Kevin, we hardly new ye!

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is about to throw himself out of Washington, D.C.

He’s a clue-challenged failure and a fraud.

And what does a failure and a fraud do when confronted with that reality?

Run for public office.

Yesterday, Kev returned to his roots - North Carolina - to speak on a rural health care pilot program.

Rural health care? What does that have to do with the FCC? Nothing and everything.

Kevin, who was born in Charlotte, is pushing what would be a 42-state broadband tele-health (those Republicans love their double-speak) network.

What Kevin’s really doing is testing the waters.

Though his FCC term as a commissioner doesn’t expire until 2011 – his Chairmanship will almost certainly be replaced under new Presidential leadership.

Some in Washington feel this is Kevin’s exit, stage left for his return to North Carolina and a run for something, anything.

Hate to tell you this, Kevin, but no one’s going to miss you in Washington.

You were inept and dropped the ball one too many times – and this is what your friends in high places think of you. The rest of us wrote you off a long time ago.

You weren’t the guy the Bushoids hoped for. You were nothing more than a sheep in sheep’s clothing – and even that’s giving you too much credit.

Even Sam Zell had to grab you by the lapels and throw you against the wall or something close to it. He needs some temp waivers from the FCC to get his $8-plus billion buyout of the Tribune corp. so he can close the deal and avoid the almost- imminent financial penalties due if the deal doesn’t get done by year’s end.

Kev, you told him you could walk that through. What happened? Zell rhymes with Hell and that’s what he’s putting you through for your lack of obedience.

It doesn’t help, Kevvie, that you didn’t cover your tracks well and word got out on your clandestine meetings with Zell, which breaks a whole lotta FCC rules and regs. Then again, Kevin – what’s another rule and regulation to break when you’ve broken so many already?

I think the GAO lost count of yours.

All Zell wants is to keep WGN radio and TV in the empire. Is that too much to ask? It’s not like Chicago is market size one or two. Kevin, that’s easy stuff made easier. There was enough diversion with Iran, Iraq, gas prices, recession, and other fun stuff to slip your Zell deal through.

If you trace Clear Channel back far enough, you’ll find Zell’s fingerprints all over the Jacor side of the deal. It was Zell that helped create golden parachutes for all those ham-fisted executives Clear Channel can’t get rid of.
*
And it’s not just Zell you’ve frustrated. You’ve enraged the top-of-the-chain radio groups for your inability to lift the eight-station cap on large markets. What’s the problem with one company owning just about every radio station in a major market?

That kind of dominance just may make radio valuable again, at least provisionally - for all the wrong reasons.

You should’ve re-read your job description as defined by the current administration. You were supposed to eliminate those exasperating ownership caps once and for all while garroting any remaining free media.

Who needs low power FM neighborhood stations that serve specific communities when you can approve and blanket markets with Christian-right programming from a central, national location? At least that much you did.

Kevin, you were put in position to be the bagman for big media – and given all the tools and political clout to do so and, somehow, you still found a way to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory.

I’ll hate to see you go. Without knowing it, you actually aided and abetted the other side.

Kevin, my boy, you walked into a field of land mines. House Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-MI) put it in writing that he has “serious concerns” about your December 18 deregulation time line.

Go back to North Carolina. Run for something, anything.

And take your wife, please. She’ll be out of work as soon as Dick Cheney, her employer, is out of office.

You won’t miss those small-talk conversations at Washington dinner parties that always end up with “I pity you,” whenever you’re asked what you do for a living.

Three words, Kevin: You blew it!

I don’t think we’ll be seeing you around Capitol Hill much longer. North Carolina’s calling and maybe you still can save enough face to run for something as long as it doesn’t require too much skill and follow-through.