive uptick in fines that would be generated.
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
If you think this is just a dark-minded paranoiac vision,
think again. Rental car companies have already deployed a
very similar system of onboard electronic monitoring to
identify customers who dare to drive faster than the posted
limit -- and automatically tap them with a "surcharge" for
their scofflaw ways. While this inventive form of "revenue
enhancement" was challenged and subsequently batted down by
the courts, the technology continues to be honed -- and
quietly put into service.
Already, 15-20 percent of all the cars and trucks in service
have EDRs; most of these are General Motors vehicles. GM has
been installing "black boxes" in its new cars and trucks
since about 1996 as part of the Supplemental Restraint (air
bag) system. Within a few years, as many as 90 percent of
all new motor vehicles will be equipped with EDRs, according
to government estimates -- whether the requirement NHTSA is
pushing actually becomes law or not.
The automakers are just as eager to keep tabs on us as the
government -- in part to keep the shyster lawyers who have
been so successfully digging into their deep pockets at bay.
EDRs would provide irrefutable evidence of high-speed
driving, for example -- or make it impossible for a person
injured in a crash to deny he wasn't wearing a seat belt.
Insurance companies will launch "safety" campaigns urging
that "we use available technology" to identify "unsafe"
drivers -- and who will be able to argue against that?
Everyone knows that speeding is against the law -- and if
you aren't breaking the law, what have you got to worry
about?
IT'S ALL FOR OUR OWN GOOD.
But if you get edgy thinking about the government -- and our
friends in corporate America -- being able to monitor where
we go and how we go whenever they feel like checking in on
us, take the time to write a "Thanks, but no thanks" letter
to NHTSA at
http://dms.dot.gov/
[and end]
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FOREIGN PRESS FOUNDATION
Editor: Henk Ruyssenaars
http://tinyurl.com/h3ft3
The Netherlands
fpf@chello.nl
Rex 84: FEMA's Blueprint for Martial Law in America
http://www.globalresearch.ca/PrintArticle.php?articleId=3010
=======================================
Stephanie Caruana
Author
The Gemstone File: A Memoir
stephaniecaruana@verizon.net
ENTER:
