People have been asking how they can help with the MZD2 Campaign for Congress.  It turns out there are lots of ways. 

 

Forward This E-Mail: The easiest and most inexpensive way to help is to Forward this Newsletter to your Friends and suggest that they check out what this campaign stands for.  In many ways that's an Endorsement as important as the Party's.

 

Attend a Fund Raiser:  Every political campaign needs money.  Here's a way you can open your checkbook and have some fun at the same time.  On Sunday, June 22nd, Norma and Phil Willis, of Jamestown, will open their seaside home for an elegant reception to benefit Mark's campaign.  Hob nob with like-minded Rhode Islanders, expand your personal network, and help out the cause of better government all at once.  To get your Invitation, Click Here.

 

Help Us Collect Signatures:  Starting July 1st the campaign has ten days to collect 500 nominating signatures from registered voters in the District. We'd like to collect many more than that, and at least some nominating signatures from each of the 20 cities and towns Mark hopes to represent.  It's a short assignment but a critically important one.  Will you volunteer?  campaign@markz4ri.org

 

Write Letters of Support: Newspapers throughout the District will be looking for the opinions of their readers on the issues of the day.  Do you agree with Mark on the Economy?  or Energy? or the need for a bias toward Smaller Government?  Then please write to the editor of your newspaper and say so.

 

In days gone by there were many fewer broadcast outlets than there are today and federal regulators took a much more aggressive hand in controlling topic matter, especially when it came to political messages.  The 'Fairness Doctrine' held that both sides of an argument should be given an airing so that viewers and listeners would be exposed to opposing views.  Twenty-one years ago the formal requirement for Equal Time was repealed because the explosion of cable TV, Radio and Internet Sites made access a non-issue.  Since that time there has been a proliferation of programs, especially on Talk Radio, that take a side and push it forcefully. 

 

Now there is serious talk in Congress of re-imposing the so-called Fairness Doctrine.  This is being discussed even though broadcast access is still growing exponentially and virtually anyone with an opinion can find a forum to express it.  So what's really going on?  The way I see it the growing trend towards Conservative Talk Shows is the result of market forces: That's what sells.  There have been plenty of attempts at copying the format with Liberal and even Socialist viewpoints, and no one seems to listen.  I don't think that means the government should insist that un-saleable formats have to be aired in equal measure with saleable shows in order for listeners to be allowed to hear the one of those that they want to hear.

 

That's why a bill is now in Committee called the Broadcaster Freedom Act that would protect the rights of broadcasters to decide what ideas sell in their markets by statute.  In fact it's bogged down in Committee because many there think the Bad Old Days took a better approach.  It's a ploy to kill the bill without going on record.  To counter that a Discharge Petition has been started to get the bill out to the floor for an Up or Down vote.  Today that petition has 194 of the 218 signatures it needs from House Members.

 

James Langevin has already voted against this bill once.  I'm afraid he's getting ready to do so again, this time by ignoring the petition to give it a fair hearing on the floor of the House.  If I were in the House today, I'd sign the petition and let the full membership decide.  I'd like to be able to ask my current Representative in Congress if he's already signed it, or if he means to.  I'd like to ask him that while I still have the right to do so On-Air.

 

John F. Kennedy stated, 'We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.'

I'm not afraid of the American People.  Is my opponent?  I don't know.  Why don't we all ask him?

 

- Mark Zaccaria

 

By the way, would you like to see what a Bill in Congress looks like?  The Broadcaster Freedom Act is only two pages long and it's pretty easy to understand.  Click Here