Hidden Angle - NPR, PBS

[realFedUp]

http://www.cjrdaily.org/archives/001479.asp

Hidden Angle
April 29, 2005
CPB Looks Under Bed, Finds No Dust Balls, Hires New Maid

The other day, we wrote about the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's new acting president, Ken Ferree, and his apparent cluelessness about a couple of little fiefdoms -- NPR and PBS -- that fall under his charge.

While Ferree is getting up to speed on just what it is that NPR and PBS do, the CPB is pushing forward with its purported plans to overhaul public broadcasting's programming to make it more "fair" and "balanced." But there's a new wrinkle that calls into question the CPB's reasoning: According to two public opinion studies commissioned by CPB itself, Americans appear to like public broadcasting just the way it is.

On Wednesday, the Center for Digital Democracy reported that two unreleased surveys conducted for the CPB by polling firms Tarrance Group and Lake Snell Perry Associates in 2002 and 2003 have neither been officially released to the press nor shared with PBS and NPR. (Some of their findings were included in CPB's annual report to Congress, but the original reports remain under wraps -- CJR Daily was provided a copy by the Center.) The surveys were followed by four focus groups to further explore the issue of bias.

Despite the bellyaching coming from some conservatives about liberalism run amok in public broadcasting, both surveys came to the same conclusion: The majority of the U.S. adult population doesn't see any real bias in public broadcasting. But CPB apparently remains unconvinced. According to an article published in the Washington Post last week:

continued

[orwell]

1. Oh I Get It...

The "equal time" rule only applies to public broadcasting, but not to the MSM.

I'm so glad they cleared that up...

[realFedUp]

2. It's the dismantling of America plan

anything good and truthful is abhorrent
to the fascist regime currently squatting
in the White House.

[Zenlitened]

3. Repukes manufacturing a crisis where there is none, in order to...

... ram through destructive "reforms."

Same old, same old.

Wonder if anybody's gonna call them on this one?

Man, do we need to get Congress back!

[Tux]

4. So much

For our breath of fresh air. Will they remove Celtic music for being pagan? Ban jazz since it's black music? Have to remove any evironmental news.

I wish conservatives would understand that a democracy works best when it's citizens are informed, educated, and allowed a pluristic society so that one group and check and balance another.