Correction and WMD and FCC

A link in my last post, the one to John Judis' article on the lessons on Imperialism from Woodrow Wilson, was wrong. Apologies. It's corrected, and still above. Great new piece co-written by Judis in The New Republic on the WMD issue came out this week. Of course, TPM has good bits on it.

IT WORKED!!

...the Senate Commerce Committee [approved] bipartisan legislation that will roll back the Federal Communications Commission's June 2 vote that relaxed media ownership rules.

But it's not over yet. The public outcry led to the Senate's action (the phrase Moving with unusual speed has been used), and the continuing raising of voter voices will keep the pressure up for this to pass the
The Senate bill would in fact even force Clear Channel to divest themselves of some of their holdings!! It's almost enough to make you briefly optimistic.

If you don't, yet, care about this issue, I humbly suggest reading up on it. Want a quick course? Here are the Top Ten Conglomerates (The Nation) and a broader run-down of Who Owns What (from the Columbia Journalism Review). Remember--this is with current rules!! They'd like to let it consolidate more!! I just wrote a letter to Powell. Maybe I'll post it later. For now bye. I'll chat more soon.

Recommended reading

Yesterday both TPM & Altercation highly recommended this article by John Judis in The National Review (which is noteworthy cuz at least Alterman has remarked on the relative conservatism and pro-administration stance in TNR's editorial pages these days). It's a critique of the new US imperialism by way of the OLD US imperialism and Woodrow Wilson's response to it. I'm parroting here. I haven't yet read it, but I trust the pointers.

I was not familiar with John Judis, per se, though I think I've read him before. It turns out he was a member of SDS , which is great, so Todd Gitlin isn't the only
frontline 60's radical who has graduated to pundit status. I haven't the read the article above, but Judis also has an excellent piece in The American Prospect it's an up-to-date analysis and historical & philosophical perspective on the Iraq invasion. And not as heady as it sounds, well-writ, straight-forward, a great article. Read it!!