Judge in Tribune bankruptcy being pushed to his limits

The judge in Tribune Company's nearly 2-year-old bankruptcy case struggled openly at a key hearing as he attempted to referee what one participant described as a "four-ring circus" and another called "total chaos."

Faced with a proceeding that has splintered into four competing restructuring plans brought by sparring creditor factions, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey acknowledged that moving the complex case forward efficiently is taxing the powers of the bench. "It's an unwanted meeting with my own limitations," he said at one particularly frustrating juncture during a seven-hour hearing in a bankruptcy courtroom filled to capacity with lawyers representing constituents in the Chicago-based media company's Chapter 11 case. Experts say the Tribune case is developing into Exhibit A for how bankruptcy law has evolved since 2005, when Congress mandated a limit for how long a court could grant debtors the exclusive right to file their own restructuring plan.