isen.blog

If you're a felon, you can't own a radio station license. Theoretically.

Steve Labaton, of the New York Times, writes of a case where the FCC agreed to allow sale of a radio station even though its licensee was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice. The FCC agreed, that is, until somebody turned on the light and the cockroaches went scurrying into the cracks.

The convicted felon was a powerful Oklahoma Democrat, but until the lights went on, only the FCC Democrats, Copps and Adelstein, seemed upset. Powell and Martin were ho hum, business as usual. (Abernathy?) Until the lights went on, that is.

From the NYT article,

"The commission for decades has had a policy that if you are disqualified from holding a license, then you don't have a license to sell. That's Telecom 101," said Harry F. Cole, a partner at the law firm of Fletcher, Heald & Hildreth who has practiced for 30 years before the commission, frequently on broadcast issues. "Here you have a case of a guy who lied and lied as a government official. You have to smack yourself in the head and ask, 'Why did they let him get away with this transfer?' "

Could it be that the Republicans were acting on principle -- that the FCC has no duty to enforce the public interest obligations of licensees? Not. If public interest were the guiding principle, wherefore Stern? Wherefore boobiegate? (Public interest is the beard for Stern and boobie, anyhow.)

Maybe, as the NYT paraphrase of the FCC staff letter granting license transfer says,

"there were reasonable exceptions to the policy and Mr. Stipe should be permitted to sell the stations, because the misconduct did not involve other executives at the companies, the companies had "an unblemished record of compliance with the commission rules" and Mr. Stipe was in failing health.

So, let's see. If I run somebody over, I should keep my driver's license because (a) other people I work with didn't run anybody over and (b) My health is failing. Huh? Who hired these FCC staffers?

An extended quote, to keep the public record from becoming privatized (old NYT articles become pay-per-view):

. . . the [FCC] has revoked licenses for a variety of other crimes, from sexual abuse of a minor to fraud to dealing in illegal narcotics. The character guidelines also make clear that truthfulness is a central element of the rules.

The agency's decision to permit the sale was disclosed in a letter on Jan. 18 to lawyers for the four radio stations. They were being sold for $2.2 million by companies controlled by Gene Stipe, who for many years was among the most powerful Democrats in Oklahoma.

He stepped down in 2003 after 53 years in the state legislature - at the time he was the longest serving member of any state legislature in the country - as investigators focused on his role in a scheme to launder money given to the congressional campaign of a friend.

Mr. Stipe then pleaded guilty to three criminal counts, acknowledging his role in an illegal scheme to funnel more than $245,000 into the failed campaign of Walter Roberts for a seat in the House of Representatives. Mr. Stipe was sentenced to five years' probation and six months' house arrest.

The commission's chairman, Michael K. Powell, appeared to ratify the staff decision earlier this week, when one of his senior aides told Andrew Jay Schwartzman, a lawyer who was critical of the deal, that Mr. Powell would not seek a review of the decision by the full commission, Mr. Schwartzman said in a filing with the commission.

Mr. Schwartzman, a lawyer who heads the Media Access Project, an organization that has been critical of efforts to deregulate the industry, said he had stumbled onto the deal during a Google search on a separate issue and was immediately outraged by its implications.

"This involves somebody who has pleaded guilty to tampering with an election in the service area of these stations and is a clear demonstration of how the democratic process has been corrupted by this man," he said. "I cannot imagine a more powerful case for loss of license and a weaker case for enriching him."

Mr. Schwartzman then tried to get the commission to reconsider the staff's decision. He was told there would not be the three votes from among the five commissioners that would be needed for the commission to intervene.

But after The New York Times called officials at the commission about the matter on Wednesday and Thursday, Mr. Powell abruptly reversed course. On Friday, commission officials said the full commission had agreed to order a review of the case.

Mr. Powell has announced his intention to leave the agency next month. Kevin J. Martin, the leading contender to replace Mr. Powell, also indicated to officials that he would not vote to review the matter, but he changed his mind after Mr. Powell did, officials said.

The decision also followed sharp questions about the staff's opinion by Jonathan S. Adelstein, one of the Democratic commissioners, who was supported in his effort by a second Democratic member, Michael J. Copps.

"This deal demands a lot more scrutiny than it's gotten, and I now expect that it will get the review that it deserves," Mr. Adelstein said. "Lying to the government raises serious questions about a broadcaster's character under our longstanding policy. I've raised concerns with my colleagues that letting a convicted perjurer profit from the sale of these stations may be a dangerous departure from our past precedent."

Read the whole NYT article before it disappears behind the Great Wall of Privatization.

The above is a non-issue if you trust the public airways to felons. But if you don't, consider:
1. The FCC now proposes that its commissioners be allowed to meet in secret, but only in the public interest, of course. There are even proposals floating around for three FCC commissioners, or one. Staff letters, such as the one that Andrew Schwartzman found revealing the scandalous behavior below, might become unnecessary. Dirty deals would be harder to find.
2. The branch of the Spectrum Policy Task Force report that calls for privatized spectrum envisions no mechanism for public review of such ownership; indeed, under a private ownership regime, the mob, or al qaeda, or the trilateral commission, or robots from space inhabiting Earthling brains, could own and trade spectrum in the unregulated marketplace.