The White House is seeking big budget increases for the Voice of America, especially for its broadcasts to Muslim countries. This is something people with various views on our Middle East policies should be able to agree on. Simply piping information into the communist world was one of the most important things we did to weaken and delegitimize the Soviet regime — I remember people eagerly awaiting the next news broadcast, jazz program, or “special English” tutorial (where the broadcasters spoke verrrrrry sloooooowly so foreigners could listen and learn). It’s not that everyone was a dissident awaiting instructions from Washington, but rather that the very existence of VOA’s relatively non-political broadcasts (editorials were clearly labeled as such) was a reproach to the totalitarian goons. This same thing is likely, especially in Iran, but really anywhere with a tightly controlled press. And although I expect I’ll be bombarded with criticism, it does seem to me that the more aggressive propaganda broadcasts, like Radio Liberty and Radio Free Europe, were less effective.