Which is better: Ignorance or Knowledge?

Federal Communications Commission Chair Tom Wheeler concluded that he was not comfortable with part of a comprehensive study of the media marketplace and decided to eliminate the portion of the study that gave him concern. The truth of the matter is that conservative activists scored a victory in favor of ignorance over facts.

This so-called controversy has a lot in common with the false debate over whether greenhouse gas causes climate change or whether smoking causes cancer. It is entirely possible we'll hear accusations that the studies are really all about affirmative action or voting fraud or some other conservative lightening rod. This lack of knowledge has been a real problem for the FCC. In fact, a number of policies that many of the critics presumably support have been overturned in court because the FCC did not have the facts and analysis to support its decisions. And what of the so-called secret army of "media monitors" spreading out across the country to intimidate journalists into giving the "right" answers and covering the "right" stories? They don't exist. What we did have government-funded researchers conducting a voluntary, anonymous series of questions to understand better the decision-making process in newsrooms generally.