A Lame Plan from a Likely Lame Duck

[Commentary] Jessell has no love for Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin, who has all of five months left at the FCC's helm. OK, a little love. Instead of pushing the same old discredited localism ideas that have been haunting broadcasting for decades -- programming quotas, ascertainment and such -- Chairman Martin has come up with an idea that could, in theory, yield some programming that could actually enhance the service that stations provide. The trouble is, the proposal still puts the FCC where it doesn't belong: in the middle of TV stations' decisionmaking on news and programming. Any news dollar a station spends on an FCC-approved independent news bureau is one less dollar spent on something else, perhaps another local producer or reporter. The FCC is, in effect, directing stations' news priorities. An unintended consequence of shifting resources to state issues may be the loss of local coverage — hardly the aim of the FCC's localism proceeding.