Slashdot Mirror
FCC's Powell vs. Howard Stern on KGO-AM
Lauren Weinstein writes "Greetings. Tuesday morning on KGO-AM radio in the San Francisco Bay area, host Ronn Owens was interviewing FCC Chairman Michael Powell when Howard Stern called in. The resulting exchange was certainly interesting. The audio clip is available via my blog.
that was fast.
I told people 6 months before his sattelite deal that he was going to jump when his contract expired and all his complaining was just an excuse for it. Now he's just keeping his name out there and his value up.
Who the hell would post and link to an audioclip on their server to slashdot.
How about a transcript? I can't very well listen to audio, especially not howard stern at the office... ;)
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
The funny part I heard on the radio this morning was Michael Powell denying his family connections had anything to do with his appointment. I would have more respect for him if he had combined his answer 'look at my resume' with an acknowledgement that all political appointments are just that -- political.
And why not throw up the Coral as well.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
What if the result of more people voting is exactly the opposite of what you want?
Oprah didn't get fined for talking about tossed salads on her show, Bono didn't get fined for saying the horrible F word on live TV. But after janet's nasty boob popped out, they pulled a 3 year old tape of the stern show and deemed it indecent, then fined Viacom the biggest indecency fine in history. The point is, how are radio people supposed to jnow what's indecent, when they pull 3 year old stuff to fine you with? Michael Powell is the head of the FCC, and is responsible for this nonsense. I hope he's replaced very soon.
Did Howard forget to bring them up? What kind of Stern shows this ?!?!
Transcript of the conversation can be found on Jeff Jarvis's Buzzmachine.
(Sorry Jeff)
Come on, seriously now, who HASN'T gotten at least one job from a friend/family member/spouse/etc. I understand that this is a bit bigger, but powell saying he got the job because of his resume and not his father is like Paris Hilton saying she's famous because she's pretty. There are a lot of unfamous prettier people and a lot of more qualified candidates for this position not named Powell.
Let's get one thing perfectly clear, I did not vote for George W Bush, and I do not endorse what he does or says.
"
"The audio clip is available via my blog."
That's a self-negating statement if I've seen heard one.
yes, we have no bananas
Here's a tip but it's not well publicized (esp useful to people on dialup)
;-)
n _Call.mp3" without the spaces put in by /. and without the doublequotes.
STEP 1: Open your favourite text editor (or operating system, as the case may be
STEP 2: Type in "http://brokenwindow.ca.nyud.net:8090/images/Ster
STEP 3: Save it as "whatever.m3u". Open it in the media player of your choice, and it will be streamed instead of downloaded. Hurrah!
Here are streaming (media player) links:
http://www.sftalk.com/stern1.m3u - Part 1
http://www.sftalk.com/stern2.m3u - Part 2
http://www.sftalk.com/stern3.m3u - Part 3
As much as I like Howard Stern's radio show, he's really hurting his own cause at this point.
Accusing Michael Powell of nepotism will get him air time on the Today show, but it hardly has the same impact of Jon Stewart taking on the Crossfire hosts on the actual ISSUES in media.
By the way, I strongly suspect that's what's happening here...Jon Stewart is getting a lot of positive attention appearing on other people's shows, 60 Minutes, Crossfire, so Howard Stern jumped on the bandwagon. There's a huge difference, though. Jon Stewart made valid, well thought out points, backing them up with facts, even quotes from his show, even though he certainly had an axe to grind.
Howard just called Michael Powell names. I'd expect that from Stuttering John.
One more year and Howard will be off the terrestrial radio and onto my Sirius - then the FCC can go after Oprah all it wants. Supposedly they truly are investigating her. Sure.
He should just stop this childish behavior for now and leave things alone, he's not helping his case at all.
Powell handles himself well: he can talk sense on the fly. I'd say he has a lot upstairs. Much of what the FCC has been doing is pretty wrong, but that's what politicians do, and we can't even give Powell all the blame, since he's not the only FCC commissioner.
Stern didn't make much sense, and didn't want to hear anything that didn't fit his conspiracy theories. He sounded spiteful and small. At least his ``good luck to Michael Powell'' sounded sincere. Maybe he realizes that without the notoriety the FCC has given him, he probably wouldn't be moving to satellite radio.
See what I've been reading.
Please dont represent it as one.
Stern: Ronn, hi.
Owens: Is this who I think it is?
Stern: Yeah, and I want to say hi to the commissioner and a friend of mine told me the commissioner said he was going to be on the show....
The commissioner has fined me millions of dollars for things I have said and consistently avoids me and avoids me and I wonder how long he will stay on the phone with me.
Owens: Go ahead and ask your questions.
Stern: Hi, Michael, how are you?
Powell: Hi, Howard, how are you?
Stern: Does it make you nervous to talk to me?
Powell: It does not....
Stern: All right, so well, I've got about ten zillion questions for you because you honestly are an enigma to me.
The first question being: How did you get your job? It is apparent to most of us in broadcasting that your father got you your job. And you kind of sit there:
You're the judge, you're the arbiter, you're the one who tells us what we can and can't say on the air and yet I really don't think you're qualified to be the head of the commission. Do you deny that your father got you this job?
Powell: Well, I would deny it exceedingly. You can look at my resume if you want, Howard. I'm not ashamed of it and I think it justifies my existence. I was chief of staff of the antitrust division, I'm an attorney, I was a clerk on the court of the United States I was a private attorney I have the same credentials that virtually anyone who sits in my position does and I think it's a little unfair that just because I happen to have a famous father and other public officials don't that you make the assumption that is the basis on which I sit in my position.
Owens: Caller already asked this question so move on....
Stern: So out of all the people that sit on the commission, you were moved to the head of the class. I don't buy your explanation but OK.
You know, the thing that amazes me about you is, you continually fine me but you're afraid to go to court with me and I'll explain myself if you give me a second:
Fine after fine came and we tried to go to court with you to find out about obscenity and what your line was and whether our show was indecent, which I don't think it is. And you do something really sneaky behind the scenes. You continue to block Viacom from buying new stations until we pay those fines.
You are afraid to go court. You are afraid to get a ruling time and time again.
When will you allow this to go to court and stop practicing your form of racketeering that you do by making stations pay up or you hold up their license renewal?
Powell: First of all, that's flatly false.
Stern: It's not false. It's true.
Powell: I'm afraid it is. There's no reason why Viacom or any other company who feels that they have been wrongly fined can't sue us in court. We have no basis whatsoever to prevent them from going to court.
Stern: You're lying. I've lived through your fines, Michael. And Mel Karmazin came to me one day and said, Howard, we're gonna have to pay up some sort of cockamame (sp?) bunch of fines that we don't we're wrong because we can't get our paperwork done. We are finding it increasingly difficult to boy radio stations. I know you're not telling the truth. And I question why you are selected to be one who is the FCC commissioner....
I'm going to Sirius satellite radio....
Owens: That's the question I was going to ask. Now he's going to go to satellite. One of the things that I read is that there are people who said cable TV, satellite radio, that ought to fall under the aegis of the FCC that content there...
Stern: Nobody's saying that... That's not going to happen. Michael knows that. This is the guise of the public airwaves. Michael's a Republican He knows that the marketplace....
Owens: By the way, weren't you appointed by Clinton?... No, no, no, no, he was appointed head of the FCC by George W. Bush.
Powell: Howard, the only thing I would ask is that if we're going to b
Best Windows Freeware
I read the transcript. Regardless of whether you agree with him, Powell held his own with dignity and respect. Stern's used the "Big Lie" strategy: Repeat something enough, and it seems like truth. Fine for entertainment, appalling for matters of law. Top that with ad hominem attacks and stonewaling, and you get quite a performance.
I'm disgusted, and hope he loses big.
Tom Geller
mirror here. The full file is 2,068,115 bytes. It's over half done, and should be finished fairly quickly. I've mirrored other content in the past, so if anyone wants me to host stuff, let me know.. i've been fairly reliable :)
Freedom of speech isn't an absolute freedom.
Fair enough. Your right has been terminated. You opinions are no longer community accepted and you are hereby denied the right to speak.
How does it feel to have the cannon pointed at you?
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
I find it amusing that they deny that Howard has been singled out by the FCC... meanwhile, he received over 50% of the fines that the FCC slapped on broadcasters over the past five years.
;-)
Now you tell me if that isn't showing that they are trying to use him as an example!
"Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
why doesn't stern organize mass complaint filings
He did.
He did.
then if the fcc takes no action on thousands of letters, he can genuinely talk about hypocricy
He did. That was the clip you were commenting on.
sod off.
Howard was as self controlled as ANYONE could get confronting someone that is specifically targeting them personally.
Powell IS unfairly doling out his "justice" and certianly is trying to make stern into an example.
As I said earlier, I am no Fan of Howard, but he has some very legitimate points.
Personally, Howard was very nice and acted well for a person finally getting to confront his tormenter.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Everyone needs to remember that the purpose of the airwaves is to serve society and the public at large. Broadcasting something that 70-80% of the public at large finds patently offensive does not serve the public interest.
That public would say the same thing about all those "Vote for Candidate X" ads running over the airwaves right now. If you listen to the people running these campaigns, it's not just a battle for the White House but a moral crusade against the forces of evil right now. Each side is so convinced that the other will bring chaos and ruin to our society that they get a good Two Minute Hate in every time the other party's ads come on. So to let the current administration decide what should or should not be broadcast over the public waves that, in your words, "...the public at large finds patently offensive" is a dangerous course of action.
Do I listen to Howard Stern? No.
Do a lot of people I know listen to him? Yes.
Should I be able to dictate to them what they should or should not listen to based on my personal opinion of him? No.
It's a classic case of "I may despise what you say, but I'll fight to the death to protect your right to say it". If we censor Stern (who is strongly anti-Bush, if that's a coinsidence I'll eat my shoe) today, who do we censor tomorrow? Jon Stewart? Any dissenting voice that the administration feels is a danger to the country? I live in NYC, I remember the peaceful protestors around the RNC this year, and how they were prevented from holding an organized event because of the politics of our city. It disgraced our city, and our way of life, and condoning such totalitarian behavior only makes things worse.
Ok, this is the link to the KGO radio archive, the Stern call comes up at about 30 minutes into it.
http://rope.kgoam810.com/archive/kgo09.ram
~~~Please pass the salt, I hate unsalted MD5s
Cheap shot? When someone sits in a position of moral judgement over others, everything is fair game. Judge not others lest you be judged, remember?
It is a undeniable that Powell got his position because of politcal favor. Powell doesn't actually deny that it played a role, just that it wasn't "the only basis." To deny it is silly. I suspect that Clinton owed Colin for not running against him in 1996 and there were probably many other reasons as well. But it is perfectly fair to point out that someone who sits in moral judgement of others is no priest himself and does sit in his position purely on his own merits.
That said, I don't think that it is fair to say that Powell is particularly unqualified, just that no one really is qualified and it is a shame on us that we can't figure out a better way to behave than to go around taking money from people who say things that we don't like.
Selective enforcement of vague rules gives regulators too much power. The rules need to be clear enough that professionals in the field know where the limit is, and the limit should be the same for everyone. If the defacto rules change (as they did post-JanetBreast) there needs to be clear notification, and the new standards should not be enforced retroactively.
If it's true that Stern is suddenly being fined for 3 year old bits, that's wrong. If they were indecent 3 years ago, he should have been fined then, otherwise the FCC should concentrate on his current actions. On the other hand, if they wait before complaining, they've got 3 years worth of material to levy fines on before Stern can adapt.
And I don't see how most current music is of any more public value than Stern or Janet's breast
Broadcasting something that 70-80% of the public at large finds patently offensive does not serve the public interest
And banning something that 20-30% of the public doesn't have a problem with does?
"When I grow up, I want to be a weirdo"
I've always loved this quote.
If you suck on a tit the movie gets an R rating. If you hack the tit off with an axe it will be PG. ~Jack Nicholson
Sig? No, thanks. I don't smoke.
Sig? No, thanks. I don't smoke.
The FCC should not have any power over the content of media broadcasts. Regulation of station location and power to make sure they don't interfere, first come, first serve license allocation, that should be the beginning and the end of their little feifdom.
As it is, the FCC is just the (very) sticky little fingers of a wildly out of hand government. Blatant promotion of superstition over reason, inspiring fear of the power structure using fines and jail and confiscation as tools, supporting business monopolies for content management, and exercising broad control over rank and file sexuality and speech - this is what the FCC does in the domain of audio and audiovisual broadcasts. They have usurped the role of the parent and blunder madly about the broadcast media space, restricting speech and content left and right.
We can't do anything about it, either. Well, short of lively revolt, we can't. In the USA, citizens can't create law, can't dispense of bad law, and can't vote on created law. Nor can citizens elect anyone who might be able to effect such changes. That's what we get for letting them foist off a republic on us.
Bend over, Mr. Stern. Just about the time you get on satellite broadcast, no doubt in my mind at all they'll be regulated by the FCC as well.
Why do I say that? Intuition, driven by this experience: Every time I hear the boneyard (XM channel 41) guys say "fuck", I cringe, knowing some religious wacko out there is writing a letter to Michael Powel and crew. You watch. I'm not much for predictions normally, but I think this one, you can take right to the bank.
Sirius is exactly like XM in this context - exactly. You have to realize that satellite isn't like cable. It is not locked to a physical location; it is broadcast through the air, and anyone can hear it emanating from a car, from a boombox in some kid's hand, out of a business's doors, etc. I should know. I own five of the darned things. I'm one of the people that the sound of satellite radio hangs around like a raucous, crazed aura. I bought my kids XM receivers, and told them it was the "sound of freedom." I also pointed out that it wasn't likely to be allowed to persist, that they should enjoy it while they could.
My advice to everyone is get satellite radio now, while it is still the wild west of broadcast media. It is tons more fun than terrestrial sources at this point in time; but I don't think it can continue this way. You can bet your last dollar that the controlling elements that run the system are planning to legislate XM and Sirius into line with the rest of the censored media. Then what you'll have is simply higher fidelity blandness. The gold rush is now. That's exactly why Howard Stern is making the transition. But just as he sees the gold, so does the government, and it is absolutely certain, 100% supported by US history, that they don't like free speech. At all.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Oh really?
I can't watch a football game on cbs with my kids in the room (5 & 3) because of the COMMERCIALS for CSI. Rotting corpses and the like. This will give them nightmares.
Boobies will give them happy dreams.