In a U.S. Senate hearing about the retransmission consent laws, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) said that getting the FCC to step in and take some sort of action against Fox News Channel and MSNBC “would be a big favor to political discourse; to our ability to do our work here in Congress; and to the American people, to be able to talk with each other and have some faith in their government and, more importantly, in their future.”
As the New York Times notes in its coverage, the FCC does not have the authority to regulate those networks, as they are distributed via cable, and not over the broadcast airwaves.
More from the Times here.
Rockefeller’s complaint is a common one among many media critics. What do you think of the comments? Should the FCC regulate cable news? Or is the current system working well enough? Let us know in the comments.