The FCC And The PEBCAK POTUS

     The structure of the actual commission that runs the Federal Communications Commission is simple: there are five Commissioners, no more than three of whom can be from the same party, and they serve five year terms that can be informally extended to seven and a half years if they aren't replaced.  The President appoints them, the Senate confirms them (or doesn't, though it's rare), and the President gets to pick which one gets the Chairman's seat.

     For over-the-air stuff, the Commission's basic mandate is to regulate the operation of actual transmitters, those devices that fill up the limited RF spectrum with signals.  It's different for every service, from the few remaining Non-Directional Beacons and maritime services down below the end of the AM band -- remember AM radio? It's kind of still there, barely --  up through amateur radio and shortwave broadcasting, low-band communications, FM and television broadcasting, VHF and UHF comms, cell phones, terrestrial relay services (mostly digital stuff), satellite radio and TV and so on.  When it comes to broadcasting, the FCC licenses individual radio and TV stations, not networks or group owners.  Each spot on the dial in each location comes with a license -- or a big old Federal fine.

     President-elect Trump's incoming FCC Chair has big plans -- or at least big talk -- about knocking "the networks" into line, but he's got less direct power over them than his sponsor appears to believe.  The FCC can be expensive and annoying to the stations the networks own directly.  Those are relatively few, though in the biggest cities -- think New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington D.C., San Francisco, Boston and so on.  But they're not the biggest owners; that would be Hearst, E. W. Scripps Company, Sinclair (probably the largest, avowedly conservative and has the greatest number of ABC stations) and Tegna, Inc.  None of these companies own only stations affiliated with just one network; Tegna's got the biggest block of NBC stations (22), but owns ABC, CBS and Fox stations as well; each of them owns stations that carry the four largest TV networks -- so it's tricky for the entity that licenses stations to go after a network: networks are not, themselves, licensed by the FCC.  Each and every one of these very large companies (think billions, not millions) has lawyers by the barrel-full; they have all formed in the course of long strings of acquisitions, mergers and divestments.  Legal sparring with the FCC (and other regulators) isn't just a thing they do, it's a part of what they are.

     Most of these station-owning companies avoid overt politics and editorialized content, other than Sinclair, and even Sinclair is careful where they tread: they're all in the business to make money, and they will follow the money remorselessly, wherever it leads.  The FCC may be able to cost them a few bucks, if they do something the new Chairman deems worthy of reproof  -- but most of their attorneys are already on the payroll, and enjoy an opportunity to keep busy.