Mediacom Fires Rhetorical Phasers at NAB Retrans Arguments

made me do it" catchphrase to South Park and the Nazi Party as it attempted to rebut NAB arguments made earlier this month against greater regulatory control over retrans as the agency has begun rulemaking for the Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act Reauthorization's Section 103, which covers retrans (see 1507140021). NAB is distracting the FCC by arguing that multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) are bigger bad actors, as "that would simply mean there are two scamps, rather than only one scalawag that the FCC needs to sit in the corner," Mediacom said -- while adding that NAB allegations of MVPD misdeeds such as poor customer service, excessive equipment fees and questionable billing practices are groundless. Mediacom also scoffed at the NAB's much-repeated argument that blackouts are engineered by MVPDs to leverage FCC intervention: "The absurd premise underlying this claim is that poor, gullible, meek and powerless station owners like CBS Corp., Disney, Fox and Sinclair Broadcast Group have been maneuvered and coerced into ordering station blackouts against their will," Mediacom said. The cable company also likened the argument that MVPDs cause blackouts to Germany's framing Poland as the aggressor to legitimize its 1939 invasion. NAB is making "a giant leap" when it argues that since most retransmission consent negotiations are resolved without blackouts, such negotiations do not need FCC intervention. Pointing to Star Trek's Mr. Spock once saying he was needed most of all "among a shipload of illogical humans," Mediacom said he was needed more elsewhere -- "In a roomful of broadcast industry lobbyists relying on assorted logical fallacies to defend the status quo for retransmission consent." NAB did not respond to a message seeking comment Monday.