In late April of 2002, Vermont Congressman Bernie Sanders held 2 town meetings
in Vermont to discuss the issue of the growing corporate control over the US media
-- and over 600 Vermonters showed up to participate.
In June, Congressman Sanders wrote an op-ed, published in Washington's The
Hill newspaper and widely circulated on the internet including by Common Dreams,
titled "Congress
Can No Longer Ignore Corporate Control of the Media."
Then Thursday, July 11, an overflow crowd came to the US Capitol for Bernie
Sanders' Symposium on Corporate Control of the Media with US Rep.
Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Robert McChesney, author of "Rich Media, Poor Democracy,"
John Nichols, co-author of "It's the Media, Stupid" and The
Nation magazine's Washington correspondent and Linda Foley, president of the
Newspaper Guild.

One
of our best-kept secrets is the degree to which a handful of huge corporations
control the flow of information in the United States. Whether it is television,
radio, newspapers, magazines, books or the Internet, a few giant conglomerates
are determining what we see, hear and read. And the situation is likely to become
much worse as a result of radical deregulation efforts by the Bush administration
and some horrendous court decisions.

|
| Rep.
Bernie Sanders
(I) Vermont
|
Thanks to Congressman Sanders you can hear an audio tape of the
symposium here on Common Dreams. It's 1 hour and 27 minutes long (5.5 MB) and
Real Player is required to listen.
Listen
here
Get Real Player free
Also See:
Symposium
on 'Corporate Control of the Media' to be Webcast Nationally
Congress Can No Longer
Ignore Corporate Control of the Media
Articles by
Robert McChesney on the Web
Articles
by John Nichols at The Nation
Website of the Newspaper Guild
Website of Rep. Sherrod
Brown (D-OH)
Website of Rep. Bernie Sanders
(I-VT)
FAIR's Corporate
Ownership website
###