In the latest in an ongoing series of eye-rolling developments, the government agency in charge of the digital television converter box coupon program – the Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration – said it will likely stop processing coupon requests as early as next week because it expects to run out of money. Congress has to step in and act fast.

There was a little bit of good news for some consumers about the looming nationwide transition to digital television broadcasting, which is now less than two months away. But there is a lot more that needs to be done -- fast.

The Federal Communications Commission has one of those ominous countdown clocks on its web site, showing the exact number of days, hours, minutes and seconds left until the looming switchover to all digital, over-the-air television broadcasting on February 17th. For the record, we are now 75 days and some change away from the big switch. And with each passing day it appears more and more likely that government efforts to make the huge switchover easy and painless are going to be woefully inadequate, leaving millions of Americans with blank television screens.