Elixir
Made in America
That has been decades in the making. When the Cross Ownership Act was negated by the elecommunications Act of 1996, over 4,000 radio stations were bought out. Minority ownership of TV stations dropped to its lowest point since the federal government began tracking such data. And since then, restrictions on media merging have only decreased.When the foundation of a belief system is "bias", there is a very very very long road to critical reasoning. Especially when one insulates themselves in a media bubble. I was shocked just how radical AM Radio was becoming in the past year or two.
When single entities were permitted to own thousands of stations, programming became an exercise in efficiency. They had exactly ONE model they needed to push. No more hiring local talent or production staff - they already had Rush Limbaugh, pre-packaged, one-size fits all and ready to jam down the throats of audiences nationwide, with a guaranteed level of ratings that ensured record profitability from advertising revenue.
It's not that radio station owners suddenly became conservative - they're just driven by the same corporate greed that undermines product quality in every single unregulated market there ever was. Conservative listeners are easy to manipulate, so why bother trying to herd the cats that comprise the liberal segment of society? You don't don't want to waste shareholder money doing that unless you want angry shareholders to vote you off the board.