Conservative activists are saying that Obama doesn't give... he doesn't give an F or an S or anything about broadcasting decency, and I really hope that they're right, Louis. I really do. There was this move by the Bush administration years ago to crack down on profanity in broadcast TV, because as you know, Louis, if a child hears one of the seven dirty words on TV, his life is ruined.
Louis: Of course, right.
David: So now the Obama administration actually has to decide do we want to continue this indecency crusade or do they want to say, you know, for lack of a better term, screw it? And I really hope that the Obama administration does not even get involved in policing swears on TV.
Social conservative groups are not going to make this easy, though. They're ramping up these campaigns saying Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, they don't care about F-bombing the nation's children.
Louis: And they shouldn't.
David: And they shouldn't, right. In 2003, remember when Bono accepted an award at the Golden Globes and he said on live TV, "This is really, really F-ing brilliant."? The Parents Television Council, which is one of these religious right watchdog groups, they demanded the FCC clean up the broadcast airwaves. They needed to clean it up. Top priority!
Louis: Right, because any kid who hears that is going to turn into Jared Loughner, right?
David: [Laughs] Right. What's more likely to turn someone into a serial killer, thinking that the government controls people through grammar or hearing... or seeing Janet Jackson's nipple? Right? I mean, which... is Janet Jackson, is she this... I didn't know that it was so... we were on the edge like that.
Louis: Neither did I.
David: To take a quote... to take a page from Joe Biden's notebook, this is not a big F-ing deal, right?
Louis: No.
David: That's really the way I feel. And the conservative groups...
Louis: And why does the FCC exist? How is this Obama's responsibility at all?
David: Well, it's Obama's... Obama can choose to continue actively seeking to prevent words from being said on programs, whether he wants to or not. And listen, don't politicians waste enough time on stuff that makes absolutely no difference?
Louis: Or legislation that will never pass and they know it?
David: Exactly. Do you want Barack Obama spending time figuring out whether "Family Guy" can have whatever language it wants or not? I mean, is that... that's how you want the president... for those who say the president isn't getting enough done...
Louis: Yeah, and you know what the first story on Fox News is going to be as soon as he starts trying to impose his will on broadcast, you know, on cleaning up the airwaves, it'll be...
David: He's meddling! He's getting too involved in too much stuff.
Louis: No, they'll say oh, why isn't he worrying about these wars we have going on? Why isn't he making jobs?
David: That's right, Louis.
Louis: Why isn't he fixing our deficit? He's worrying about F-bombs?
David: Unemployment is up and the president is worried about swear words on TV?
Louis: Terrible president.
David: You're absolutely right.
Louis: And if he doesn't do anything about it, he's also a terrible president.
David: And these conservative groups, Penny Nance, the CEO of Concerned Women for America, she blasted the administration the other day for not doing more to protect America's children from dirty words. Children need to be protected actively. Yeah. The Parents Television Council, which brought the original complaint regarding the Golden Globes, sent out an urgent appeal to supporters asking them to pressure the administration to act. They need to act.
You know, I believe long-term, this is going to become less and less restrictive. I mean, Louis, think about in movies, right, if you look at the ratings 15 years ago versus now...
Louis: Yeah, they get more lax every year.
David: You can always, what would the term be, do more at lower ratings. Like I guess now in PG-13 movies, you can have one F-bomb, right? Is that...
Louis: Depending on the context, yeah.
David: Yeah. So I think it's time to move on. This is going to be like gay marriage, I hope, and it's just time for... let's worry about something else. Please. Begging you. Conservative groups, I mean, I thought you were focused on gay people not getting married because that was going to ruin your life. I thought children's lives were being ruined by being told that it's OK to be gay. And now the problem is swear words?
Louis: We're regressing a little bit.
David: Yeah, it almost is. Over the weekend, I'm going to be over at the Free Press National Conference for Media Reform in Boston, and I'll be doing some live interviews on Free Speech TV. I don't know exactly when I'll be on yet. I'm saying, to be honest, one of the options was like the first, open the conference on Friday morning with some interviews. I can't commit, I'm commuting in that morning, I can't commit to getting up that early, Louis, to do interviews. You know that that's risky with me. I need a full night's sleep, I need to be well-rested, otherwise, the work will suffer.
Louis: Dave needs his beauty sleep.
David: Yeah. So don't expect me early on Friday on Free Speech TV, but at some point either Friday or Saturday, maybe both, I don't know, I should be on there.
Today on the bonus show, there's this... there's a group of genetically modified cows that are producing, quote, "human milk". It's a weird story. We'll talk about it on the bonus show. Also, Quran-burning, now, deaths as a result of Quran-burning by Terry-- is this the Terry Jones that we... we had him on the show when he was going to burn Qurans.
Louis: I think this is the same guy, yeah.
David: We'll also talk about widespread cracking on Southwest planes. You know, I try to avoid Southwest whenever I can, I mean, it's literally like a circus on those planes. It's insanity. I try to avoid it whenever possible. This is yet another reason, maybe, to avoid Southwest planes. So all those stories and more on the bonus show. www.DavidPakman.com/membership. You've got to be getting the bonus show, ladies and gentlemen, at this point. So sign up. We'll be back, we're going to talk about mind control, Libyan mission creep, and Jesse Ventura will be with us a little bit later on, so stay tuned.
Announcer: The David Pakman Show at www.DavidPakman.com.
Transcript provided by Alex Wickersham and www.Subscriptorium.com. For transcripts, translations, captions, and subtitles, or for more information, visit www.Subscriptorium.com, or contact Alex at subscriptorium@gmail.com.