Today's New York Times describes secret efforts by Republican operatives to make our Public Broadcasting System more "fair and balanced."

Kenneth Tomlinson, the Republican chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) -- the government-funded organization that was designed to shield PBS from political pressure -- is aggressively pressing PBS to correct what he considers "liberal bias."

He secretly hired a White House staffer to help draft "guiding principles" for the future of CPB. He brought in a consultant to monitor the "anti-Bush" and "anti-Tom Delay" content on Bill Moyers' NOW program, and then set up and funded right-wing commentator Paul Gigot's new PBS program. Now Tomlinson is working behind the scenes to stack CPB's board and executive offices with Republican Party cronies.

Tomlinson told the Times that he's trying to restore "objectivity and balance" to public broadcasting. This top-down partisan meddling goes against the very nature of PBS and the local stations we trust. Let the people speak and decide the future of PBS, not secret dealings by White House operatives.


A senior FCC official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he must rule on issues affecting public broadcasting, went further, saying CPB "is engaged in a systematic effort not just to sanitize the truth but to impose a right-wing agenda on PBS. It's almost like a right-wing coup. It appears to be orchestrated."


This is completely ridiculous.

And you know whats funny? I just read a statistic that NPR does interviews with 3 conservatives for every 1 liberal. And yet they are still called liberal. What the hell?

Leave PBS alone. Its called PUBLIC broadcasting for a reason. Because it belongs to the White House. The CPB is supposed to "Protect PBS from partisan meddling." And yet thats exactly what they are doing. They hired th WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATION DIRECTOR for god's sake.

Thank god media reform activism is really good at smiting this kind of crap. I doubt this will get very far.

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www.contraweb.tk
.: Digital Activism for the New Millenium :.

They have some great programs. I don't watch it as much as I should, though. I'm also glad that discussions on various issues don't degrade into grade school shouting matches on PBS like they do on FOX or CNN...

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Proudly a "South Park Republican"

Back during the election I remember there being a huge fuss over the so called “liberal media.” I found statistics similar to yours. I don’t have them bookmarked anymore. Do you have a link to your source or did you get them from the same New York Times article?

Edit: I forgot to put the quote.

So....tell me.....how do you consider it "fair" that PBS and NPR are both very liberal-leaning programs and that ALL the taxpayers are forced to fund them? I often listen to NPR when I'm in my car. I like to get the liberal perspective once in a while. But there's no question: they ARE very liberal. They hate George Bush. They have a slant against ALL conservatives and Republicans. I dare say that IF you were forced to partially fund the 700 Club......Rush Limbaugh.......or some such program, you'd have a problem with it too.

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"If the President simply adds a couple of Republican solutions to a trillion dollar health care package that the American people don't support, it isn't bi-partisan. It's political cover," Rep Eric Cantor (R-Va.)

..the false moniker of "liberal-media" has been bandied about with relish by the right-wing for years....

Yup, some liberal media, you know the one, the one that hounded a President about a stained blue-dress, but won't say squat about a president that lied about WMD and the reasons for war. The same liberal media that hounds an innocent (D) congressman because his intern goes missing, but doesn't say a WORD about a dead intern in a republican congressman's office...

I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoo sick of the bull crap coming from the partisan zealots on the right-wing about this topic....you know what, turn Lush on, watch Faux Spews and STFU!!!!@!

Truebrit.....I think the topic was about taxpayer funding. I think you just proved you would NOT want to be forced to fund Fox News or any other program you consider conservative-leaning. Well???? That's exactly what we're talking about here.

Since NPR is partially taxpayer-funded, there should be at least a portion of the day where they have a conservative-leaning host. They should at least TRY to make it "fair and balanced." That's all this Congressman is asking for.

Either that....or STOP using any of MY money for it.

And YES....while the liberal press did take glee in covering Clinton's sex-scandal. In general, they weren't tring to get him removed from office. They just like a good sex scandal for their ratings! In the final analysis with most of the liberal press....they would say it was his "personal business" and they didn't demand he resign. And we ALL know that's EXACTLY what the liberal press would have demanded had it been a Republican president.

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"If the President simply adds a couple of Republican solutions to a trillion dollar health care package that the American people don't support, it isn't bi-partisan. It's political cover," Rep Eric Cantor (R-Va.)

Isn't it true that most of you who defend PBS and NPR have NO PROBLEM with them.....BECAUSE they are LIBERAL-LEANING? Truthfully.....would any of you have a problem with your taxpayer dollars going to a conservative-leaning tv and radio station?

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"If the President simply adds a couple of Republican solutions to a trillion dollar health care package that the American people don't support, it isn't bi-partisan. It's political cover," Rep Eric Cantor (R-Va.)

"Fair and balanced"??? Huh???NPR has been found to have a 3-1 bias in favour of CONSERVATIVE voices over Democratic ones....so what's your beef....should it be 4-1? 5-1?

"I dare say that IF you were forced to partially fund the 700 Club......Rush Limbaugh"


700 club? interesting that a conservative would admit politics from a so-called 'religious" show - TAX that man right now.

Rush - you mean the taker on the $1,000,000 to push orange juice that gets funding from the TAX PAYERS???!!!!

Sesame Street is too liberal because they educate ALL kids.

from 1965-2000

longest running ultra-conservative show in history - was it on FOX? no, PBS