Well, well, well. Liberals are crying foul because conservatives are trying to bring balance to the government-funded entity known as the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).
Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, Republican chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which promotes PBS programming, is doing his job: trying to bring fairness and objectivity to the left-leaning, taxpayer-supported network.
The writers of this New York Times (reg. req.) story don’t seem too keen on Tomlinson (“Republican Chairman Exerts Pressure on PBS, Alleging Biases”), and they portray him as some kind of radical figure when he’s actually expressing the sort of view PBS claims to want to protect. What they choose to include and exclude from the story is revealing. For instance, the article begins with an ominous tone, informing us that Tomlinson, “Without the knowledge of his board…contracted last year with an outside consultant to keep track of the guests’ political leanings on one program, ‘Now With Bill Moyers.’”
It doesn’t sound to me like he did anything illegal or unethical. Then again, unlike PBS and the NYT, I admit my bias. I’m with Tomlinson all the way on this. The left-leaning network, or whatever it’s called, needs to make a dramatic move to the center, and “center” shouldn’t be defined by the same liberals who’ve been running the place for years. Or having tantrums
The writers also make sure we know that Tomlinson “encouraged corporation and public broadcasting officials to broadcast ‘The Journal Editorial Report,’ whose host, Paul Gigot, is editor of the conservative editorial page of The Wall Street Journal.”
The horror!
Pseudo-intellectuals and “progressives” weaned on the NYT and National Public Radio (another left-leaning, government-sponsored entity) must be aghast. I’m sure it’s quite traumatizing to know that the voice of a conservative from a right-leaning newspaper is broadcast from the sacred halls of public television. That conservatives are also members of the public whose taxes support PBS is lost on them.
This is a telling section:
Mr. Tomlinson’s tenure has brought criticism that his chairmanship has been the most polarizing in a generation. Christy Carpenter, a Democratic appointee to the board from 1998 to 2002, said partisanship was “essentially nonexistent” in her first years. But once Mr. Tomlinson, a former editor in chief of Reader’s Digest, joined in September 2000 and President Bush’s election changed the board’s political composition, the tenor changed, she said.“There was an increasingly and disturbingly aggressive desire to be more involved and to push programming in a more conservative direction,” said Ms. Carpenter, who is now a vice president of the Museum of Television and Radio. One of the more disturbing developments, she added, was a “very vehement dislike for Bill Moyers.”
Anyone of average intelligence can read between these lines. Tomlinson is the first conservative in years to stand up to PBS cronies and challenge the network to produce balanced programming, and the exalted ones are naturally ticked off. His efforts are bound to cause division. Nothing new under the sun, people.
You see, liberal types in media and public television really believe they’re moderates and conservatives are extremists. Upsetting the big, fat, tax-funded apple cart has sent them rolling, and they’re resistant to even consider that Tomlinson may have a point.
[Note: I deleted some rather strong language in the previous paragraph about "perversion and deviancy." I'm not one to back down unless I'm wrong, but I don't want to go over the top trying to make my point, either. PBS does broadcast a few quality shows. "Anne of Green Gables" is one of my all-time favorites, so I need to keep that in mind as I criticize the network.]
I had my own encounter with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting last year. I interviewed for some position in history programming, I think. I suspect I was there for purposes of “diversity,” because I certainly wasn’t qualified. Knowing I probably wouldn’t get the job, I decided to speak frankly about PBS. I said something about “diversity of ideology and not just diversity of skin color,” and “obligation to balance programming,” etc.
The interviewers never bothered to challenge my implication that PBS leaned left. I blogged about it in The PBS Incident.
