How it works

The commercial broadcasters have tremendous influence in Washington, D.C., for a couple of reasons. First, they're extremely rich and they have lots of money and they have had for a long time, so they can give money to politicians, which gets their attention.

Robert McChesney
Not a MindZip member yet
Money
Time
Attention
First
Influence
Politicians
Washington
Random

Explore more quotes

What I've found is that there is a tremendous interest in these issues, across the political spectrum, sort of left-right terms we used to describe people don't really hold here exactly.
Robert McChesney
So the system we have in radio and television today is the direct result of government policies that have been made in our name, in the name of the people, on our behalf, but without our informed consent.
Robert McChesney
The public gets not one penny from them in return for those airwaves.
Robert McChesney
Also, the commercial media in a superior position, really, to any other corporate lobby, because where would people hear about commercial media or corporate media criticism, where would they hear criticism of them other than in the commercial media?
Robert McChesney
The commercial broadcasters have tremendous influence in Washington, D.C., for a couple of reasons. First, they're extremely rich and they have lots of money and they have had for a long time, so they can give money to politicians, which gets their attention.
Robert McChesney
And understand that scarce spectrum is used today for example for cell phone operators, they have to pay for the airwaves they use, for their services.
Robert McChesney
When the government picked companies and gave them monopoly rights to frequencies in San Francisco and Los Angeles and New York and Chicago, it was picking the winners of the competition; it wasn't setting the terms of the competition.
Robert McChesney
The relationship between the media owner, their relationship isn't strictly with people and audiences. It's also with advertisers, and that's the most relationship in radio; in fact it pays the bills.
Robert McChesney
Basically what they're saying is, if you want to be on TV, if you want to be a credible candidate, you've got to buy ads. And if you're not buying ads, you're not a credible candidate, we don't cover you.
Robert McChesney
The number one lobby that opposes campaign finance reform in the United States is the National Association of Broadcasters.
Robert McChesney
As the mainstream media has become increasingly dependent on advertising revenues for support, it has become an anti-democratic force in society.
Robert McChesney
Because what's going on now, and this applies mostly to television stations in the largest markets too, but TV stations basically are now the primary receivers of campaign spending.
Robert McChesney
Our existing media system today is the direct result of government laws and subsidies that created it.
Robert McChesney
The whole process of getting licenses to broadcast, which took place decades ago, was done behind closed doors by powerful lobbies, and wealthy commercial interests got all the licenses with no public input, no congressional input for that matter.
Robert McChesney
Local television news, on both radio and television, is so appalling. Makes print journalism look like the greatest stuff ever written.
Robert McChesney
When the government allocates monopoly rights to frequency, and there are only a handful in each community, it's picking the winners in the competition.
Robert McChesney
Which is supposed to mean they're doing something in their broadcasting they would not do is they were simply out to maximize profit; if they were really public service institutions, not purely profit maximizing institutions.
Robert McChesney
So that what you tend to see is someone like a Rush Limbaugh, he's the classic case because he's the most successful, he didn't sort of like come out of his mother's womb with the highest ratings in the country.
Robert McChesney
One survey that I saw that was published I think in Variety or Electronic Media within the last three weeks says that now the average hour of radio in the United States has 18 minutes of commercials.
Robert McChesney
But having said that, what's happening with campaign finance reform and our political culture is devastating.
Robert McChesney
So the competition isn't once you got the license, running the station; it's getting the license.
Robert McChesney
So it's a much more difficult issue to organize around, because you can't get media at all to make your case. And that's where cases tend to be made politically.
Robert McChesney
If you look at the history of broadcasting, what you find is the National Association of Broadcasters is a trade association whose mission is to protect the interests of the commercial broadcasters.
Robert McChesney
If you're running for reelection in the House of Representatives race, you know, it's very important to you that you be on fairly good terms with the local affiliates in the largest market in your area. I mean you don't want to antagonize them.
Robert McChesney
You know, a left-winger, the barrier to success if you're on the left in commercial radio is a mile and a half higher than it is if you're on the right.
Robert McChesney
The cost of congressional and presidential campaigns has been leaping every two or four years. I think this year it will be 60 percent more than 1996; well over twice as much as in 1992 in the presidential and congressional races.
Robert McChesney
But having said that, there's also a sea change in attitude towards media.
Robert McChesney
And they've got to be held accountable; our broadcasting system has to be made accountable; and unless it is, it's going to be very hard to change anything else for the better in this country.
Robert McChesney
Because Hightower's problem, among other things, is that advertisers would be a lot less interested in his show than in Limbaugh's, even if they have similar ratings, because of what Hightower is saying.
Robert McChesney
Maybe if you and ten of your friends could pool your savings and borrow some money and actually buy some obscure station in Sonoma, and then take some chances and have some fun.
Robert McChesney
The bronze powder business, however, no longer required my personal attention, and was well managed by those I had chosen as the guardians of a secret, which was long and honourably kept.
Henry Bessemer
The kinds of shows that seem to work now, the comedy shows, are those which require very little attention. They're superficial and I like articulate comedy.
Mary Tyler Moore
The constant attention is what is so difficult.
Natalie Wood
As a scientist, my attention became totally focused on global warming some 15 years ago by the elegant and powerful measurements of carbon dioxide trapped in ice cores taken as much as 2 miles deep from the great East Antarctica ice sheet.
John Olver
Anytime you have a difficult encounter with your child, there is a good chance that at least one of these factors is bringing out the worst in him or her: transitions, time pressure, competition for your attention, conflicting objectives.
Cathy Rindner Tempelsman
I think it would have been a lot better for him to say, I did it and I'm sorry, McGwire was never one to show a lot of emotion on the field, not a player who sought attention and craved to be thought of as a nice guy.
Fay Vincent
I wanted to write a story that demanded the viewer's attention.
Nigel Kneale
After some minor pieces of theoretical study that I worked on, a student in my statistical mechanics class brought to my attention a problem in polyelectrolytes.
Rudolph A. Marcus
I don't want to come off like the jealous brother who wasn't getting the attention, but it was like no one was really into me anyway. I wasn't really a priority.
Jack Osbourne
If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice, or representation.
Abigail Adams
There's a lot of other movies I like, but I don't even pay attention to directors to tell you the truth.
Jason Mewes
The genius of the economic machine is in its ability to convert these indulgences into profitability. It converts desire into attention, a grip on our eyeballs and eardrums, which in turn can be marketed to advertisers.
Todd Gitlin
The police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
Robert Peel
The writer should never be ashamed of staring. There is nothing that does not require his attention.
Flannery O'Connor
The poet produces the beautiful by fixing his attention on something real.
Simone Veil
The nation did not begin to realize the extraordinary possibilities of the vast Western territory until its attention was thus suddenly and definitely concentrated on the Pacific by the annual addition of over fifty million dollars to the circulating medium.
John Moody
Movies absorb our attention more completely, I think.
Roger Ebert
I guess because I pay so much attention to the physical part of the character, I don't look upon it as like Charlize Theron up there. I don't think of them as like Charlize Theron films.
Charlize Theron