Proposed Media Consolidation to Benefit Big Business

Unknown to most Americans, pending Federal Communications Commission deregulation will allow increased corporate monopolies of the US broadcasting industry

By Michael Mehas, The Inquisitor's United States Editor

While the Federal Communications Commission charges towards a scheduled June 2 vote on proposals to eliminate the FCC cross-ownership ban and ease other media ownership restrictions, the American public remains largely unaware about the serious ramifications these changes will have. Seventy-two percent of Americans say they have heard "nothing at all" about the FCC media-ownership debate, according to a recent survey by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, two Washington-based independent media research organizations.

What three out of every four Americans don't know is that the FCC may be poised to eliminate or soften the whole roster of rules governing how many TV and radio stations a single commercial entity can own in the same market. Deregulation will also eliminate the rules that prohibit co-ownership of TV stations and newspapers in the same city or the ownership of more than one TV network.

"That's not acceptable," FCC commissioner Michael Copps told The Inquisitor during a break from the recent Public Forum on Proposed FCC Rules Changes presented by the University of Southern California's Center for Communication Law and Policy. "It's been like a state secret. My plea for all people with the media is to exercise your responsibilities and your rights in this debate."

Some opponents of the proposed deregulation claim that corporate media groups, the very companies that the existing rules were designed to regulate, are themselves responsible for the public's lack of knowledge. Most news outlets have failed to cover these important issues. "The media have not done a very good job of teeing up this debate for the American people," says Copps. "I haven't seen the first network news report on media ownership. It's an important issue that affects what you see and hear and read - and they're not reporting it."

Indeed, the daily under-informing and misinforming of America that characterizes corporate media consolidation has reached new levels. There appeared little differentiation in the coverage of the recent war in Iraq by the five corporate conglomerates that control much of US broadcasting- NewCo (News Corp), General Electric (NBC), Disney (ABC), AOL-Time-Warner (CNN) and Viacom (CBS). Most television news reports skipped over negative aspects of the war such as the use of cluster bombs and depleted uranium by US and British forces. Nor were many serious questions raised as to the credibility of the Bush administration's claims that Saddam Hussein possessed dangerous weapons of mass destruction and proven ties to Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. Today, in hindsight, these claims look shaky at best.

For their part, some media chiefs claim that the proliferation of news and entertainment programming - through new TV channels, radio stations and the Internet - has made the present media ownership rules obsolete. "The indisputable fact is that American consumers today enjoy a greater quantity, quality and variety of television programming than at any time in our nation's history," says Mark Pedowitz, Executive Vice President of the ABC Entertainment Television Group. "The extraordinary competition and diversity in television today provides no factual or legal predicate for government intervention into the business relationships between networks and program producers."

Pedowitz notes there are many options available to producers or production companies who are unable to develop or license a program with ABC, including other major commercial networks such as NBC, CBS, UPN, WB, Fox, PBS or Pax. Or they can take their program to the hundreds of cable networks such as USA, Sci-Fi Channel, Lifetime, HBO, TNT, Showtime, A&E, Hallmark, or even to first-run television syndicators such as King World, Tribune, Sony or Warner Bros. Unfortunately, a growing number of these so-called independents s are controlled by big US media conglomerates.

As one of two dissenters on the five-member FCC panel (fellow Democrat Jonathan Adelstein being the other), Copps considers the rush toward the June 2 deadline a big mistake. He voices strong concerns about not having enough time to make a correct and accurate decision. "We need to hear from non-traditionalists...(like) the people," Copps concludes.

The entire process looks flawed. As the deadline approaches it is not even clear when FCC commissioners will be given a draft proposal of what they are going to vote on. The law does dictate that the proposal must be tabled at least three weeks before voting but that will leave little time for careful deliberation of a policy which could create radical change and billions of dollars of takeover opportunities for acquisitive media groups.

Intentional or not, this delay in public disclosure will prevent both the media and the public from engaging in a heartfelt debate about how these 'secret' proposals will impact on the future of freedom and variety of the press in America. Just a few years ago, this would have been widely condemned as unacceptable by members of both US mainstream political parties.