Divided Government

At the AF roundtable last night, I argued less for John McCain than against Barack Obama, mainly on the idea that with an energized Democratic Senate and House (combined with a dying Teddy Kennedy), some form of nationalized health care was virtually inevitable. George Will adds another important point in his column today:

Unless McCain is president, the government will reinstate the equally misnamed “fairness doctrine.” Until Ronald Reagan eliminated it in 1987, that regulation discouraged freewheeling political programming by the threat of litigation over inherently vague standards of “fairness” in presenting “balanced” political views. In 1980 there were fewer than 100 radio talk shows nationwide. Today there are more than 1,400 stations entirely devoted to talk formats. Liberals, not satisfied with their domination of academia, Hollywood and most of the mainstream media, want to kill talk radio, where liberals have been unable to dent conservatives’ dominance.

The “Fairness Doctrine” is such an absurd joke I find it hard to comprehend. Should the government really be in the business of telling the media what ideas are appropriate to air, and which should be regulated? Are liberals really that concerned about AM talk radio? How can such an idea pass constitutional muster?

So yeah…if you want higher taxes, nationalized medicine, and the return of the fairness doctrine, vote for Barack Obama. He’s your guy.