There is something intriguing between the lines when media outlets like the New York Times contend that Ken Tomlinson is leading a “putsch” or a “coup.” It implies that public broadcasting is indeed enemy territory to conservatives, an enclave with loyalty to liberal Democrats, with PBS and NPR stations scattered like blue asterisks in the red states. That’s all true.
But it’s ridiculous when it’s compared to what Tomlinson tried to do. He tried to add cold-filtered Tucker Carlson and the Journal Editorial Report as a mere attempt to balance out the PBS lineup….on Friday nights. (What about the rest of the week?) He didn’t try to get Bill Moyers, or the Washington Week gang taken off the air. He tried to add conservatives, not subtract liberals on PBS. He tried to have Fred Mann analyze some NPR, but never attempted to put a conservative show there, which would no doubt curl Nina Totenberg’s hair. At the end of the day, the new right-leaning PBS shows stayed on as long as Tomlinson was in charge. Now we’re back to the post-Firing Line square one. Conservative shows last on the air only as long as the “putsch” talk circulates.
PS: As for the old editorial Byron cites, don’t believe the baloney that taxpayer funding’s desperately needed for small rural pubcasting stations. By far, the lion’s share of tax money goes to the massive content-producing stations in Boston, Washington, Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York. They could fund small rural stations by surrendering a fraction of their money. But the pubcasters’ lobby exploits the don’t-defund-Minot argument as a shameless argument for more coin, not better distributed coin.