Chicago -
By Free Press
Free Press filed its reply Tuesday to last week’s Sinclair Broadcast Group merger filing at the Federal Communications Commission. Sinclair’s filing should have been an opportunity for the company to explain the supposed benefits of its merger with Tribune Media Company, but Sinclair largely used its submission to attack organizations and individuals that asked the FCC to deny the proposed deal.
Posted on August 31, 2017
By John Light/BillMoyers.com
President Trump’s Federal Communications Commission, under chairman Ajit Pai, has been clearing the way for a merger between Sinclair Broadcasting and Tribune Media, two television companies that together own hundreds of local news stations.
Just months ago, this sort of merger would have been illegal. For years, FCC rules prevented any one owner of local news stations from reaching too many Americans, or from owning more than one station in a single community.
But Pai, who spent the day before Trump’s inauguration with Sinclair’s CEO, has been moving quickly to clear these regulations away so that Sinclair can move forward with its plans to grow larger.
Media watchdog groups are pretty certain that Sinclair will use these relaxed rules to do exactly what the rules were intended to prevent: The company’s new, nationwide network, they predict, will present a single viewpoint under the guise of local news.
Posted on August 19, 2017
By Jessica Corbett/Common Dreams
As the New York Times published a scathing new report Monday detailing how Sinclair Broadcast Group “is ridding itself of regulation,” three ranking Democrats on relevant House of Representatives committees sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission chairman about his agency’s alleged “preferential treatment” of the conservative-leaning local television behemoth.
In the 12-page letter sent to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, a Republican appointed by President Donald Trump, Reps. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), Mike Doyle (D-Pa.), and Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) rely on recent news reports to outline four ways in which the FCC, under the Trump administration, “has taken a series of swift actions that have benefitted Sinclair.”
The Democratic lawmakers outline reports that the FCC:
Posted on August 15, 2017
Pie & Brand
There is nothing funny about North Korea.
Well, actually there is . . .
Posted on August 14, 2017
By The Museum of Classic Chicago Television
“Here’s an interesting clip [from 1988] – the Illinois Lottery drawing on WGN Channel 9, where on this particular night, the balls did not drop into the mixing chamber for the ‘Cash 5’ game and the winning numbers had to be selected off-camera and given via an on-screen scroll about 20 minutes later, during the 7 O’Clock Movie airing of Vertigo.”
Posted on August 3, 2017
