[opendtv] FCC chief has had quite a year

LIFE IN THE POP LANE

=46CC chief has had quite a year

By Ren=E9e Graham, Globe Staff  |  November 23, 2004

It's the season for Time editors to mull possible candidates for its 
2004 Person of the Year. According to the magazine's criteria, the 
final selection will be ''the person or persons who most affected the 
news and our lives, for good or ill, and embodied what was important 
about the year, for better or worse."

To that end, among those being considered are filmmakers Michael 
Moore and Mel Gibson, as well as White House adviser Karl Rove, who 
has been largely credited as the mastermind behind President Bush's 
reelection.

Interesting choices all, but here's an even better suggestion -- 
Michael Powell, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.

=46rom driving Howard Stern to announce a 2006 move to satellite radio 
to making ABC affiliates so skittish about airing a film with graphic 
violence and profanity that more than a third canceled a Veterans Day 
airing of ''Saving Private Ryan," no individual this year has had a 
greater effect on our cultural lives -- for good or ill, for better 
or worse -- than Powell.

He was again in the news last week for criticizing ABC's ill-advised 
opening for ''Monday Night Football," featuring a towel-clad 
Nicollette Sheridan, of ''Desperate Housewives," seducing Terrell 
Owens of the Philadelphia Eagles. The FCC is considering opening an 
investigation that could result in a fine against ABC.

Created in 1934, the FCC, according to its website, is ''charged with 
regulating interstate and international communications by radio, 
television, wire, satellite and cable." Yet as this nation continues 
its unnerving lurch toward conservative sanctimony, Powell, nominated 
to the FCC in 1997 by President Clinton and designated chairman by 
President Bush in 2001, has positioned himself as our country's top 
cop for good taste and cultural propriety.

=2E..

<http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2004/11/23/fcc_chief_has_had_quite_a_y=
ear/>




 
 
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