Update: House Appropriations Committee votes to cut PBS funding. If politicians want to save the taxpayers some dough, this is good place to start. Well done.
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Well, well, well. So the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) has finally gotten the message. The taxpayer-supported network is updating its editorial policy in light of complaints about a leftist bias, which they still deny. A couple of months ago I went on a tirade against PBS. It was fun.
According to ABC News, PBS is hiring an ombudsman to deal with viewers’ complaints and “review controversial programs.” Conservatives serving on the board at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which was formed in 1967 to fund PBS, raised so much ruckus that the public entity had to do something.
Unfortunately, you have to “get loud” with some people to get your point across. A Republican majority in all three branches of government definitely helps. From now on, opinion segments have to be clearly identified as opinion and not news. This is what my liberal detractors don’t seem to get. The problem is not a news outlet’s editorial slant. Newspapers, news shows, etc., will inevitably lean one way or another. Disguising an opinion as objective news is the problem.
From the Los Angeles Times:
CPB Chairman Kenneth Tomlinson has recently led a charge to add more conservative programming on PBS, saying that the service has a liberal reputation.Though PBS had contemplated the creation of an ombudsman’s position for more than six months, its decision comes after the CPB appointed two ombudsmen this spring to evaluate public television and radio content. Those hires caught PBS officials off guard.
In addition to mandating neutrality, the new guidelines instruct journalists to enter into inquiries with open minds and to provide viewers with a sense of transparency about their news-gathering methods and sources. The new standards also require opinion pieces to be clearly identified.
It’s about time. Read about the job interview I had last year with the CPB. That was fun, too. 
