More than a year ago lefty webzine Third Coast Press -- along with several members of Chicago Media Action and the local peace and justice movement-- challenged the licenses of every TV station in the Chicago market. Their petition to the FCC cited the stations' failure to adequately cover the debate over the war in Iraq and their chronic lack of attention to the city's African American, Latino and working class residents. Today, the FCC finally did what we always predicted they would do: they rejected the TCP petition. Indeed, those of us in the media reform/media democracy movement would have been shocked had that corrupt and venal agency actually done the right thing and launched further inquiries into TCP's complaints.

But this is not the end of this issue. Far from it. If the FCC had accepted the TCP petition, they would have had to hold a public hearing -- in Chicago-- about the stations' performance and their service to the public interest . Well, I can tell you that plans are already afoot to hold a public hearing, or perhaps even a series of public hearings, without the sanction of Bush's FCC. Chicago's TV broadcasters will not be able to escape public, democratic accountability so easily....

FCC Rejects Call for Chicago Stations' License Denial

By Ira Teinowitz

The Federal Communications Commission today rejected Third Coast Press' attempt to halt the license renewal of all 18 Chicago market TV stations, saying the progressive newspaper didn't prove its charge that the stations have been "systematically negligent" in serving the public service.
Read the whole story here: http://www.tvweek.com/news.cms?newsId=11228