Sometimes, when the world has you feeling down, it’s nice to spend some quality time at home where people appreciate you (at least you hope they do). But if you can’t get any love in your hometown, where do you turn to next?

I don’t know, but that’s the conundrum facing late night television host Jay Leno, now that Boston’s local NBC affiliate (WHDH) wants to preempt his new show with a ten o’clock local news broadcast. Leno will be relinquishing his role as the host of NBC’s Late Night and venturing into the uncharted waters of primetime with The Jay Leno Show. MSNBC is reporting that “Ed Ansin, who owns WHDH’s parent company, told the Boston Globe he did not believe Leno’s new show would be successful. He said the station would do better financially with a news show that competes with Fox-affiliated WFXT-TV’s highly rated 10 P.M. newscast.”

However, one of the drawbacks of being a network affiliate is that you have to toe the company line; you can’t just go behind the network’s back and run all willy nilly with your decisions. Accordingly, a furious John Eck, NBC’s President, reprimanded the renegade network with some harsh words: “WHDH’s move is a flagrant violation of the terms of their contract with NBC. If they persist, we will strip WHDH of its NBC affiliation. We have a number of other strong options in the Boston market, including using our existing broadcast license to launch an NBC owned-and-operated station.”

Sounds like things are getting pretty serious in the Boston television circuit. Prolific blogger Perez Hilton was quick to jump in on the side of WHDH, proclaiming that “WHDH believes the local news would draw a larger audience than Leno’s show and we can’t say we disagree.” Perez went on to predict that “Jay’s run as a hometown hero will soon be drawing to a close.” When the hate’s coming from home, it hurts. Especially when your hometown broadcaster is predicting that local news about high school football games and firefighters saving straggly-looking cats from trees will receive higher ratings than your nationally syndicated show.