The Perplexing Chairman

摘要

There are plenty of reasons to criticize FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, ranging from his attacks on TV content to an almost Ahab-like determination to stick the harpoon of a la carte into the nearest cable leviathan. But his modest deregulatory proposal on newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership hardly merited the smackdown he got from Democrats on the commission and Capitol Hill. Frankly, it was too insignificant for our tastes. We're not sure why the anti-consolidation activists weren't declaring victory rather than rending their garments over a compromise in which Martin agreed to drop all the other proposed deregulatory changes from 2003, and to settle for just a watered-down change to the ownership rule.