Parliamentary Impasse Changing Media Landscape Is Irrelevant to Public Livelihood On the eve of Constitution Day on Friday, lawmakers produced a scene not seen in the country's 61-year-long constitutional history. The governing and opposition party legislators spent the night together at the parliament's main hall - not to discuss life-and-death issues for voters, but to keep the other side from occupying the Speaker's desk, either to railroad a few law bills or to prevent it. Without some 11th-hour agreement on Assembly operation, the global news audience, who watched the parliamentary melee here last December in which sledge hammers and fire distinguishers prevailed, might be seeing its Season II in a week or so. At the heart of the inter-party maelstrom this time is a media industry reform bill, which calls for allowing businesses and newspapers to also own broadcasting stations, including 24-hour cable news networks. The governing Grand National Party(GNP) contends the cross-ownership is vital for enhancing the domestic industry's competitive edge, diversifying news channels and creating more jobs in this era of media fusion, which is right, given the current global trends. Its political opponents, led by the main opposition Democratic Party(DP), counter it would only open the way for conglomerates as well as large (conservative) papers which already occupy 70 percent of the advertising market, to further their oligopoly and set the stage for perpetuating the conservative grip on power, an argument which also is not wrong under Korea's reality. Ture, the DP should cooperate for its passage during the ongoing extra session, as it promised three months ago. The problem is a joint study group for the controversial bill, composed of experts recommended by rival political groups, has failed to reach a consensus the past three months, issuing separate reports with completely different conclusions. All this reaffirms that the media industry debate is not a matter of a do-or-die logical duel but the one requiring a compromise, which is also what democracy is about in real politics, something the Korean politicians are pathetically incapable of doing. It would be all the better if the two sides can come up with an idea in the process, which can both diversify news suppliers and, at the same time, prevent the excessive influence of a few players with the same ideological inclinations. In this regard, the compromise idea presented by Rep. Park Geun-hye, arguably the most influential GNP politician - which calls for limiting one media company's combined market share to 30 percent of the total_is neither entirely new nor conclusive but can be a start for a debate from the ground up. The last thing the voters want to see repeatedly is a parliamentary scuffle like the one of seven months ago. The economic effect of the media big bang has long been confirmed as overblown, not downright false. The legislation of this bill_which has little to do with public livelihood unlike the ''Non-Regular Workers'Protection Law''_can wait. Undue adherence to its passage by President Lee Myung-bak and his party would only reaffirm their opponents are right.