Capital Ideas
Ted Hearn writes about moves by the pay TV industry inside the Beltway.
Memo To Mr. Charles Dolan
Memo to: Cablevision chairman Charles F. Dolan Re: FCC chairman Martin’s War On ESPN Date: Dec. 8, 2008 From: MCN Washington News Editor Mr. Dolan, The rumors are that FCC chairman Kevin Martin will take up residence in Silicon Valley when the clock runs out on the Bush administration in January. That’s a not a bad location for him, actually, in that Martin has clearly been fu ...... Read More
Comments (0)Hurricane Bonus
Another hurricane has crashed into New Orleans just as the city seemed to be completing its recovery from the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina three years ago. Hurricane Gustav swept in from the Gulf of Mexico on Labor Day, with powerful winds forcing millions to evacuate their homes to avoid repeat of the Katrina disaster. But hurricane season, it seems, isn’t all doom and gloom at ...... Read More
Comments (0)Catherine The Not So Great
Washington—Cablevision Systems Corp. last week named senior Federal Communications Commission official Catherine Bohigian as the company’s first Washington-based lobbyist in many, many years. The announcement by the Bethpage, N.Y., cable company rocked the industry because no one has worked more closely with FCC chairman Kevin Martin in carrying out his relentless regulatory assault ...... Read More
Comments (2)Getting In To See Obama: No Hope
Washington—When Sen. Barack Obama speaks at a private fundraiser, his campaign workers bar reporters who show up on the spot. Only a handful of campaign reporters, pre-assigned for the occasion, are allowed into the function. No exceptions. “That’s the policy,” said Courtney Chapin, the Obama campaign aide assigned to give drive-by reporters the human Heisman ...... Read More
Comments (0)Hundt, Kennard Suffer From McCain Amnesia
Democrats Reed Hundt and William Kennard—successive chiefs of the Federal Communications Commission under President Clinton—were early supporters of Sen. Barack Obama’s quest for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination over Sen. Hillary Clinton. Now, Hundt and Kennard are making public appearances in which they are openly attacking Obama’s presumptive Rep ...... Read More
Comments (2)Martin DMZ Blocks Korean Reporter's Access
Fifty-five years of peace on the Korean peninsula suffered a minor setback last week after Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin landed in Seoul for a two-day ministerial session of the 30-country Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. According to a published report, Martin held a press conference that U.S. Embassy officials limited to U.S. media outlets, angerin ...... Read More
Comments (0)Martin Responds To Leased Access Stay
Washington—If Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin is smarting from his latest setback in federal court, he didn’t show it a press conference Friday morning. A day earlier, a panel of U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit stayed Martin-backed rules intended to slash the rates that third-party programmers pay to get on cable systems. It was the fourth ...... Read More
Comments (1)2008 Not So Great For NAB's Rehr
David Rehr, president of the National Association of Broadcasters, must be unlucky. After a string of NAB policy defeats in Washington, D.C., the airline industry goes and produces one of its worst flight backups in decades just as thousands prepare to jet to NAB’s annual convention in Las Vegas. Maybe it’s because broadcasters and the airlines have something in common: Both use thei ...... Read More
Comments (4)Like Cable, NFL's Goodell Can't Get NFL Sunday Ticket - Maybe
Evidently, NFL Commission Roger Goodell has something in common with Comcast and Time Warner Cable: He can’t get DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket, either. “I come from New York. I can’t get satellite in New York City,” Goodell told the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet last Wednesday. DirecTV, the No. satellite provider with 16.8 million subscr ...... Read More
Comments (10)Kevin Martin: Real Estate Bundler
Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin is expected to leave office when President Bush’s second term expires next January. Preparing for the transition, Martin has put his Georgetown home on the market for $1.2 million, up more than $400,000 from when he bought it seven years ago, according to Mr. Emit Renraw, senior account executive at ETR Acala Properties of D.C.Mu ...... Read More
Comments (0)Fair Harvard? Hardly. Martin Sandbags Comcast
Washington – Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin dragged his agency all the way to Harvard Law School on Monday to make the same point he’s made in just about every U.S. time zone: He dislikes and distrusts Comcast Corp. The Harvard session was billed as a discussion related to broadband network management practices. Instead, Martin decided to turn it into a feder ...... Read More
Comments (0)McSlarrow, Rehr Quietly Extend Contracts
WASHINGTON — The leading cable and broadcasting trade associations in Washington D.C. have made key personnel decisions — but they both decided not to tell anyone. Let’s start with the National Cable & Telecommunications Association. Kyle McSlarrow, who became NCTA president in March 2005, would have been up for a contract extension this year if his original package had be ...... Read More
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