New Barton Joins House

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We have it on good authority that House Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton became the proud papa of Jack Barton (a strapping 10 lbs, 4 oz) at 7:06 p.m. Thursday night.

All are doing fine, said a source with knowledge of the new house member, and the DTV transition can now proceed.

At one point, the committee was looking to get a break on the deadline for doing a DTV transition bill--which had been Sept. 16--in anticipation of the blessed event, but a decidedly unblessed Katrina took care of pushing that deadline back to Oct. 19.

Barton is opposed to multicasting must-carry as too burdensome on cable, but our guess is Jack is one carriage requirement he won't mind fulfilling. 

John Eggerton
John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.