Will Clear Channel rise above hypocrisy and condemn Rush for his remarks? [View All]

Dixie Chicks axed by Clear Channel

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"Just so you know," Texas native Maines said on stage, "we're ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas." Maines added she felt George W. Bush's foreign policy is alienating the rest of the world.

Her remark unleashed a nationwide backlash. The group's records have been pulled by dozens of country-music stations across the country, including two Clear Channel-owned stations in Jacksonville, WQIK 99.1-FM and WROO 107.3-FM.

"Out of respect for our troops, our city and our listeners, (we) have taken the Dixie Chicks off our playlists," said Gail Austin, Clear Channel's director of programming for the two Jacksonville stations.

That's a big leap in logic, said media expert Dennis Stouse, a Jacksonville University professor and chairman of the school's department of communications. "It doesn't have anything to do with our troops or our city."

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Maines apologized for the remark last Friday. However, Clear Channel confirmed Tuesday the group's music is still not being aired by either station.

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|Seeing Through The Fog of Clear Channel

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If Clear Channel's leadership wasn't so historically close to the Republican government and if Michael Powell didn’t lead the FCC, these comments may not have seemed too controversial, especially in light of the topics normally covered on Stern’s show. Clear Channel CEO Lowry Mays is a staunch Republican and Bush supporter. Mays and Clear Channel are major contributors to Bush’s campaign. When the elder George W. gave Texas A&M his presidential library, Mays, one of the school’s regents, became a major donor. The elder George W. and Mays also shared a stage when they were both inducted into the Texas Business Hall of Fame in 1999. (Boehlert)

Tom Hicks, a Clear Channel board member, is a major Bush donor who has been greasing George W.’s palms since the 1990s. As the governor of Texas, Bush privatized the $13 billion of financial assets of the University of Texas and put them under the control of Hicks. In exchange, Hicks hooked up Bush supporters with investment deals, and bought the Texas Rangers from a group of investors that included Bush, earning Bush $15 million of his initial investment of $605,000. (Boehlert)

The head of the FCC, Michael Powell, was appointed by the current president and is the son of Secretary of State Colin Powell. Michael Powell has never seen a merger he didn’t like, and has pushed deregulation even further than the 1996 Telecommunications Act that helped Clear Channel become one of the biggest media companies in America.

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Clear Channel has the ability to control programming on their stations, and to regulate who gets on and who doesn't. The Chicago Tribune and Salon.com released a "banned playlist" of songs Clear Channel radio DJs were told not play following the Sept. 11 disasters. Over 150 songs were on it, including John Lennon's "Imagine," Louis Armstrong's "What A Wonderful World," and R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World (As We Know It). The company even banned the Dixie Chicks from being played after their anti-Bush statements regarding the Iraq war. The company then organized pro-war rallies, called "Rallies for America," where people crushed Dixie Chicks cds, held up signs about the damn liberals and cheered for the war. (Barrett) Even though it was the first time in the history of the United States that a broadcasting company had sponsored a pro-war rally, it may not have surprised the Republican-controlled FCC.

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