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.

We wish it were otherwise but it isn’t, and it is hard to imagine that the two government agencies in charge of the switchover – the FCC and the Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration – will suddenly fix all the problems. It’s particularly hard to imagine that happening as one administration is leaving office and another is coming in, and it will be on the administration’s watch when the switchover actually takes place.

One of the biggest problems is the $1.5 billion program run by NTIA to provide $40 coupons toward the purchase of converter boxes to make older, analog televisions capable of picking up over-the-air digital signals. Under the program, households are eligible to receive two of the $40 coupons that can be applied toward the purchase of converter boxes, which generally range in price from $50 to $150.

The coupons are indeed helpful for consumers, but they unfortunately come with a 90-day expiration date. Worse, households that got coupons that expired cannot reapply for new ones. That might not sound that unfair were it not for the fact that supplies of converter boxes have been uneven at best, particularly the lowest-cost models.

Making matters worse is the fact that the people who depend on free, over-the-air television are disproportionately senior citizens, low-income households and/or minorities. Many aren’t tech savvy and are going to probably need individual help in buying, installing and programming their converter boxes.

Even if the coupon program were working well, the switchover is going to be much more complicated and expensive for millions of consumers than simply buying a converter box and hooking it up to the old Philco.

Many consumers will discover they cannot receive the free over-the-air channels they now get, including their local network and public television stations. Many will need expensive new antennas and even then they might lose some channels, especially in hilly areas or even in big cities with lots of tall buildings.

Tom Regan, a columnist for the Christian Science Monitor, this week wrote about how he discovered the darker side of the DTV switchover.

Here’s what he found when he hooked up his converter box and flipped on his old analog TV.

“I could only pick up about five channels, eight at most. And they were never the same ones. Twist the antenna one way and get ABC and NBC. Turn it another way and get CBS and Fox. I couldn’t get any PBS stations at all, which were the real reason I wanted to get a better signal in the first place.”

He bought a digital antenna.

“The picture actually grew worse, so I took it back. The signal was super finicky. If I walked in a certain part of the room, the signal disappeared all together.”

Regan does a nice job of summing up how many consumers already feel about the DTV transition, and millions are likely to feel in the near future as they try to prepare for the changeover.

“What bothers me the most about this entire exercise? I feel led astray. The information that has been coming out from broadcasters and the FCC about the switch from analog to digital has been nothing but glowing. They haven’t told us (or at least haven’t spoken loudly enough) about the problems we might have getting digital signals. They haven’t told people about the extra expense that might be involved. And they haven’t told people that come Feb. 17, their television-viewing experience might be worse, not better.”

The time for excuse making by the current FCC and NTIA and the broadcasting industry is over. It is beyond irresponsible for these entities to continue tinkering around the edges of the DTV transition and hope for the best, as they’ve now done for months.

The clock is ticking.