Not being one to avoid making enemies, Tim Robbins took the opportunity of his keynote speech at the NAB Show in Vegas.

"We don't want any kind of reporting outside the soundbite," said Robbins. "I don't know about you, but show me a drunk starlet getting out of a car with no panties on, and I think the world is a better place."

But it's what he said about satellite radio which will be of most interest to folks here. Here's an excerpt from Variety, which has one of the better accounts of the keynote:

"Robbins stepped on sensitive ground when noting that 'just when we were getting close to a national music playlist, along comes satellite radio that actually plays music people want to hear.' NAB battled to stop the proposed XM and Sirius merger, which the Justice Dept. recently approved. Despite NAB's ongoing, bitter protests, the Federal Communications Commission is likely to approve the merger, too."

The article ends saying that about two-thirds of the packed ballroom rose to a standing ovation.

[Variety]

The National Associations of Broadcasters spent nearly $9 million to lobby Capitol Hill in 2007, according to the Senate's public records office.

That's more than 3-times what Sirius and XM spent on lobbying last year.

The difference, of course, is that a chunk of that money was to argue that the NAB didn't in fact compete with satellite radio. A rather self-defeating argument in my opinion (and the DOJ apparently agreed).

To be fair though, the NAB also used a portion of that lobbying fund to argue against the use of unused TV channels, known as white spaces, for high-speed internet (because who needs more internet in this day and age, when you could have... nothing, instead). They also lobbied over issues related to radio royalties and media ownership.

The first-half of 2007 saw a lobbying spend of $4.3 million, while the second-half saw an increase to $4.6 million.

[AP]