Inouye ‘Aggressively Preparing’ TV Content Bill

INOUYE 'AGGRESSIVELY PREPARING' TV CONTENT BILL
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
The Senate Commerce Committee is “aggressively preparing” bipartisan legislation on the regulation of foul language and excessive violence on television, panel chairman Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) disclosed in a letter Wednesday. Chairman Inouye made the disclosure in an effort to block Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) from trying to add a pair of broadcast-TV-content mandates to the Federal Communications Commission’s fiscal-2008 budget, which is scheduled to be debated by the Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday. Sen Inouye said that although he was “sympathetic” to Brownback’s proposals, they should not be debated in the context of the FCC’s budget. Instead, they deserved to be considered by the Commerce Committee. Inouye is the second-most-senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6459510.html?rssid=196

ACLU OPPOSES BROWNBACK CONTENT AMENDMENTS
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The American Civil Liberties Union has written the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate Appropriations Committee asking them to oppose a move by Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) to strengthen the FCC’s profanity-regulation powers and give it the ability to regulate violence. In letters to committee Chairman Robert Byrd (D-WV) and ranking member Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) , the ACLU urged them to oppose two amendments Brownback plans to attach to an appropriations bill Thursday that would target indecency and violence. “There are some things the government does well,” said the ACLU in the letter, “but deciding what is aired and when on television is not one of them.”
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6459495.html?rssid=193