The Fairness Doctrine has become an urban legend among the left with a regrettable amount of built-up legends of its power.

Whatever you think it did, it almost certainly did not do that. In practice it meant that J. Random Crazypants would be allowed to give an editorial -- sometimes in the middle of the night, and sometimes as 60 second after the news. Additionally the Doctrine never applied to Cable TV for obvious First Amendment reasons.

problem is who gets to decide that both sides are bing presented fairly? do you think that Fox Newsmax and OAN are going to be under the same pressure to give the liberal viewpoint as MSNBC and CNN will to show a righting viewpoint?

There are a number of problems with the Fairness Doctrine in principle. The intent of it is that nobody monopolizes the then-scarce licensed broadcast stations. This is not a problem today, as TV and radio broadcast stations are abundant and also compete with the Internet and thousands of cable channels. A more reasonable attempt at such a law today might provide oversight on the licensure of individual TV and radio stations to ensure that new stations can be started up easily. I'm not convinced it is a real problem today except on PBS and NPR, which are taxpayer-funded and seemingly biased.

The fairness doctrine was a good thing, but it existed in a different time. Bringing it back today wouldn't address the main issue which is the internet.

When everyone is given a loudspeaker, and the power to create an audience of millions; when "journalism" is equivalent to any random opinion; when anyone with the will and a negligible amount of resources can promote their agenda... No amount of oversight can bring back balanced discussion about actual facts. Reversing a post-truth society cannot happen without radical disruptions to the system that got us here in the first place.

Yes please

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Highly cherry-picked. The next paragraph says that FCC limits broadcast of indecent and profane material.

As I said, the FCC is allowed to enforce a certain morality. It seems clear that the morality being enforced would fall in line with the ruling power of the day.

There are plenty of locales where broadcasts cross state lines. I grew up in an area where we got Boston (Massachusetts) and Providence (Rhode Island) stations. NYC stations cover three states. I'm sure there are plenty of other examples (probably involving even more than three states).

So the justification for federal intervention (interstate commerce) is there.

Of course, that doesn't prevent the feds from letting the states handle it, but it does create an incentive for some states to want the feds to handle it.

Look up "border blasters" to see how that plays out internationally. We'd have the same problem in the states, I'd bet.

*Please note, I'm not in favor of censorship, it's just that this analogy is inaccurate

Olive Garden isn't given access to something it requires to operate at the pleasure of the government. Broadcast TV on the other hand...

All of broadcast TV is allowed because the government says it is. ABC/CBS/NBC/FOX don't own the radio spectrum they are operating on, the government does and they grant the right to use it to those companies. There's a long list of things that the government requires them to do in order to keep this pleasure. One of them used to be the Saturday morning cartoons. I miss those.

not a valid analogy

Information moves too fast and government moves too slow for me to buy into this "existing procedures and rule-making" line.

Your next point about the FCC needing a major rethink is interesting. What are you thinking here? FCC also regulates internet-based communications (e.g. Youtube or podcasts)?

Jimmy's greatest sin was being unfunny and having terrible ratings.

His second greatest was lying about Charlie Kirk's assassin.