FOX News’ parent company, News Corporation, is embroiled in a phone hacking scandal that has shone a spotlight on the detestable practices its owner, Rupert Murdoch, promotes as journalism.

The ever-growing scandal has shut down one newspaper, led to multiple arrests and numerous resignations in the UK, and an FBI investigation into allegations that News Corp. staff may have sought to hack the voicemail of victims of 9/11 and their families in the US.

And now a committee in the UK parliament has issued a report blasting both Rupert Murdoch and his son James (also an executive at News Corp.) for their complicity in the scandal, concluding that Rupert Murdoch is “not a fit person to exercise stewardship of a major international company.”

It’s time for the FCC to take action. The law requires that the FCC consider the “character” of media owners when deciding whether to grant, deny or revoke a broadcast license.

Tell the FCC: Enforce the law. Revoke the broadcast licenses held by Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. Click here to automatically sign the petition.

We already knew that the hacking activities at the center of the scandal were not limited to a few rogue reporters, but reflect systematic orchestration from the highest levels of News Corp. This new report, however, is the clearest evidence yet that the rot went all the way to the top.

With the law saying that the FCC should consider Murdoch’s “character,” this recent report detailing both his willful blindness that contributed to the phone hacking scandal and his lack of candor in his testimony about his role, ought to enough to call the issue into question.

As Melanie Sloan, the Executive Director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) — the nonpartisan watchdog group — aptly put it, “If [Rupert and James Murdoch] are not passing the character standard under British law, it seems to me that they are not going to meet the character standard in America.”

Tell the FCC: Enforce the law. Revoke the broadcast licenses held by Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. Click here to automatically sign the petition.

CREW has already sent a letter to the FCC demanding that the commission revoke News Corp.’s broadcast licenses.

But the commission is likely to flout the law unless significant public pressure can be brought to bear.

We need to speak out.

Remember, Rupert Murdoch may own a massive media empire, but he doesn’t own the airwaves — we do. And the 27 broadcast stations Murdoch owns are only allowed to use the public airwaves because the FCC has made a determination that it is in the “public interest” that they be given licenses to do so.

The deplorable actions Murdoch has condoned in News Corp. go to the very heart of whether or not we can trust his company to act in the public interest.

News Corp. has crossed a line and it’s time for the FCC to take action.

Tell the FCC: Enforce the law. Revoke the broadcast licenses held by Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. Click the link below to automatically sign the petition:

http://act.credoaction.com/r/?r=6883524

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What do President Obama, Rupert Murdoch and Rush Limbaugh have in common?

They’re all ignoring a massive public outcry against media consolidation by favoring new rules that would allow conglomerates to gobble up more local media across America.

Please click here to help stop media consolidation now — it’ll just take a second.

By signing this letter to the Federal Communications Commission, you’re joining thousands of people who have already told the agency to stop this latest attack on independent media.

I am joining with tens of thousands of Americans to urge you to foster more independent media outlets across the United States. We need your agency to expand media ownership opportunities for women and people of color. Given our nation’s diversity, we need more independent stations to provide communities with diverse programming and a range of viewpoints.

More media mergers translates into less of the news and information people really need. Please abandon any proposal that would leave communities with fewer voices and fewer choices in local media.

And the public response has been overwhelming: So far more than nine out of every 10 comments to the FCC opposes letting broadcasters snatch up even more media outlets.

President Obama was once an outspoken opponent of media consolidation. In 2007, he said that protecting local, independent and diverse media was “critical to the public interest.”

But times have changed. The president has failed to speak up as his FCC has sided with Murdoch and big-media lobbyists in a push for unchecked consolidation.

Last year, Obama also stood on the sidelines while his FCC approved the Comcast-NBC Universal merger — one of the largest and potentially most disastrous media mergers in history.

Now Obama’s FCC is on the verge of weakening the rule that prevents one company from owning both broadcast stations and newspapers in the same market.

Murdoch has long lobbied Washington for this change, which would allow News Corp. to buy up even more local television stations and newspapers in markets from New York City to San Diego. And it would give Clear Channel, Earth’s largest radio conglomerate — and the company that syndicates Rush Limbaugh’s program to more than 600 stations — the power to dominate the dial even more.

Please click here to tell the FCC to side with the people, not Big Media

Nobody — not Rupert Murdoch or other powerful media moguls — should be allowed to monopolize our print and broadcast media and crowd out independent voices. But corporate special interests have prevailed up until this point, dictating ownership rules to the FCC.

And the results are appalling: People of color own just 3 percent of our country’s full-power TV stations and just 7.7 percent of all radio stations. Women own just 6 percent of all broadcast outlets.

By creating real limits to media consolidation, the FCC can pave the way for the kind of independent media that a healthy democracy needs. But the agency needs to hear from you first.

Please click here to urge the FCC to fight the big media barons and oppose further consolidation.

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Glenn Beck has previously ranted about a Maoist conspiracy theory including the Entertainment Industry Foundation, EIF, of which News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch is on the “honorary board of governors.”

Beck has now criticized the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) workshop scheduled for December 1 & 2, 2009. He claims that they want to discuss how to “help journalists do their job.”

BECK: Yesterday, we had two stories that seemed like no big deal if you didn’t know what was behind them. The first story was about the government getting into Internet regulation. Remember, protect you from the shady Internet blogger trying to scam you into buying the perfect pancake maker. Oh, the government is here just trying to help you. Remember that?

Also, the other story was the FTC — not the FCC, but the FTC — they’re just getting together for a little lunch, you know, a conference in December, the 1st and 2nd of December. They just want to talk about how they can help journalists do their job.

Oh, I’d like to have a little speech there, too. They want to know, should there be extra funding for journalists? Should there be tax credits for certain news organizations?

Rupert, gravy train is about to come, I’m sure. Should the government be more involved? OK. Remember those two stories here.

Rupert Murdoch gave his speech this morning, as scheduled, at the FTC workshop titled “From Town Criers to Bloggers: How will Journalism Survive the Internet Age?” So, once again, Beck has linked his boss to another conspiracy theory…

The purpose of the workshop was not to find ways to “help journalists do their job.” Here’s what the FTC press release had to say:

The workshop will consider a wide range of issues, including: the economics of journalism in print and online; the wide variety of new business and non-profit models for journalism online; factors relevant to the new economic realities for news organizations, such as behavioral and other targeted online advertising, online news aggregators, and bloggers; and the ways in which the costs of journalism could be reduced without reducing quality.

Beck even intertwined this latest conspiracy theory with his idea that net neutrality is the government wanting to censor the Internet, the group Free Press is Marxist and that free speech is at risk.

Nowhere does the FTC press release state that the government wants to tell journalists how to do their jobs, regulate or censor what is published, or conspire against people like Beck in any way. Beck made that connection and included Rupert Murdoch, the CEO of FNC parent company, News Corp.

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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable. The FCC may penalize licensees for knowingly broadcasting false information.

As public trustees, broadcasters may not intentionally distort the news. Broadcasters are responsible for deciding what their stations present to the public. The FCC has stated publicly that “rigging or slanting the news is a most heinous act against the public interest.”

If you would like to contact the FCC, or file a complaint, the applicable  information has been added to FNB.

Click here for FCC contact info

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