STATEMENT OF 
COMMISSIONER MICHAEL J. COPPS
CONCUR IN PART, DISSENT IN PART
Re: Promoting Diversification of Ownership in the Broadcasting Services, et al. (MB Docket Nos. 
07-294, 06-121, 02-277, 01-235, 01-317, 00-244 and 04-228).
Todays decision would make George Orwell proud.  We claim to be giving the news industry a 
shot in the armbut the real effect is to reduce total newsgathering.  We shed crocodile tears for the 
financial plight of newspapersyet the truth is that newspaper profits are about double the S&P 500 
average.  We pat ourselves on the back for holding six field hearings across the United Statesyet 
todays decision turns a deaf ear to the thousands of Americans who waited in long lines for an open mike 
to testify before us.  We say we have closed loopholesyet we have introduced new ones.  We say we 
are guided by public commentyet the majoritys decision is overwhelmingly opposed by the public as 
demonstrated in our record and in public opinion surveys.  We claim the mantle of scientific research
even as the experts say weve asked the wrong questions, used the wrong data, and reached the wrong 
conclusions.      
I am not the only one disturbed by this illogical scenario. Congress and the American people have 
done everything but march down to Southwest DC and physically shake some sense into us.  Everywhere 
we go, the questions are the same:  Why are we rushing to encourage more media merger frenzy when we 
havent addressed the demonstrated harms caused by previous media merger frenzy? Women and 
minorities own low single-digit per centages of Americas broadcast outlets and big consolidated media 
continues to slam the door in their faces.  Its going to take some major policy changes and a coordinated 
strategy to fix that.  Dont look for that from this Commission. 
Instead we are told to be content with baby steps to help women and minoritiesbut the fine 
print shows that the real beneficiaries will be small businesses owned by white men.  So even as it 
becomes abundantly clear that the real cause of the disenfranchisement of women and minorities is media 
consolidation, we give the green light to a new round ofyes, you guessed itmedia consolidation.  
Local news, local music and local groups so often get shunted aside when big media comes to 
town.  Commissioner Adelstein and I have heard the plaintive voices of thousands of citizens all across 
this land in dozens of town meetings and public forums.  From newscasters fired by chain owners with 
corporate headquarters thousands of miles away to local musicians and artists denied airtime because of 
big medias homogenization of our music and our culture.  From minorities reeling from the way big 
media ignores their issues and caricatures them as people to women saying the only way to redress their 
grievances is to give them a shot to compete for use of the peoples airwaves.  From public interest 
advocates fighting valiantly for a return of localism and diversity to small, independent broadcasters who 
fight an uphill battle to preserve their independence.  It will require tough rules of the road to redress our 
localism and diversity gaps.  Do you see any such rules being passed today?  To the idea that license 
holders should give the American people high quality programming in return for free use of the public 
airwaves, the majority answers that we need more study of problems that have been documented and 
studied to death for a decade and more.  Todays outcome is the same old same old: one more time, were 
running the fast-break for our big media friends and the four corner stall for the public interest.  
It is time for the American people to understand the game thats being played here.  Big media 
doesnt want to tell the full story, of course, but I have heard first-hand from editorial page editors who 
have told me they can cover any story, save onemedia consolidation, and that they have been instructed 
to stay away from that one.  But thats another story.  
Todays story is a majority decision unconnected to good policy and not even incidentally 
concerned with encouraging media to make our democracy stronger.  We are not concerned with 
gathering valid data, conducting good research, or following the facts where they lead us.  
Our motivations are less Olympian and our methodology far simplerwe generously ask big 
media to sit on Santas knee, tell us what it wants for Christmas, and then push through whatever of these 
wishes are politically and practically feasible.  No test to see if anyones been naughty or nice.  Just 
another big, shiny present for the favored few who already hold an FCC licenseand a lump of coal for 
the rest of us.  Happy holidays!
If you need convincing of just how non-expertly this expert agency has been acting lately, you 
couldnt have a better example than the formulation of the cross-ownership rule that the majority is 
adopting today.  I know its a little detailed to see how the sausage is made, but its worth a listen.
On November 2, 2007with just a weeks noticethe FCC announced that it would hold its 
final media ownership hearing in Seattle.  Despite the minimal warning, 1,100 citizens turned out to give 
intelligent and impassioned testimony on how they believed the agency should write its media ownership 
rules.  Little did they know that the fix was already in, and that the now infamous New York Times op-ed 
was in the works announcing a highly-detailed cross-ownership proposal.  
Put bluntly, those Commissioners and staff who flew out to Seattle with staff, the sixteen 
witnesses, the Governor, the State Attorney General and all the other public officials who came, plus the 
1,100 Seattle residents who had chosen to spend their Friday night waiting in line to testify were, as Rep. 
Jay Inslee put it, treated like chumps.  Their comments were not going to be part of the agency's 
formulation of a draft ruleit was just for show, to claim that the public had been given a chance to 
participate.  The agency had treated the public like children allowed to visit the cockpit of an airlinernot 
actually allowed to fly the plane, of course, but permitted for a brief, false moment to imagine that they 
were.  
The New York Times op-ed appeared on November 13, the next business day after the Seattle 
hearing.  That same day, a unilateral public notice was issued, providing just 28 days for people to 
comment on the specific proposal, with no opportunity for replies.  The agency received over 300 
comments from scholars, concerned citizens, public interest advocates, and industry associationsthe 
overwhelming majority of which condemned the Chairmans plan.  But little did these commenters know 
that on November 28, two weeks before their comments were even due, the draft Order on newspaper-
broadcast cross ownership had already been circulated.  Once again, public commenters were treated as 
unwitting and unwilling participants in a Kabuki theater.  
Then, last night at 9:44 pmjust a little more than twelve hours before the vote was scheduled to 
be held and long after the Sunshine period had beguna significantly revised version of the Order was 
circulated.  Among other changes, the item now granted all sorts of permanent new waivers and provided 
a significantly-altered new justification for the 20-market limit.  But the revised draft mysteriously 
deleted the existing discussion of the four factors to be considered by the FCC in examining whether a 
proposed combination was in the public interest.  In its place, the new draft simply contained the cryptic 
words [Revised discussion to come].  Although my colleagues and I were not apprised of the revisions, 
USA Today fared better because it apparently got an interview that enabled it to present the Chairmans 
latest thinking.  Maybe we really are the Federal Newspaper Commission. 
At 1:57 this morning, we received a new version of the proposed test for allowing more 
newspaper-broadcast combinations.  I cant say that I fully appreciate the tests finer points given the 
lateness of the hour and the fact that there was no time afforded to parse the finer points of the new rule. 
But this much is clear: the new version keeps the old loopholes and includes two new one pathways to 
cross ownership approval.  So please dont buy the line that the rule we adopt today involves fewer 
loopholesit adds new ones.  Finally, this morning at 11:12 a.m. as I was walking out my office door to 
come to this meeting, we received an e-mail containing additional changes.  The gist of one of these 
seems to be that the Commission need not consider all of the four factors in all circumstances. 
This is not the way to do rational, fact-based, and public interest-minded policy making.  Its 
actually a great illustration of why administrative agencies are required to operate under the constraints of 
administrative processand the problems that occur when they ignore that duty.  At the end of the day, 
process matters.  Public comment matters.  Taking the time to do things right matters.  A rule reached 
through a slipshod process, and capped by a mad rush to the finish line, willpurely on the merits
simply not pass the red face test.  Not with Congress.  Not with the courts.  Not with the American 
people. 
Its worth stepping back for a moment from all the detail here to look at the fundamental rationale 
behind todays terrible decision.  Newspapers need all the help they can get, we are told.  A merger with a 
broadcast station in the same city will give them access to a revenue stream that will let them better fulfill 
their newsgathering mission.  At the same time, we are also assured, our rules will require independent 
news judgment (at least among consolidators outside the top 20 markets).  In other words, we can have 
our cake and eat it toothe economic benefits of consolidation without the reduction of voices that one 
would ordinarily expect when two news entities combine.  
But how on earth can this be?  To begin with, to the extent that the two merged entities remain 
truly independent, then there wont be the cost savings that were supposed to justify the merger in the 
first place.  On the other hand, if independence merely means maintaining two organizational charts for 
the same newsroom, then we wont have any more reporters on the ground keeping an eye on 
government.  Either way, we cant have our cake and eat it, too.
Also, since when do unprofitable businesses support themselves by merging with profitable 
onesand then sink more resources into the money-losing division simply as a public service?   Think 
about it this way.  If any of us were employed by a struggling company, and we suddenly learned that a 
Wall Street financier had obtained control, would we (1) clap our hands with joy because we expect the 
new owner is going to throw a bunch of cash our way and tell us to keep on doing what wed been doing, 
except more lavishly or (2) start to fear for our jobs and brace for a steady diet of cost cutting?  
Heres my prediction on how it will really work.  Mergers will be approved in both the top 20 and 
non-top-20 marketstowns big and smallbecause the set of exceptions we announce today have all the 
firmness of a bowl of Jell-O.  Regardless of our supposed commitment to independent news judgment 
the two entities newsrooms will be almost completely combined, with round after round of job cuts in 
order to cut costs.  Its interesting to hear the few proponents of this rule bemoan the lost jobs that they 
say result from failing newspapers.  Ask them this: in this era of consolidation in so many industries, isnt 
cutting jobs about the first thing a merged entity almost always does so it can show Wall Street it is really 
serious about cutting costs and polishing up the next quarterly report?  These job losses are the result of 
consolidation.  And more consolidation will mean more lost jobs.  Newly-merged entities will attempt to 
increase their profit margins by raising advertising rates and relentless cost-cutting.  Herein is the real
economic justification for media consolidation within a single market.  
The news isnt so good for other businesses in the consolidated market, either.  Think about the 
other broadcast stations there.  Its just like Wal-Mart coming to townthe existing news providers look 
around at the new reality and figure out pretty fast that they ought to head for the exit when it comes to 
producing news.  Now, it may not be as stark as actually cancelling the evening newsit could just mean 
doing more sports or more weather or more ads during that half hour.  But at the end of the day, the 
combined entity is going to have a huge advantage in producing newsand the other stations will make a 
reasonable calculation to substantially reduce their investment in the business.  This is why, by the way, 
experts have been able to demonstratein the record before the FCC, using the FCCs own datathat 
cross ownership leads to less total newsgathering in a local market.  And that has large and devastating 
effects on the diversity and vitality of our civic dialogue.  
Lets also be careful not get too carried away with the supposed premise for all this 
contortionism, namely the poor state of local newspapers.  The death of the traditional news business is 
often greatly exaggerated.  The truth remains that the profit margins for the newspaper industry last year 
averaged around 17.8%; the figure is even higher for broadcast stations.  As the head of the Newspaper 
Association of America put it in a Letter to the Editor of the Washington Post on July 2 of this year: The 
reality is that newspaper companies remain solidly profitable and significant generators of free cash 
flow.  And as Member after Member Congress has reminded us, our job is not to ensure that newspapers 
are profitablewhich they mostly are.  Our job is to protect the principles of localism, diversity and 
competition in our media.   
Were newspapers momentarily discombobulated by the rise of the Internet?  Probably so.  Are 
they moving now to turn threat into opportunity?  Yes, and with signs of success.  Far from newspapers 
being gobbled up by the Internet, we ought to be far more concerned with the threat of big media joining 
forces with big broadband providers to take the wonderful Internet we know down the same road of 
consolidation and control by the few that has already inflicted such heavy damage on our traditional 
media.
In the final analysis, the real winners today are businesses that are in many cases quite healthy, 
and the real losers are going to be all of us who depend on the news media to learn whats happening in 
our communities and to keep an eye on local government.  Despite all the talk you may hear today about 
the threat to newspapers from the Internet and new technologies, todays Order actually deals with 
something quite old-fashioned.  Powerful companies are using political muscle to sneak through rule 
changes that let them profit at the expense of the public interest.  They are seeking to improve their 
economic prospects by capturing a larger percentage of the news business in communities all across the 
United States.  
Lets get beyond the weeds of corporate jockeying and inking up our rubber stamps for a new 
round of media consolidation to look for a moment at what we are not doing today.  Thats the real story, 
I thinkthat the important issues of minority and female ownership and broadcast localism and how they 
are being short-changed by todays rush to judgment.
Minority and Female Ownership
Racial and ethnic minorities make up 33 percent of our population.  They own a scant 3 percent 
of all full-power commercial TV stations. And that number is plummeting. Free Press recently released a 
study showing that during just the past year the number of minority-owned full-power commercial 
television stations declined by 8.5%, and the number of African American-owned stations decreased by 
nearly 60%. It is almost inconceivable that this shameful state of affairs could be getting worse; yet here 
we are.
In most places there is something approaching unanimity that this has to change. Broadcasters, 
citizens, Members of Congress, and every leading civil rights organization agree that the status quo is not 
acceptable.  Each of my colleagues has recognized, I believe, that paltry levels of minority and female 
ownership are a realitywhich makes todays decision all the more disappointing.  There was a real 
opportunity to do something meaningful today after years of neglect, and we blew it.
It didnt have to be this way.  I proposed both a process and a solution.  We should have started 
by getting an accurate count of minority and female ownershipthe one that the Congressional Research 
Service and the Government Accountability Office both just found that we didnt have. The fact that we 
dont even know how many minority and female owners there are is indicative of how low this issue is on 
the FCCs list of priorities.  We also should have convened an independent panel proposed by 
Commissioner Adelstein, and endorsed by many, that would have reviewed all of the proposals before us, 
prioritized them, and made recommendations for implementation. We could have completed this process 
in ninety days or less and then would have been ready to act. 
Todays item ignores the pleas of the minority community to adopt a definition of Eligible 
Entity that could actually help their plight.  Instead, the majority directs their policies at general small 
businesses a decision that groups like Rainbow/Push and the National Association of Black Owned 
Broadcasters assert will do little or nothing for minority owners.  Similarly, MMTC and the Diversity and 
Competition Supporters conclude that they would rather have no package at all than one that includes this 
definition.  Lack of a viable definition poisons the headwaters.  Should we wonder why the fish are dying 
downstream?  
So while I can certainly support the few positive changes in this item that do not depend on the 
definitional issuesuch as the adoption of a clear non-discrimination rulethese are overshadowed by 
the truly wasted opportunity to give potential minority and female owners a seat at the table they have 
been waiting for and have deserved for far too long.  My fear now is that with cross ownership done, the 
attentions of this Commission will turn elsewhere.
Localism
At the same time that we have shamefully ignored the need to encourage media ownership by 
women and minorities, we have also witnessed a dramatic deterioration of the public interest performance 
of all our licensees.  We have witnessed the number of statehouse and city hall reporters declining decade 
after decade, despite an explosion in state and local lobbying.  The number of channels have indeed 
multiplied, but there is far less local programming and reporting being produced. 
Are you interested in learning about local politics from the evening news? About 8 percent of 
such broadcasts contain any local political coverage at all, including races for the House of 
Representatives, and that was during the 30 days before the last presidential election.  Interested in how 
TV reinforces stereotypes?  Consider that the local news is four times more likely to show a mug shot 
during a crime story if the suspect is black rather than white.
The loss of localism impacts our music and entertainment, too.  Just this morning, I had an e-mail 
from a musician who took a trip of several hundred miles and heard the same songs played on the car 
radio everywhere he traveled. Local artists, independent creative artists and small businesses are paying a 
frightful price in lost opportunity.  Big consolidated media dampens local and regional creativity, and that 
begins to mess around pretty seriously with the genius of our nation. 
All this is a travesty.  We allow the nation's broadcasters to use half a trillion dollars of 
spectrumfor free.  In return, we require that they serve the public interest: devoting at least some 
airtime for worthy programs that inform viewers, support local arts and culture, and educate our 
childrenin other words, that aspire to something beyond just minimizing costs and maximizing revenue.  
Once upon a time, the FCC actually enforced this bargain by requiring a thorough review of a 
licensee's performance every three years before renewing the license. But during decades of market 
absolutism, we pared that down to postcard renewal, a rubber stamp every eight years with no 
substantive review.
To begin with, the FCC needs to reinvigorate the license-renewal process.  We need to look at a 
station's record every three or four years.  I am disappointed that the majority so cavalierly dismisses this 
idea. And we should be actually looking at this record.  Did the station show original programs on local 
civic affairs?  Did it broadcast political conventions?  In an era where too many owners live thousands of 
miles away from the communities they allegedly serve, do these owners meet regularly with local leaders 
and the public to receive feedback?  Why dont we make sure thats done before we allow more 
consolidation? 
In 2004, the Commission opened up a Notice of Inquiry to consider ways to improve localism by 
better enforcing the quid pro quo between the nations broadcasters and the public.  The Notice addressed 
many of the questions raised by earlier, dormant proceedings dating from years before.  Todays Localism 
Notice asks more questions and tees up meritorious ideasbut again my question: why the rush to vote 
more consolidation now, consolidation that has been the bane of localism, and why put off systematic 
actions to redress the harms consolidation has inflicted?  
Our FCC cart is ahead of our horse.  Before allowing Big Media to get even biggerand to start 
the predictable cycle of layoffs and downsizing that is the inevitable result of, indeed the economic 
rationale for, many types of mergerswe should be enforcing clear obligations for each and every FCC 
licensee.  
Conclusion
Those who look for substantive action on these important issues concerning localism and 
minorities will look in vain, I predict, once the majority works its way on cross ownership.  We are told 
that we cannot deal with localism and minority ownership because that would require delay.  But these 
questions have been before the Commission for almost a decadeand they have been ignored year after 
year.  These issues could have beenshould have beenteed up years ago.  We begged for that in 2003 
when we sailed off on the calamitous rules proposed by Chairman Powell and pushed through in another 
mad rush to judgment.  Dont tell me it cant be done.  It should have been done years ago.  And we had 
the chance again this time around.  Now, because of a situation not of Commissioner Adelsteins or my 
making, we are accused of delaying just because we want to make things better before the majority makes 
them far worse.  I see.
When I think about where the FCC has been and where it is today, two conclusions:
First, the consolidation we have seen so far and the decision to treat broadcasting as just another 
business has not produced a media system that does a better job serving most Americans.  Quite the 
opposite.  Rather than reviving the news business, it has led to less localism, less diversity of opinion and 
ownership, less serious political coverage, fewer jobs for journalists, and the list goes on.  
Second, I think we have learned that the purest form of commercialism and high quality news 
make uneasy bedfellows.  As my own hero, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, put it in a letter to Joseph 
Pulitzer, I have always been firmly persuaded that our newspapers cannot be edited in the interests of the 
general public from the counting room.  So, too, for broadcast journalism.  This is not to say that good 
journalism is incompatible with making a profitI believe that both interests can and must be balanced.  
But when TV and radio stations are no longer required by law to serve their local communities, and are 
owned by huge national corporations dedicated to cutting costs through economies of scale, it should be 
no surprise that, in essence, viewers and listeners have become the products that broadcasters sell to 
advertisers.  
We could have beenshould have beenhere today lauding the best efforts of government to 
reverse these trends and to promote a media environment that actually strengthens American democracy 
rather than weakens it.  Instead, we are marking not just a lost opportunity but the allowance of new rules 
that head media democracy in exactly the wrong direction.
I take great comfort from the conclusion of another critic of the current media system, Walter 
Cronkite, who said, "America is a powerful and prosperous nation. We certainly should insist upon, and 
can afford to sustain, a media system of which we can be proud."  
Now its up to the rest of us.  The situation isnt going to repair itself.  Big media is not going to 
repair it.  This Commission is not going to repair it.  But the people, their elected representatives, and 
attentive courts can repair it.  Last time the Commission went down this road, the majority heard and felt 
the outrage of millions of citizens and Congress and then the court.  Todays decision is just as dismissive 
of good process as that earlier one, just as unconcerned with what the people have said, just as heedless of 
the advice of our oversight committees and many other Members of Congress, and just as stubborn
perhaps even more stubbornbecause this time it knows, or should know, whats coming.  Last time a lot 
of insiders were surprised by the countrys reaction.  This time they should be forewarned.  I hope, I 
really hope, that todays majority decision will be consigned to the fate it deserves and that one day in the 
not too distant future we can look back upon it as an aberration from which we eventually recovered.  We 
have had a dangerous, decades-long flirtation with media consolidation.  I would welcome a little 
romance with the public interest for a change.