At long effin’ last
: The LA Times says broadcasters are, at long last, going to challenge the FCC’s indecency cops.
“I think the government is more vulnerable to an indecency challenge than they’ve ever been before,” said Kurt A. Wimmer, a Washington communications lawyer….
Broadcasters haven’t brought a major indecency or obscenity case since 1978, when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the FCC’s authority to issue indecency fines. That case involved a Pacifica radio station’s airing in 1973 of comedian George Carlin’s “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television” routine.
If the broadcasters had fought long ago, we might not be in this unconstitutional mess. CBS, which wimped out with a recent consent decree, is going to fight the Janet Jackson case. And Fox is, as I’ve reported before, fighting the Married by America fine (the one brought about by only three letter writers).
If the broadcasters had had the balls to fight this before, they might have given constitutional cover to Congress not to vote against the First Amendment. But they were wimpy and late.
