Is it me or is Super Bowl XLIII flying under the radar this year? Sure, without an East Coast team from a major market (read New York) involved, the hype on the networks and newspapers seems oddly absent this year.

But, this province of millionaires, corporate jets to Tampa, galas and $3 million commercials feels at odds to the mood of the country. People are losing jobs, their homes are going into foreclosure and they have a lot more on their minds, I suspect.

Or maybe there’s a fundamental disconnect when Hoosiers learned that we tore down the RCA Dome, which was still being paid for and erected Lucas Oil Stadium, which we learned this week, is losing big money. $20-30 million this year.

There’s talk of renegotiating with the Colts. Right. The Colts have financial issues, apparently, as they’re laying off 25 people. Office staff, no players.

There’s a couple of days for the NFL hype machine to get us revved up for Super Bowl XLIII. But, it sure seems quiet.

For years, we’ve been predicting a train wreck on February 17 at midnight when the government mandated turnoff of analog television signals is scheduled.

Broadcasters have been briefing Congress on their concerns for years.I’ve been a part of delegations from the Indiana Broadcasters Association that met annually with our representatives and senators to discuss the issue. I think a few understood the implications. One or two.

But, I always had a sense that we were wasting our time and that no one in the Congress or adminstration would really focus on the implications until the last minute. I was right.

Now, less than four weeks from D(igital) Day, the alarm has finally sounded. The United States Senate appeared close to agreement at the close of the week on a bill to delay the shutoff to June 12.

President Barack Obama earlier this month called for the transition date to be postponed after the Commerce Department ran out of money for coupons to subsidize digital TV converter boxes for consumers.

Senate Republicans last week blocked Democratic efforts to push back the deadline. The Democrats cited mounting concerns that too many Americans who rely on analog TV sets to pick up over-the-air broadcast signals won’t be ready.

Republicans in both the House and Senate say that a delay will confuse consumers, create added costs for television stations that would have to continue broadcasting both analog and digital signals and burden wireless companies and public safety agencies waiting for spectrum that will be freed up by the switch.

TV stations across America have run millions of pubic service announcements, served up millions of web pages of information, conducted on-air simulations and manned phone banks. Anyone that isn’t prepared now is going to be in the same shape in four months.

The Senate bill by Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia aims to address Republican concerns by allowing broadcast stations to make the switch from analog to digital signals sooner than the June 12 deadline if they choose to.

Sure, we’ll just go ahead and shut down and incur the wrath of viewers, the Federal Communications Commission and the new administration.

If Rockefeller’s bill passes the Senate next week, the matter goes next to the House. With the clock ticking down on Feb. 17, the quickest course of action for Congress would be for the House to simply pass the Senate bill.

Personally, I think the Congress should work on something more consumer-friendly. Instead of moving the DTV Transition Date, how about sliding tax filing up to August or September.

I’m not ready for April 15.

It’s 40 days to the shutdown of analog television signals and Washington is starting to wake up.   America’s television stations have broadcast volumes of public service announcements, done thousands of news stories, held town meetings and conducted numerous phone banks to prepare consumers for the switch to the digital-only future.

Today, President-Elect Barack Obama’s transition team asked for a delay in the nation’s scheduled switch to digital television, citing funding difficulties. The team co-chair John Podesta wrote to key US lawmakers asking for an extension to the February 17 legislatively-mandated cutoff date.

“During the transition, we have discovered major difficulties in the preparation for the February 17 conversion from analog to digital broadcasting,” he said. “These weaknesses mean major problems for consumers.”

By early February projections suggested more than five million requests for coupons to be used to defray part of the cost of converter boxes would not be met, with the figure “increasing by hundreds of thousands every day,” he said.

In addition, the funds provided to support the conversion are “woefully inadequate,” Podesta said, pointing out that particularly low income, rural and elderly Americans would be hit.

The major networks, predictably, support the delay, in the “interest of the American consumer.”

But the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry group, suggested keeping the February 17 transition date. It says converter boxes are available in sufficient supply and consumers are aware of and prepared for the transition, but added legitimate concerns about the coupon program should be addressed immediately.

Having been involved with this for years and talking to viewers I’m convinced that moving the date is only postponing the inevitable.  There are many issues.  And even consumers who are able to get converter boxes are confused and have difficulty setting them up, getting a proper antenna on them and understanding how they work with their TV.

Congress provided a bailout for banks and the automakers.  How about a bailout for the consumers?

What Congress ought to do is fund a program that would make technicians available for viewers who need help.  Obama has compared the task ahead on getting the economy going to that faced by FDR.  How about a WPA approach – training unemployed workers to troubleshoot specific problems that the public could report to centralized groups?  Or provide coupons that could be used by confused consumers to hire one of the Geek Squad at Best Buy or some other enterprising group or individual.

It’s politically correct to vote for a delay, June 1 has been suggested as the new shutoff date, but I believe we’ll see the same result.  The only difference is that Washington suddenly woke up at T minus 40 when they should have woken up at T minus 1000.