 It's my end, come now, let's hope to be alive, come let's be alive. A special guest this evening is Marsilius Parsons, who I'm sure is a face that is familiar to many of the viewers. And it gives me a special and ironic pleasure to welcome him to this program. I guess I must, what do you think, maybe I've been on mute and quote me, which is one of the shows that Marsilius hosts. I was there probably 15 times over the last 17 years or something. So today I am not going to be quoted, you are going to be quoted. And we've asked Marsilius on the show to talk about television in general, its impact on society, which is a very, very important issue. And also talk a little bit about channel three and how it functions. When we started off Marsilius by mentioning something that we chatted about the other day. I had read an article recently with things to indicate that larger and larger corporations in the media in communication are swallowing up other large corporations. For example, recently we learned that for $6 billion General Electric for NBC, the Gannett newspaper chain is swallowing up daily newspapers. They now own daily newspapers all over the country. Many cities only have one daily newspaper. Are you concerned about the fact that fewer and fewer people are owning the communications network of a measure? Is that a concern to you as a news person? Yes, I guess it is a concern. But I would have to say that I am not alarmed yet. I think that the lack of diversity is a danger. But in news, which is my particular interest, I have not yet seen that the concentration of ownership, for instance, at the network level, has diminished news gathering capacity. It has, in some cases, increased it. Stations in some markets, not at the network level, but in some markets, the infusion of new capital has given new impetus to the stations to do more news, not less. That is not universal, but that has happened in several occasions. This is the week that the stock market crashed. This is the week when we have a lot of worry about what impact that will have in business, and in my business in particular. What is that going to do? I came back from a news director's convention in Orlando where I found that very few stations were expanding. They were laying off. They weren't laying off because of a concentration of ownership. They're just laying off because a lot of advertisers who support news operations are hedging their bets, holding back money, and it is money that drives news departments. Well, it's not just. Let me take that discussion to another tangent. The article that I read pointed out that people like Rupert Murdoch, who owns newspapers all over the world, is now getting into television in the biggest place. These giant conglomerates that will end up owning thousands of magazines and television stations and movie production companies. It seems to me that what they will end up doing is hiring people who will develop a style of journalism, either on television or in the print, which will not raise issues, which will go against basically the deep interest of the corporations all over. Now I'm not saying that all the time. That's a danger. No doubt about it. Wasn't that a danger in the days of William Randolph Hearst? Sure was. I think we're not going to say that the past was wonderful, but I think what we can say about the past, at least, is when William Randolph Hearst was at his prime, he probably had a dozen newspapers in New York City. Hearst competed against Joseph Pulitzer at The World. He competed against The New York Times and several of the newspapers. Now we really only have two newspaper, well, three in New York City, where in the first time there were seven or eight. Okay, let me just switch discussion a little bit and talk about, as a public official, one of the frustrations that I have, and I think I probably speak for almost all public officials, is on your show or on any show, and I think it's a national trend. In fact, it's more severe, I would say, in other areas. You have public officials who get on the television, who are asked to deal with very complicated issues. And we will get a bite, that's what the word is, of 30 seconds or one minute on the average news show. And one has an enormous frustration that people out in TV land that nobody, that the world's greatest public official, the world's greatest newscaster, cannot in one minute deal with issues that are enormously complicated. So people end up getting little snippets of information, often out of context, sometimes sensationalized, and people who are dependent upon learning what's going on through the television really end up not knowing terribly much. What do you think? Two mistakes. One, anyone who relies on television for their news is mistaken, I mean, is making a bad judgment. The more you read, the more you watch, the more diverse opinion and fact that you are exposed to, the better informed you are. If I was to read just The New York Times every day, I would have not as nearly as broad a view as if I were able to read The Wall Street Journal, the L.A. Times. If I watched CBS News, I'm not as well informed as if I watched CBS and NBC and ABC, and Cable News Network. As to the fact that we do in fact edit and that we reduce you to snippets or bites, one, hopefully that drives the public figure of the person on television to be more succinct. And that is, I mean, that's a fact. That is a fact just as much as McDonald's is a fact. I mean, we have fast food now. Everything is fast. People, I mean, it shows I'm dismayed by USA Today, which is sort of a mick newspaper. Right. But the fact is that that newspaper would not survive were it not for the fact that people support it. Okay. I mean, that's good. Let's stay with that. And I would, as we are discussing Channel 3, let me say that I think compared to other stations around the country which have happy news formats. Yeah, that's unfortunate. I think Channel 3 does a better job. And Channel 3, as we know, has one hour of news for a relatively small market. So this is not a criticism, per se, of Channel 3. But I do believe, and your point is, as I understand it, that if people are just going to watch the news or watch Channel 3 news, they are in fact not going to know fully what's going on. They're going to have to look at the news. Absolutely. But the problem is, if you're talking about a USA type format here in Burlington with the Burlington Free Press, and we're talking about Channel 3 or Channel 5, which by definition uses 45 seconds of one minute steps. How do people end up knowing what's going on? Now, the problem that I have, and I want to throw this out to you, as a public official, and I think I don't speak just for myself. I think I can speak for almost any public official. Absolutely. Is there is a growing concern that people just do not know what's going on. We are living in a very, very complicated world. And I have no problem with people disagreeing with me, having a different philosophical position than I do, as many people do. And I'm prepared to debate that. We have elections, and we, et cetera, et cetera. My concern is that there is a... I don't know if it's growing. I think it may well be just a lack of understanding on the part of the general population as to what's going on. For example, one of the statistics that I often mention is that I think you've seen these polls, and I don't want to argue Nicaragua here. But what I find stunning is not that people support aid to the countries or oppose aid to the countries. It's that the polls a year ago, where half the people did not know which side the United States government was supporting. That frightens me. It frightens me as well. It frightens me that 40% of the people polled in the national poll had no idea who George Bush was. They just didn't know who he was. They thought he ran a liquor store in South Texas someplace. How do you explain it? How could 40% of the people not know who the vice president of the United States is? I don't know. And he's on television five times a week, correct? Well, he doesn't get obviously the coverage. I mean, the vice presidential office is a ceremonial office. But I mean, it's indicative of the problem. We tested five, six hundred high school kids who couldn't name all New England states, who thought that Boston was a New England state, who thought that New Jersey was part of the six New England states. That's a problem of education. That is a problem that, you know, it is such a complex world that maybe a lot of people retreat from it. Let me go back to one of your original points though, which was that, you know, we were only giving you snippets. I think one of the things that sometimes public officials don't realize, or what they want to do is they look at things in a very insular way. When you look at Burlington, you look at Chittenden County. I am in a medium where I cover the state of Vermont, and one of the biggest complaints is not just that we don't cover Burlington, but that we don't cover Brattleboro, Springfield, Rutland, Montpelier, and things like that. Well, in an effort to cover all of those and appeal to a mass audience, because we do have a mass audience, we have to reduce the amount of time that we're going to give to you, or to Madeleine Cuenan, or to Jeffrey Wenberg, or to the mayor of St. Albans. And there are other alternatives. One of them is this. This is a half an hour of an edited interview, and people should take advantage of that through cable, through the diverse... I mean, there was a time when I came to Channel 3, when Channel 3 was the only television station that you could get if you lived in St. Johnsbury. Now you can get 20 or 30 through advanced technology. And to some extent that hurts Channel 3, because people I no longer have that captive audience. But if someone like Channel 31 is doing a better job of covering St. Johnsbury, then they should be watching Channel 31, or they should be watching their public access in St. Johnsbury. I have a great deal of ground to cover. One of the best... I don't live in Burlington, I live in Shelburne. One of the things that I read cover to cover is the Shelburne News, because it tells me everything that's going on in Shelburne. It covers the zoning commission, it covers the planning commission, it covers the select one, it covers the school board at both the elementary and secondary levels. It tells me a great deal about my community. The free press can't possibly do that. Let me get back, and I certainly agree with you that the weekly newspapers and the state play a very important role, among the 15 or 20 of them, they're often very high quality. But let me get back to an issue, and you'll recall an incident that occurred that I thought was almost symbolic of one of the problems that we have to deal with. You remember during the November election, Lehi was running against snowing. And the CIS, I gathered, if I recall, had granted time for them to do it. I think it was a Sunday night debate, right? That's correct. And what ended up happening is the Lehi-snelling debate got bumped in order to accommodate the second part or the first part of the mystery show. Sound right? That's right. Now, I'd like you to talk a little bit about that, but here is a situation where we are electing a United States senator who will play an important role in whether or not to go to war or whether there's peace or the status of the economy. The United States senator is a very, very important position. We had one hour opportunity to watch them on prime time television. And the station or CBS opted to put on a mystery show. Now, what is the sense of priorities there? Why do we not see, for example, in the United States, with the exception of convention time of Democrats, Republicans, or like candidates for president, one never hears major officials speaking for more than the 30 seconds they're granted on National Tube about the major issues of the day. How do American people know how a guy like Lukakis feels about the future of this country if he's not going to have the opportunity or any of the presidential candidates, of course? Well, let me address both the specific incident and then the general question. It's easier to answer the specific question, and I'm sure you're familiar with it. When we carried the Iran-Contra hearings, we did not get a whole lot of calls that said, boy, we're delighted that you're covering the Iran-Contra hearings, which was the major national story of the week, the month, the year. We got instead calls from outraged people who said, where is guiding light? Where is as the world turns? They were not in the mood to be informed. They were in the mood to be entertained. As far as Murdershey wrote, that is, I think, the second or third most popular television entertainment program. We went to the candidates and said, we are leaving them hanging with, if we broadcast the program, when we had originally scheduled it, we will be covering Murdershey wrote, will you move? And the candidates said, no, they would not move. So the alternative was to go to Channel 5. Channel 5 carried that broadcast. We carried it later. We taped it and delayed it and ran it on a night when we had a program that was not as widely watched as, and the candidates agreed. A candidate doesn't want to irritate a whole lot of people who want to see Murdershey wrote. Pat Leahy doesn't, and Dick Snelling didn't want to be known as the two men who stepped on, I can't even remember her name. You're raising, I agree with your analysis and let's stop for a moment and deal with that. We are living in a complex world where we have nuclear weapons, where the environment is clearly threatened in a dozen different ways, severe economic problems as the collapse of the stock market this week indicated. I happen to believe very strongly in democracy. I really do. That's why I like being mayor of local control and all that stuff. And I think it's great when people yell and scream and have their points of view. That's what this country presumably is supposed to be about. The truth is, and what I fear very much is that we are losing that. And one of the reasons, and I'm not pointing the thing, I don't know who is responsible for this and there are probably a thousand different factors. And I think you pinpointed one of the areas. If we're going to be in a limited democracy, you know what? In my view, people are really going to have to know what candidates believe. And they're going to have to have a knowledgeable understanding of why they're going to go for a lady or a Snelling or a Sanders or a Cunin, okay? And you can't do it on 30-second ads or 10-second ads. And the problem is, as I think you indicate, if people would rather watch a murder she wrote than understand what the candidates are talking about, or read a USA Today, which is a paper for kind of nice colored pictures and nice simple- For skimming. For skimming, right? If people are saying, I'd rather watch the football games than take responsibility for the world that I live in, I don't blame you, alright? Okay. On the other hand, what I'm suggesting is that that pattern continues. We really are not going to live in a democratic society. And certainly I think the media, it's a vicious circle, okay? If we create that type of climate and we emphasize the football or the murder she wrote rather than serious dialogue and discussion in creative ways as to how we can shake the world that we're living in, that's what you're going to get. If people become more and more attuned to entertainment and simplicity, that's what we're going to get. But that is not, it's not an if, that is a fact. We remember Edward R. Murrow for Harvest of Shame, a documentary about migrant workers. At the time it was broadcast it probably had, if it was lucky, 10% of the audience. What Edward R. Murrow was most watched for was an insipid program in which in the infancy of television he went into people's houses and says, here's Bernie Sanders at home, show us your kitchen, show us your living room, talk to your family, your son. That's what Murrow was watched and he got 90% of the audience for that show person to person. He did not get an audience and the history of television has shown that when you broadcast documentaries, even ones that have a certain amount of drama to it, one that was an, I thought was an excellent program. I used to be a volunteer firefighter here in Burlington and I happened to see it when I was over there. The fire next door about the destruction of the South Bronx, a fantastic documentary on what's happening to the family unit, to the people, you know, slum lords are setting fires to their own properties to collect insurance, drive people out. They don't have to, great documentary. What won the time period? 10 to 1? Some situation comedy. Nobody wanted to watch programs like that. People don't want to watch Harvest of Shame. Maybe it is such a complex world that what they're looking to television for is escape and not information. There is room for both in the medium. There is room for a program like this. When does this program get broadcast? Tuesday at 8.30. Tuesday at 8.30. Well, I would imagine that the audience on Tuesday at 8.30, I hope some of you people are watching this and not watching either Bob Newhart or something like that. Not because I'm on it, but because you'll be informed, but I am afraid that most people are going to be watching Bob Newhart. But the issue gets us back to it. I don't know the answer. What I am saying, and maybe we can switch over from all the political... Well, let me just finish one other thing. If they watch you, okay, or watch this kind of a program, and I mean there are all sorts of scientific measurements to show what people watch, but if Channel 3 or any network was to put on documentary after documentary after documentary, it can only go so far. I'm in a business and that's one thing that a lot of people in my profession don't want to either acknowledge or admit, and that is it's a business. And if the business for which I work doesn't make money, I'm out of work. I have 10 reporters and the largest television station in Burlington, not just because of the commitment of the Martin family which owns Channel 3, but also because they can make enough money to support those 10 reporters. And we have enough advertiser support to support half an hour news. When WABC in New York saw that commercial support slipping, they didn't go out and do more documentaries and more news, they did less, because they couldn't financially support it. Eventually they'd go out of business. Let me just change. I mean it's a subject that we can go on indefinitely about, except that I want to repeat the very serious concern. I think you stated it very well. Given the option of watching a game show or a situation comedy, or seeing something, a serious program or whatever format, dealing with the future of our country, what statistics seem to indicate is that people would opt for the game show. That's very sad. And that's tragic. And if that trend continues, as it has for many years, I fear for democracy, because ultimately, I think as people like Thomas Jefferson and many other people have said, we're not going to survive as a democracy unless you have an informed citizenry and an informed electorate. It is why we are considering, I mean why I, if I was a political official, would consider the Finnish system where you must vote or be fined, favor the Dutch system of television perhaps, where documentaries are allocated to specific special interest groups, when a time is given to them to present their views. But I'll bet you even in Holland, they're probably watching German television, which is broadcasting Magnum, than watching the Dutch television. Let's jump to that, because we talked about that briefly the other day. The television that we're used to in the United States certainly is not the only type of television that exists in the country, in the world. You mentioned, for example, that in Holland, political parties themselves have access to the television, but interestingly enough, now people say, well, that's great, the ruling party is going to have all the time, right? Actually, in Holland, the situation is very different. Why don't you explain that briefly? Well, it was 10 years ago when I learned of it, and that is that, for instance, in the Dutch parliament, there are five or six political parties, and although the government runs the news operation in a, as the BBC or the CBC runs the government, you know, as the government corporation runs news in Canada and Britain, documentary time and public service time is allocated to those political parties in inverse proportion to their representation in parliament. So the smallest party in parliament has the greatest amount of time. The philosophy at the time, as I understood it, was that the ruling party is going to get its coverage in the regular news, and we have to do something to counterbalance that and give the smallest some representation. The same thing might be true here, if we were to do it here. The Democrats and Republicans would each get 15 minutes on Channel 3, but the independence or the progressive coalition would get very exactly. I don't think that's likely to happen, and also it may not happen without legislation. The Canadians do the same thing. When they get close to election time, they give each party, and there are basically three of them, the Progressives, the Conservatives and the New Democratic Party, they each get a half an hour, I think it's once a week, during the election period. Yeah, we could do that. You'd probably have to do it through legislation. Let me switch to another area right now, and you're leading us into it. Right now when campaign time comes, your station and every other station in America is going to be embodied with 30 second ads, with 10 second ads and so forth. And increasingly in terms of American politics, that becomes the heart of politics. Television and the ads are as important to a campaign as anything else. It doesn't take a PhD political scientist to suggest that that is not the best way to develop a dialogue and a debate on the political issues of our day. How would, do you think, channel three feel, A, about the banning of those ads and substituting essentially free time for political blocks of time for candidates or political parties to use as creatively as they can in order to get their message out? I can't speak for channel three because I am an employee and not the ownership of the management. I think it would be unlikely for a number of reasons. First of all, you talk about buying time. We are already under either through regulation or law, I'm not sure which, required to sell candidates time at the cheapest rate available. This was designed to give small party candidates greater access to television so that the richest couldn't buy up all the time. Secondly, if you are going to prohibit television stations from making money in order to put on political free political time, there may be some constitutional questions there. For example, you have the option, because I understand that channel three does not accept ads for growing from the oil races. I think that has been the policy. If channel three went out, it was not going to take ads for United States senatorial races, but in fact, in order to give the candidates the opportunity to communicate with the people, we are going to make blocks of time available and treat everybody equally. I don't see where... Everybody? Candidates, right. Every candidate? Well, the same candidates who you would treat equally who came in to buy time from you. Well, again, you to some extent want to say I, Bernie Sanders, want to be treated equally like Madeline Keunen and whoever... Well, last year, Peter Smith. What about someone who's not as well known as you? Are you going to be willing to give that same... I mean, as I recall, there were initially three or four people going to run for mayor last year. Some of them hardly known at all, and yet they had in fact filed the petitions. They were considered frivolous candidates. But we don't. I believe if somebody is a candidate, they're a candidate. Now, you have that problem when you deal with... You can quote me, show us the candidates. You have to decide who you're serious candidates and who you're not. In general, I take the liberal view that... And we do that in debates, for example. Anybody who's a candidate has access to the time. Philosophically, I have no problem with that whatsoever. Practically, it can be a real problem if you've got... I mean, how many people ran for president in the United States last year? I think 100. Okay, but the point is what ends up happening right now is two things end up happening with the present system. That the Congress mandated that you provide time at the lowest possible rate to help, quote unquote, small candidates. That's not really, I think, the reality. I think the reality is Congress was acting on its own behalf. The rich didn't want to have to pay our top prices. Well, that's right. But as you know, TV advertising consumes an enormous part of anybody's and any candidate's budget. I would, I think myself that in terms of the best interest of democracy and getting the dialogue out there with 30 second ads and go turn 10 second ads, I just don't make, I really don't think so. I think there are a lot of people who would agree. I would agree, as a voter, I would agree. I do not think that, and as a news director I agree, I think that the 30 second ad is a packaged product where you're being sold a fast food candidate. Are you often by the same people who will do the advertising for McDonald's? Absolutely. The best ads for candidates are done exactly by those same companies. Do you prohibit that? Do you limit that? Who is going to make that decision? If it's made by the owners of the television stations, they may just say, we will have no candidates. Period. Well, I don't give the television companies the right unilaterally to make those decisions because obviously the way the public officials or candidates communicate with the American people is essential to the running of this country. So it would not be acceptable any more than if the national networks decided they were not going to cover the president's press conference. That would not be acceptable either. And I think there has, I don't know the easy answer. I think that the 30 second ads and the 10 second ads are insulting. They're not conducive to democracy. I think there's got to be an alternative. I don't know the answer, but I think that mandating television stations, basically forcing television stations to open their airways to the candidates and erase some reasonable objections. How many candidates are there? Everybody wants to run titles equal time. Good question. There are some First Amendment questions also that I'm nervous about as a broadcaster and as a journalist. Freedom of speech and are you going to limit access to it or by law? I'm concerned about that because if you're going to regulate what commercials and what we can take, then when are you going to regulate, only regulate that you will appear at all Mayor's news conferences or something like that? The other side is you're regulating it right now. Wealthy people who have tremendous sums of money to buy the 30 second ads, get access, candidates who don't have a lot of money do not get the access. So it's the marketplace and the big dollars that are regulating right now. That signals to me that we are running out of time. We ought to continue this discussion and those answers to those questions you ought to ask to the managers and owners of the various TV stations. They should be. Mr. Johnville, how are you here? Our special guest this evening was Marsilius Parsons, who is the news director of Channel 3. As you can see, we just began to touch the surface of what is in fact an extraordinarily important issue, the role of television in political life and the whole social life of this country. Marsilius, thanks very much for joining us. Thank you. Thank you very much.