The First Amendment (Amendment
I) to the United
States Constitution prevents Congress from making laws respecting an establishment
of religion; prohibiting
the free
exercise of religion; or abridging
the freedom
of speech, the freedom
of the press, the freedom
of peaceable assembly and the right
to petition the government
for redress of grievances.
The first
amendment is under attack right now – and the attacks need to be stopped because
they are unconstitutional.
The article below
was in the New York Times this morning:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/18/business/media/abc-fcc-lawsuit-broadcast-licenses.html
ABC on Tuesday sued the
Federal Communications Commission, accusing the agency of infringing on its
First Amendment rights. It asked a federal court to stop the F.C.C. from
pursuing aggressive regulatory moves that the network said posed an
“existential threat” to its operations.
The lawsuit was
unusual, a rare example of a major media organization suing the Trump
administration over its unrelenting campaign to punish the national press
through regulation and lawsuits.
The suit, filed in
federal court in Washington, is meant to halt a series of F.C.C. moves that
placed the network’s ability to operate in doubt. In the most extreme case, the
agency was threatening to strip several ABC stations of their broadcast licenses,
which would force them off the air.
ABC owns and
operates eight local stations that carry its programming across the country,
including in major markets like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. Like all
local stations, they can only operate with licenses controlled by the F.C.C.
The F.C.C., led by its chairman, Brendan Carr, called
for an unusual, early review of the broadcast licenses last
spring, citing ABC’s internal diversity and inclusion practices. None of the
ABC licenses, which have terms of eight years, were up for renewal yet. Mr.
Carr’s decision came after the ABC late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel, angered
President Trump with a monologue joke.
The F.C.C. did not immediately respond to a request for
comment.
We are now living in
a fascist society. In case you doubt that, consider “the 14 characteristics of
a fascist society:
1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism Fascist
regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs,
and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on
clothing and in public displays. Make America Great Again
3. Identification
of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause The people are rallied into a
unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat
or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists;
socialists, terrorists, etc. Muslim bans
4. Supremacy of
the Military Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is
given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda
is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. Next year’s budget for our military is $1.5 trillion –
and testosterone levels may be checked
5. Rampant Sexism
The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively
male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more
rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay
legislation and national policy. Epstein files
6.
Controlled Mass Media Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media
is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media
spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very
common. ABC’s license is being threatened
7. Obsession with
National Security Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over
the masses. “If we don’t fight like hell, we won’t
have a country anymore”
8. Religion and
Government are Intertwined Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most
common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious
rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major
tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies
or actions. Christian Nationalism
9. Corporate Power
is Protected The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often
are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually
beneficial business/government relationship and power elite. Trump’s cabinet
10. Labor Power is
Suppressed Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a
fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are
severely suppressed. Trump is the biggest union
buster in history. https://www.epi.org/blog/trump-is-the-biggest-union-buster-in-u-s-history-more-than-1-million-federal-workers-collective-bargaining-rights-are-at-risk/
11. Disdain for
Intellectuals and the Arts Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open
hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors
and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the
arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts. Trump has sued Harvard and other universities
12. Obsession with
Crime and Punishment Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost
limitless power to enforce laws. The people are
often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the
name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with
virtually unlimited power in fascist nations. ICE
raids
13. Rampant
Cronyism and Corruption Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of
friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use
governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability.
It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures
to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders. Trump’s cabinet
14. Fraudulent
Elections Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other
times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even
assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting
numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media.
Fascist nations also typically “The 2020 election
was rigged”
Throughout our
country’s history, brave journalists have protected us from harm.
Both Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Morrow worked for CBS.
For a number of
years, Cronkite was the most trusted man in America, and was one of the first people
to give us the facts about the war in Vietnam.
Morrow’s 1954
broadcast put an end to McCarthyism.
Sadly, CBS is no longer
the beacon of truth that it once was.
CBS' new corporate owner has taken a series
of concrete steps to address the concerns of the news division's sharpest
critics — particularly President Trump and his allies.
In recent days, the network selected a new ombudsman for
CBS News with strong conservative credentials. It promised to run full,
unedited interviews on a key public affairs show after receiving blowback from
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. And it's in talks to bring on a top
news executive who believes the mainstream press is reflexively biased. Her
name is Bari Weiss.
All of these decisions have come from top
officials at Paramount under the new ownership of Skydance Media. And they
represent a grand accommodation to Trump by CBS, known for its rich legacy of
journalistic touchstones spanning back to the dawn of television news,
including Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite and 60
Minutes.
On July 17, 2025,
CBS announced that it would end The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and
retire The Late Show franchise altogether in May 2026 after 33
years. The network, noting that the
show has been No. 1 in late night for nine straight seasons, said: "Our
admiration, affection, and respect for the talents of Stephen Colbert and his
incredible team made this agonizing decision even more difficult. With much gratitude, we
look forward to honoring Stephen and celebrating the show over the next 10
months alongside its millions of fans and viewers."
The show's
cancellation, stated to be due to high production costs and declining
advertising revenue, had been subject to speculation that it was tied to a
settlement agreement reached two weeks earlier between Donald Trump and
network parent Paramount Global in the former's lawsuit
against CBS—filed in December 2024—alleging deceptive editing of a 60 Minutes broadcast
featuring then-Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris,
which occurred as the company sought FCC approval
(regarding the transfer of its broadcast station licenses) for its merger
with Skydance Media (which was completed on
August 7, when the merged company was reincorporated as Paramount Skydance) Fellow talk show host
Kimmel defended Colbert, calling Paramount's cited reasons
"nonsensical", while Trump cheered it and said he
"absolutely loves" that CBS canceled Colbert's show. On May 23,
2026, Trump posted an AI generated video on Truth Social depicting
him throwing Colbert into a dumpster.[Letterman
said about the
stated financial rather than political reason for the cancellation "I'm
just going to go on record as saying: They're lying ... They're lying weasels.
Brave journalists in
this country still exist, as evidenced by Trump’s interview with NBC’s Kristin Welker
in June of 2026:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-abruptly-ends-interview-nbc-news-kristen-welker-election-fraud/
In an
interview with NBC News' Kristen Welker that was taped Friday and aired Sunday,
Welker pressed the president for evidence on his claims of election fraud in
the 2020 election and claims that election fraud is currently happening in
the California primaries. California, which allows
for last-minute mail-in ballots, is taking days to finish counting ballots in
close primary contests. California's gubernatorial primary and Los Angeles
mayoral race are still undecided nearly a week later. State officials say it's common to take
days and even weeks to count the millions of mail-in ballots due to California
laws and processes.
The
president, however, claimed it's taking California days to count the ballots
"because they're cheating on the election," and Welker asked,
"Do you have evidence to support that?" The president retorted,
"All I have to do is look," without citing support for his claims,
aside from the length of time. "But that's not
evidence," Welker responded.
After the president accused Welker of being "crooked or
stupid," he insisted that there's "more evidence than ever
presented" that the 2020 election was rigged. When Welker pointed out that
the president and his allies went to court to litigate those election claims —
and only prevailed in one minor case out of 62 cases total —
the president again called Welker and NBC "crooked," adding that he
thinks the same thing about ABC, CBS and CNN.
"You're
a one-sided crooked network," Mr. Trump said. "Sorry. Let's call it
quits because I've had enough. Thank you, darling. Have a good time."
After
another moment of exchanges in which Welker urged him to stay, the president
walked off camera.
The
California election system is famously slow, and experts have warned it could
take days or weeks to finish counting votes. Experts and California Gov. Gavin
Newsom knew the vote counting would be slow even before it began. Last month,
Newsom sent an open letter to
county election officials, urging them to speed up the counting process to
fight off unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about election security.
None of
us can predict the final outcome of the lawsuit filed by ABC against the FCC, but we all know how it SHOULD turn out.
Edward
R. Morrow would agree.
