Not willing to stand behind their real motives, House Republicans hide behind needy children and bad math.
The GOP is hoping to make PBS and NPR DOA as far as federal funding goes in FY2007.…
"A sinister cabal of superior writers."
Gunning For PBS - Comments Page 2
Article comments
26 - Martin Lav
Frontline (so-called liberal journalism, but I think it's the best damn show on TV)
NOVA (they don't necessarily teach creationism)
American Experience (deals with American History)
But this is the one that really got PBS in trouble.......Postcards from Buster in which one episode has a lesbian couple touring kids on a maple syrup farm.
27 - Dave Nalle
Mystery! comes from the BBC. It's just a name slapped on various BBC mystery programs for the US.
Overall I don't think PBS is too horribly left-leaning, but whether it is or not is irrelevant, there's still no justification for the government being involved in broadcasting in competition with commercial networks.
Dave
28 - JustOneMan
PBS should not go "commercial" and become just another cable station.
Hey the Muppets is a one of the biggest entertainment franchises. At its peak it was valued at over 700 million all due to PBS!
29 - JustOneMan
As for NPR the only non-bush bashing show is Car Talk....the rest has an exttremely biased slant
30 - Nancy
Nothing wrong with bashing Bush: he just gets what he begs for every time he opens his mouth.
31 - Nancy
Besides, the Car Talk brothers bash everyone, bar none. That's the best show, I swear...and I'm not even 'into' cars.
32 - JustOneMan
Nancy...the point is that since all they do is bash bush and blame america first--they really serve no public purpose..people can just listen to Air America...oh....i forgot no one listens their either
33 - Michael J. West
Actually, JOM, as I pointed out earlier, lots and lots of people listen to NPR. Including you, apparently, since you know that every show except Car Talk has an extremely biased slant.
As for PBS, I will argue for Sesame Street until my dying day. I learned to read at 30 months, and that show bears some responsibility for it.
34 - Nancy
I used to listen to NPR, but got soooo ... annoyed at those stupid, ultra low key, condescending voices the moderators all used - rather like they were always soothing restive idiot horses or something ... anyway they set my teeth on edge so I don't listen anymore. Oh - I know: they remind me of the voice of HAL 9000. Robots.
35 - Martin Lav
The importance of PBS besides the Educational purpose, is the local programming and flavor that is virtually non-existent since the consolidation of the current media empires.
Captain Kangaroo, Howdy Doody, Romper Room, JP Patches....etc.....endless list.....
They are no more and I think a PBS is the only opportunity left to produce these shows.
However, even PBS fights for the almighty Gov't dollar and they too now have to please their own advirtisers and have to sterialize their programs to satisfy their NATIONAL constituency and provide entertainment....ie Antiques Roadshow as an example.
36 - Nancy
Antiques Roadshow ... lol! You should have seen the lines of people 10 deep stretching twice around the Baltimore Civic Center when they were doing a show there - most of them laden with all kinds of junk. Excuse me: junque. It was a hoot. Lots of fun for all, and very interesting. The guy who hauled in a big bombe desk found out it was a reproduction from the 40s, while a lady with a little tiny cheap-looking painting discovered it was a rare original by a well-known antebellum primitive artist. Some might not have liked the results, but I do believe a good time, as they say, was had by all.
37 - JustOneMan
Nancy...good point...they should make it illegal to listen to NPR while your driving....electric Narcalepsy...
Micheal West...you made the point freakin Elmo in a $500 million dollar franchise...just walk into ToysRUs and youll see...Sesame Street is no different than Ron Popeil selling his "hair in a can" or "vegamatic"
38 - Clavos
The importance of PBS besides the Educational purpose, is the local programming and flavor that is virtually non-existent since the consolidation of the current media empires.
Captain Kangaroo, Howdy Doody, Romper Room, JP Patches....etc...
None of these shows were PBS shows. Captain Kangaroo and Howdy Doody were network shows (CBS and NBC, respectively), which were nationally produced and distributed.
Romper Room and JP Patches were locally produced, but were also commercial shows; Romper Room was a franchise operation.
39 - Dave Nalle
Martin, I believe they are still producing Romper Room for local distribution in Arizona - if I recall correctly.
And Michael, if you love Sesame Street you should want to set it free.
Dave
40 - ss
Forgive the long post, but I saw a great doc on PBS a few weeks ago, and it hits this discussion, indirectly, in so many ways I just have to describe it.
Anybody see the expose on reproductive science called 'Frozen Angels'?
I know, with the subject matter, it's hard to hear the title and not think 'snowflake children', but it actually barely touched on stem cells. Instead it focused most on law and commerce currently practiced in California regarding reproductive technology. By showing some of the actual mediators at the junction of biology and commerce; namely, a fairly greedy lawyer/radio talk show host, and some other privateers, and just letting them talk about life as a product...
The arrogance on display was breath taking, I mean right up there with the worst of the Neocon movement.
Interspersed with this repellant talk are unsentimental looks at how surrogate motherhood and egg 'donation' actually work.
A blond haired blue eyed woman who went to an Ivy league school can sell her eggs for $60,000. More (as in the sky's the limit more) if she teaches music or handicapped kids. And although such altruistic traits are prized, before the women offering to sell their eggs put their pictures in the catalogue, the company selling their eggs gets them made up by professional beauticians. So as to look their best and hopefully fetch a higher price.
On the other hand...
A brown haired brown eyed women with a husband serving in Iraq gets $7,000, not for the commodity of her ovum, but for the service of undergoing pregnancy and having another woman's child. On yet the other hand, it showed you a sterile woman, who would probably make a pretty good mom, who really wanted to have a baby but couldn't.
I'm not against sterile couples being able to have children, I doubt anyone is. But the reality when 'choice' becomes consumerism and the product is human life.
It will make you squirm.
Then the doc's makers cut back to the lawyer/talk show host talking with a colleague of his about a French scientist who's cloning frogs without heads, and the lawyer and his buddy are smacking their lips in anticipation of the day humans can be cloned without heads.
It's gonna be great for business.
I'm still 100% for embroyonic stem cell research, cloning for medical research (as long as it is done in petri dish, and doesn't involve implantation in the womb), I'm still 100% against religious arguements for blocking the science...
But the best arguements presented for the other side of the coin, that we are to vain and shallow for this science, that lawyers and greedy bio tech start-ups will turn our best intentions into creating human life for harvest, the best presentation of that side of the arguement I've seen was in a little documentary, aired on PBS, that probably, unfortunately, didn't pull very big ratings (even by basic cable standards).
I mean I'm ultimately against the point of view it was pushing, but it was so NOT condescending, or shrill, or argumentative, and it forced you to recognize the moral ambiguity.
It reached the level this questions deserves to be debated on.
Hardly anyone saw it because it was on PBS. And, ironically, if this election year stunt goes through, even fewer people will have a chance to catch it.
41 - Martin Lav
Dave and Clavos,
What I was trying to point out is that there aren't many local network stations that aren't affiliated with the WB, UPN or some other network anymore, therefore the ability to produce localized shows that could eventually be syndicated like the ones I previously mentioned, is harder to come by.
JP Patches is a good example of one in Seattle when I was a kid that was a clown that showed cartoons. In California we have Huell Howser and his California Gold series that's broadcast on PBS. However, there are no local shows on any of the affliate stations any longer. They are just too expensive to produce and since the local affiliates are now tied to the WB or UPN or Disney or one of the networks, there are virtually no more locally produced shows without PBS.
42 - Lumpy
What about loclly produced cable shows? We've got 5 channels of them including a local music channel and a 24 hour local news network. Local programming has moved to cable just like everything else has, making PBS obsolete.
43 - Michael J. West
And Michael, if you love Sesame Street you should want to set it free.
And if it comes back, it's mine?
44 - Michael J. West
Actually, you guys have got me thinking about a post I've considered for a long time, about local TV programming and the lack thereof...thinking about calling it "does anyone remember UHF?"
45 - Clavos
Michael,
Here in Miami, we have LOTS of UHF, but it's all in Spanish, except for the religious nuts...uh...nets.