Present Pols Absent at NATPE

Guess who didn't come to the National Association of Television Programming Executives’ convention? Politicians and regulators, at least if you don’t count former pols Jesse Ventura and Jerry Springer.

Usually either at NATPE or as part of the pre-NATPE mini-conference formerly held by the now-former Association of Local Television Stations, you could depend on a bureaucratic presence.

But a lot of things got in the way this year, NATPE president Rick Feldman and others explained, including the fact that the confab coincided with the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

Sources said Democrat Federal Communications Commission member Jonathan Adelstein almost came, but backed out.

Next year, NATPE organizers said, the politicians will be back.