A Diverse Group of Lefties

Here's the way the left will enact a Fairness Doctrine without actually calling it that:

A diversity committee at the Federal Communications Commission is raising the hackles of conservative watchdogs who say its ideological makeup is hardly diverse.

The FCC recently renewed the charter of its 31-member Advisory Committee on Diversity for Communications in the Digital Age, which is set to convene in Washington Thursday.

The committee's mission is to help "enhance the ability of minorities and women to participate in telecommunications and related industries," according to the FCC. In past years the committee has suggested remedies like changing the tax code to help minorities purchase radio and television stations.

But conservatives say the committee is one-sided and made up primarily of liberal activists who have something more than diversity in mind.

"The idea that we should have a diversity of ownership implies that we would have a diversity of people on the committee," said radio host Roger Hedgecock, founder of the Free Radio Coalition.

"The committee is a totally one-dimensional group of activists," said Hedgecock, who worries that the role of the committee will expand under President Obama, particularly when the president's appointments are confirmed and Democrats gain deeper control of the five-member commission that heads the agency.

This committee is not designed to encourage more ownership by minorities and women, but to require it. By forcing ownership by people who are more inclined statistically to liberal opinions it's hoped that more liberal opinion will get on the air and that conservative shows will be dropped. It's a backdoor way to get rid of conservative talk.

Of course, they also have to hope that these people are bad businesswomen (and minorities) and don't mind losing money by programming liberal talk. If there's one thing history has shown, liberal talk loses money.