Feingold to FCC: Delay Ownership Vote

Sen. Russ Feingold called on FCC Chairman Michael Powell to postpone an upcoming vote on changes to media ownership rules until the public has had the opportunity to comment further.
The agency has received more than 18,000 filed comments on the issue, many of those from individuals.
Feingold, a Democrat, has raised concerns over the last few years about consolidation in media since the passage of the 1996 Telecommunications Act. He has introduced legislation targeting radio consolidation and is a co-sponsor of legislation to prevent further consolidation in TV.
“The lesson of radio over the last seven years is a critical one for this debate, and we ignore it at great risk to the country,” Feingold stated in a letter to Powell, a Republican.
“In the current environment, it is very easy to move forward and to change the media ownership rules without a full appreciation of the consequences and without full disclosure and debate. It will be a much harder task to turn back the clock if these new rules do to newspapers and television what the Telecommunications Act of 1996 has done to radio.”