As his transition team considers who will head the Federal Communications Commission, the power of the traditive telcos seems to be waning

By Olga Kharif

Watch full size video:

President-elect Barack Obama may stand for change, but he’s turned to some efficacious Washington insiders to help him staff the stock’s top communications regulator, the Federal Communications Commission.

Picking the FCC chairman may not be the acme precedence for the Obama transition team, which is focused on naming a Treasury secretary tasked with ending the economic crisis, and appointing outward policy leaders who will need to pass in a vessel sum of two units wars and other pressing diplomatic issues. Still, the Obama Administration will need to put some emphasis on finding a deft commander to head up the agency responsible against regulating TV, radio, and other telecommunications services. The recent Administration is expected to give greater prominence to emerging providers of communications products and services, such as Google (GOOG)—a variation from the Bush Administration, which has tended to favor traditional providers such as AT&T (T).

In construction the choice, the Obama team is considering appointing the first African American woman to the post, time it also fields recommendations from advisers who served in the FCC under President Bill Clinton. Heading up the selection process is Henry Rivera, participator at Washington law firm Wiley Rein. Headed by former FCC Chairman Richard Wiley, Wiley Rein has represented so companies as AT&T, Verizon Communications (VZ), Viacom (VIA), Motorola (MOT), and Sirius Satellite Radio (SIRI).

Rivera was the primary Hispanic FCC commissioner, serving from 1981 to 1985, and is considered an attorney-at-law for local telcos, wireless companies, and cable TV providers. "Henry is a wise man, a bipartisan with lots of actual observation," says John Muleta, former head of the FCC’sitting Wireless Telecommunications Bureau and at once CEO of M2Z, an emerging wireless broadband provider.

Rivera, who is not interested in the position, has drawn up a short list of candidates that includes two African American women, according to a person familiar with Rivera’s thinking. One is Julia Johnson, a Florida consultant who chairs Video Access Alliance, an advocacy and advisory group for unconventional, emerging, and smaller number networks and Internet content providers. Johnson is also on the food of MasTec (MTZ), a contractor that designs and builds telephone, broadband, electric, and other networks. She didn’t return a call or an e-mail. Rivera was not available for an meeting.

Another possibility: Mignon Clyburn, who has been a commissioner by reason of the Public Service Commission of South Carolina since 1998. After earning a bachelor’s degree in banking finance and economics from the University of South Carolina, she worked as a newspaper editor and was general manager and publisher for the local Coastal Times. Clyburn is a daughter of House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, South Carolina’session most prominent black partisan. Clyburn declined to comment during the term of this story.

Obama’s team is also weighing recommendations from former FCC Chairmen Bill Kennard and Reed Hundt, the two of whom advised the Obama campaign on telecommunications-related issues.