The Economist conducts a brief, but fawning profile of FCC Chair Michael Powell. Their loves stems from the estimation that
“Unusually for a regulator, Mr Powell seems to want, gradually, to write the FCC out of the game. For that, he deserves more respect than Americans usually shower on their benighted government officials.”
All I can say is that I’ve tackled the illogic of this notion, and the double-speak term of “de-regulation” in general, before:
The communications industry is scared of nothing more than a free market. A free market would decimate the local bell monopolies, would kill cable companies, and would decimate the broadcast industry. Every single one of these industries absolutely relies on the federal government to stake out boundaries and territories, allowing only a few to have such prizes as broadcast licenses, while keeping the millions of would-be competitors out. The last thing any commercial FM wants is for the FM band to double or triple in size letting a hundred more competitors onto the airwaves. Man, they need regulation to keep raking in those monopoly profits.
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