well that if you're watching our t.v. here's a look at the top stories that's against a wall street brutal crackdown supporters for its social and financial just as sparse accusations that u.s. democracy is just an illusion. the world markets are in a panic driven freefall as severe as terry fails to save the greek economy with athens admitting they won't be able to meet critical new dictated deficit deadlines and. russia's orbit ambitions grow as another satellite for its global tracking system glow us launches into space to rival u.s. produced g.p.s.

systems. that's now alliance here on our t.v. next we scrutinize the state of american broadcasting today our special report is coming your way. brooks jackson at least the fact check team for the anybody school of communications they revealed misleading political ads coming from republicans and democrats alike just let me show you a few examples. well the obama. the fact is that corning plant shut down because it made old fashioned cathode ray tube t.v. two that are being replaced by flat screen technology not john mccain's phone. this mccain aide is part of a pattern. obama

is actually proposing is a tax cut for most service eighty percent probably in a tax increase only for families making over two hundred fifty thousand dollars a year. pashley we call this pattern of misrepresentation a pattern of deceit which is something we don't often say jackson says that checking by news organizations in two thousand and eight has been better than in previous years still t.v. stations are making a lot of money from these t.v. ads we're seeing just unprecedented amounts of cash thrown at political advertising in this election it's always seemed to me that a television station that's making so much money are they saying zose the audience the viewers a responsibility to channel a little bit of that money back into check and whether or not what's being said in those ads is true and why can't we just ban all political television advertising because in one thousand nine hundred seventy five the supreme court ruled that

money equals free speech. not when we caught up with congressman john two little outside his two thousand and six congressional debate with democratic challenger charlie brown the campaigns are just advertising driven advertising is horrendous very expensive. certainly electronic media is ridiculously expensive and that's the best way that everybody wants to use my point is where i respect the first amendment says congress shall make no law bridging the freedom of speech and the fact of the matter is that part of that the meaning of that is that you can't control the means of making a speech you have to let people raise the money in order to be able to get their message out otherwise you affectively denied them the freedom of speech how much money will you be spending on electronic media in this campaign that is a trade secret it is an open secret that nearly three billion dollars were spent on campaign ads in the two thousand and eight election and the candidates they spent

seventy five percent of their time fund raising for both candidates spend most of the time believe what they say. where's the money go right. so we can stop those practices ensuring the candidates are given free airtime that's a very simple thing the gore commission that was done back in one thousand nine hundred ninety nine there is a proposal that the networks provide. and there licensees provide five minutes of airtime to candidates that went nowhere any free airtime proposal means less profits for broadcasters profits that according to the f.c.c. top forty six percent. of mine at the back we've got an emergency to go to real men we've got a. new rail over. new york. we've got have

a good material and i know it was six degrees below zero in mind on earth to january eighteenth two thousand to seven canadian pacific train cars derailed at one thirty am creating the worst and high. ammonia spill in history just outside the housing tract to the mayo a cloud of deadly gas was moving toward the town. why not police sergeant dave goodman heard the call and went to take a look it looked almost like. something out of a cheap horror film it was just a large cloud and it just appeared to be rolling towards my not. far. off on what your market but. i am. starting goodman needed his gas mask but it was at home inside the poisonous cloud

homeland of my driveway and i wanted her to work you know they had my swat here in the garage and it up getting my gas mask. and i got my family out of the the house now they were in extreme and. my kids up for six and eight years old at that time period are you twelve ok ok i'm not my kid turns out to be in the background so they were all concerned. and i know my wife for six or seven years she was so scared that she was either going to sit there and watch our kids die you can't breathe ok. i thought she was going to die in front of our kids. good bad word tried on the neighbor but going outside was the worst thing to do we're all over the president and we were going to and mike johnson fled their home and got lost but they got lucky lundeen family rescued them

our eyes and our know is in our throats everything was burning burning burning near them happy is to see. when she only does just fine if i sit on my each other and i'll get some tall tomlin vien guide the families in. his basement no lights no heat no information really on the radio you're in northern new york music dispatchers were advising callers to listen to their emergency broadcast station or sirius. and he did a radio nine candy but a full hour after the crash there was still nothing on q.c. j j ok or any other radio station. out over the radio radio station every few days since there. never heard nothing on the radio or the t.v. yeah should be someone reading about it but there really. here is actual footage from inside the patrol car that night listen carefully you'll hear the radio

playing music. for. american air here. but there were eight commercial radio stations in my not six of them including k.c. g.b. had been bought by one company clear channel they were programmed from twelve hundred miles away the satellite i got the radio on. and just going through it though i phone case in g.b. who is the station for what at that time for emergency services or anything we heard on the radio was what time it was and the temperature what time it was and the temperature and that it's old one forty one forty five to fifteen to twenty oh it was awful only the time in town that's all we heard over and over and over and over again. and country music i wonder what is your emergency why not police tested the emergency alert system the week before but it didn't work that

night nine one one one here modem three and cops aren't allowed to interrupt regular programming when they need to interruptions cut into advertising revenue only the president can do that. if we if we could have had somebody on that would have said stay in your home. we would have yes we would have our lives would be much much better we have lots of health issues now because we were out in there for twenty minutes because we didn't know what it was no one could reach the emergency broadcaster by telephone clear channel was consolidating all six of its stations into one building and had cut the line just one broken telephone line meant no one could reach anyone at six different local radio stations and i want to do think that there's a man down in his right we have the benefit of meeting him one night when i was just france when clinton when he was my first taker ever wrote to and we became

good friends at that time when what if there were ten face that we are seeking a person whose are accounted for and his name is johnny great big or no one has heard of him or seen. a good friend of my drive. and so what did the c.e.o. of clear channel have to say about all this and you're trying to compete to sell your customer products which is our business we're in the business of selling our customers products and through our audience is the advertising that we sell we hope that we do accomplish today it is our absolute commitment to be a public service conduit to every single market that we're in which we do achieve in every single market that we're in and. broadcasters can neglect the public in other ways take the case of intercoms radio station in sacramento k d n d who sponsored a water drinking contest hold your we to win

a nintendo we think some twenty people and for the contest image why we think you can you can hear it before you have to we. see why are we thinking like. during the show any number of people were calling in and saying look this is a dangerous stunt someone could die of there are people going to drink in our modern thing do you think one can retire from one car. that they say releases do not recycle the staff laugh this off take orders anybody is anybody dying in there we've got. to take a family. we ultimately a young woman mother of three children who she was twenty eight years old i'm not mistaken. consume about two gallons of water. a lot of it you know for you ok you were really down we. don't do much water and i

had. a feeling you. know i didn't really like when you're surrounded. just hours later in a for strange died. the family's attorney asked the f.c.c. to take the radio station's license away for two years later the f.c.c. has done nothing with that intercom station instead it has rewarded intercourse with fourteen additional station licenses let's look at it to wage your entercom doesn't have the chain of command in which case why are they giving licenses or they did have a chain of command then they approve this idea why are we giving these people or radio license why aren't we thinking about pulling some of these licenses away from them. today most people don't even know we can challenge is stations license not one person in mind i did. ever hear the instance. or.

not that i'm aware of i'm not sure exactly what you mean by that. but for a vice presidential candidate sirup halan sure knows what it means come january twentieth when i am sworn in as vice president you guys have better knock it off otherwise it will have to get n.b.c.'s broadcast license revoked let's go to the f.c.c. is website to find out how one does channel or just a she's license license. carolyn's that gets us nowhere great you can surf around the f.c.c. is website forever but if you don't know the secret words you're never going to find it the secret word is pick titian so you can do it. janie creek and steve wilson spent thousands of dollars into law firm to challenge

w t v t's license for violating the f.c.c. is news distortion policy so we filed a challenge to a license really based on the facts that came out of our case nothing new here we filed back in january of two thousand and five and here we are. many years later the f.c.c. has not ever gotten back to us with anything not responded they have not sent us thanks for sending your complaint we're looking into it e-mail letter nothing zero absolutely nothing and you understand the whole premise that. the airwaves are a precious commodity there are very few of them so to get these licenses broadcast licenses for free broadcasters are supposed to act in the public interest it's the deal they make providing that privilege that's their mandate and that's what the f.c.c. is supposed to be interesting i haven't seen any evidence of that. ok

time for a little more information about the f.c.c. five commissioners had the f.c.c. the president chooses three from his own party and two from the opposing party it was president bush who set the agenda through two thousand and eight in two thousand and three bush appointee michael powell tried to consolidate the media even further and wrote rules that matched the times if they got away with what they wanted to do you can embark in a community where you have one large corporation controlling the daily newspaper radio stations television stations the cable outlet in one community their profits go through the roof i mean if you strip down to one newsroom literally competition but you told me that that sounds like the marker saying it didn't look good three of the five members this is the republicans they were all pretty much on record saying even before we consider any evidence i'm going to get rid of these rules if they've got their marching orders but the public found out they rose up against us we understand we got about three million people's way into the f.c.c.

that's almost you know one of every one hundred americans i don't even think that many people knew there was an a c c along how to get their information to us but they did they were really concerned about this power the f.c.c. approved consolidation anyway i believe we did our job and i believe we did it well but grassroots media reform activists had a surprise for him so when the f.c.c. career we didn't listen to the american public we knew that it was our time to act and so with the media access project and many other plaintiffs who joined on to. our case we told the f.c.c. that we would sue them and we took it all the way to the third district court of appeals in philadelphia the court of appeals in philadelphia where reversed the ifs and since decision. directed to conduct a do over that do over there the f.c.c. had to hold more public hearings about consolidation be held six between october two thousand and six and november two thousand and seven as artists spoke about

corporate media looking popular musicians off the air really is the travesty of it is all these bands and all these people that have grown up in these communities listening to those radio stations it's just gone to me that is just the most anti-american thing i've ever heard in my life i think it's all. it's all right. there. to europe europe. or treasury and all of that. they don't treat you like the lord is about the demise of independent producers in hollywood however the days of independent producer you taking his or her created these men on a series or movie of the week to completion is a thing of the past but in the democrats and republicans joined in opposition to more consolidated media but a competitor can start a local bank or a restaurant you just can't go in and start a radio or t.v. station. because the airwaves are finite and not only are they finite.

their own not by the seller but by the people but on december eighteenth two thousand and seven republican members of the f.c.c. voted to allow broadcasters and newspapers in the same town to have the same owner allowing cross ownership may help to forestall the erosion and local news coverage by enabling companies to share these local news gathering costs across multiple media problems. today's order amends the thirty two year old absolute ban on newspaper broadcast cross ownership. last time the commission went down this road the majority heard and felt the outrage of millions of citizens and congress and the court and they're hearing from citizens once again there's a new lawsuit from media's radio and media access project and a resolution to disapprove the f.c.c. vote by the u.s. senate we have visited this issue previously i think there is too much

concentration in the media and the f.c.c. rule moves in exactly the wrong direction adding more concentration preventing more media consolidation is a bipartisan effort i look at this is not of course an issue we let both of although some full size in the commerce committee when this was last discussed so that there were people on the republican side on the democratic side that support of the middle not so with the fairness doctrine republicans are trying to make sure the f.c.c. can never bring it back so what does your legislation do to the broadcaster for you which i'm happy to report is now co-sponsored by every single republican member of the house of representatives and this taping one democrat would simply do this would take the power away from the federal communications commission and to restore the fairness doctrine without an act of congress but there are new battles yet to be waged time after time and hearing after hearing people complain about licensing

you must require at least half of all broadcast licenses in every market to go to a locally first local control doing otherwise violates the public trust you bell to honor and i'd like to say that broadcasting is a lot like driving it's not hard right it's a privilege and if i get caught driving recklessly endangering the public i lose my license doesn't matter if i own twelve hundred cars i. don't have the right to do this on the public airways. take their licenses it's a penny go for you right now how many people here would like to see clear channel lose six licenses for this kind of broadcasting. cheney took her turn at the mike at the f.c.c. hearing in tampa w t v t was licensed in january of two thousand and five my

husband and i challenge the operating license of the fox station right here in tampa we have proven in court the top ranks of management engaged in news distortion resisting have cost us our jobs more than two years later we have yet to receive any response from the f.c.c. on the status of that complaint so why is the f.c.c. ignoring license challenges it's the only tool the public has to hold stations accountable i called the f.c.c. to learn how many petitions concerned i licenses they have and also the last time they revoked any stations license i have been told it since one thousand nine hundred six virtually no licenses have been revoked at all and i'm trying to confirm or deny that. primary it sue wilson broadcast live this hour here oh i'm fine thank you i'm following up on our conversation i don't know when it wasn't a week or so ago in terms of the numbers of petitions to deny.

somebody is going to have it mary i mean with all due respect the only people who would have it would be the f.c.c. . but it seems to me that they're not taking positions to deny very seriously if they don't even know how many they're getting very crowded thanks. oh she is not happy with me at all. but she just you say i've asked the question and we don't have that information and that is. they are having who would as you say if you want to file a freedom of information act request go right ahead so that's going to be the next step was in girls the press and public can use freedom of information act requests to demand information from the government and they have twenty business days to respond. in the meantime jane a creep finally got her response from the f.c.c. as media bureau remember how for a creator when her case

a judge told the jury she'd have to prove the station deliberately tried for the story the news the beauty ricci's and then w t v t said beds i think we are indicators on the finding of this theory the f.c.c. said they were confused whether w t v t distorted the news and in any case they would not be bound by some state court's decision or petition to deny it had been denied any case stand to the yes see see. you. on this earth i'm a broadcast journalist of twenty years currently a film about media issues broadcast lives on july sixth of this year i filed a freedom of information act request with your media hero to find out how many petitions to deny broadcasting licenses are currently pending in front of the f.c.c. i also asked what is the last time any station ever had a license taken away. by law the f.c.c.

is to despise me within twenty two days it has been four months i have heard nothing. the petition is to deny the licenses are the only names that we the people have to hold stations accountable to the public interest. if you will not stand up for me the people that mr you we the people are for ourselves are. gonna take it. we're taking it back in our schools and the prison as you say you can just use the incense of. our hammer as you know what this means and the slaves were taking it back for reporters if you're scared to see roots use goes thirty three was earlier god which is more newspaper there were t.v. series for the fall those are the three companies. who are fighting for the

internet before big media circus roulette. where. we're putting up our own low power radio towers. remember the airwaves belong to us and we the people don't take the media back no one will. come. sit back and. see.

if you just. assume. most of the. seemed to get. into the hole with me got even one good friend of the samaritan in there got something journalists. all of. these are the lead. carlo on the yacht. those looming long response middle east. in most countries they have long. to see you have the rights but if you don't love

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