A Waste of Shame

The FCC doesn't get to fast-track a court hearing on its absurd Janet Jackson indecency ruling.

That was the conclusion of a federal appeals court, although the court's schedule for paper arguments–which precede the oral ones–is only two-and-a-half weeks further into the fall than the FCC had requested.

With ownership rules and the digital transition to work out, the FCC continues to be enmeshed in court defenses of its crusade against the forces of naughty, expending energy better spent on almost anything else but parsing cusswords and defending the indefensible.

I can't wait to hear its court defense of those profanity findings, unless it gets its way with that court and can revise the decision. Any way you slice it, the commission comes up full of baloney on this issue and no amount of expost facto repackaging can change that.

By John Eggerton