Clear THIS Channel!

Hopefully this effort will go nowhere, but:

Apparently Clear Channel’s new motto is “if you can’t beat ’em, make life suck on the other side of the merger.” The broadcast giant has dropped a whole big list of requests on the FCC to impose as conditions upon XM / Sirius for a merger, not the least of which is asking for broadcast decency rules be applied to satellite radio.

One of the reasons I haven’t listened to the radio since 1992 is that Clear Channel isn’t just lousy, it’s omnipresent. And thanks to Apple’s iPod, I don’t have to subscribe to XM or Sirius, either. But imagine if CBS sued the government to get HBO to clean up “The Wire,” or force Showtime to put clothes back on all the ladies of “The L Word.”

Unlike your lousy “local” Clear Channel stations, XM and Sirius* are subscription services. If you don’t like what they broadcast, don’t subscribe. Same as pay TV channels. If Clear Channel wants to compete, they should first try not sucking.

*Soon to be XM/Sirius, or whatever they’ll call the merged companies.