FCC ACTION
Well, if you watch TV or read the newspapers, then you have every reason to believe that the Republicans controlling the Federal Communications Commission voted yesterday to turn the country over to NewsCorp. But here's some folks who disagree that this is the end of the world:

Larval Lawyer says "All of the debate and moral outrage that has followed has centered around some broad idea that "monopolies are bad." This morning, the local talk station's wacky morning hosts spent 5 minutes rambling about how bad this would be, as the world would be owned by "some Australian meglomaniac." Sigh."

Business Lawyer Weblog wonders where is the evidence that media consolidation is a bad thing:

Really, can anyone point to a merger or instance of media consolidation in the past and the direct negative effects resulting from the consolidation? When Viacom purchased CBS or when Disney acquired ABC, what was the negative effect? Byron Dorgan would say the negative effect was "media concentration" and then stare at you like he's made his point. Did CBS News suffer? Did ABC News? Did 60 Minutes, Everybody Loves Raymond or 20/20?

In 1975 everyone got his news from 3 television sources and the local papers. Now, the New York Times and USA Today and any number of papers can be delivered to almost 100% of the country (but Disney cannot reach more than 45% with TV stations it owns, and that's under the new "relaxed" rules), and there are 4 all news channels, not counting the coverage of issues of public interest from PBS to A&E to Discovery and the History Channel to MTV News. Oh, and when Viacom bought CBS, did it merge CBS News into MTV News, thereby reducing the number of "voices?"

Ramesh Ponnuru hears plenty of voices -- all against:

If the interests of the owners determine the content of the media, why is it that everything I've seen or read about the FCC vote has been against deregulation? Tom Shales had a long attack on the idea in the Washington Post's Style section on Monday morning; he said that deregulation was a right-wing plot to enrich the networks. But his own newspaper has editorialized against the position of the company that owns it. And if Shales is right that the result of deregulation will be that Fox News takes over the universe — a vision that appears to give him cold sweats — how can it make sense for Shales to praise the farsightedness of the National Rifle Association, which opposed deregulation on the supposition that it will make the media more left-wing? They can't both be right, can they?

Duane Freese has a lot of points:

These complaints would make a lot more sense if the D.C. federal appeals court hadn't thrown out five of the six rules the FCC is considering modifying as lacking proper legal rationale.
...
[T]he FCC will allow one company to own two television stations in markets with at least six competitors. There used to be only three television networks and three stations in the largest cities such as New York and Los Angeles. Who's going to notice any real change there?
...
Antitrust laws have not been revoked. So, any mergers will undergo scrutiny by antitrust regulators both at the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department. That limits the likelihood of one or two media conglomerates dishing out all of the nation's news and views. An even bigger limitation on that likelihood occurring is new technology and modern means of delivery of information to the people.