‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

[Kalalau]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Many people believe we have outgrown our need for New Deal agencies like the SEC, yet the Wall St. disasters of the bush years that destroyed peoples' retirement and or life savings happened because of a rider inserted in a budget bill by Senator Dick Armey (Republican, Texas) that prohibited the SEC from overseeing exactly the kind of "investments" (fraud) undertaken by Wall St. for the precise purpose of stealing billions upon billions of dollars. Many people innocently almost sweetly believe we have outgrown our need for the FDA, yet every few months we see a story about botulism poisoning or salmonella or some other horrible poison in the food and it stops only because the FDA is there to stop it, not from any action by manufacturers, or the dynamics of the marketplace. In the age of swine flu or bird flu or just plain old flu is it really wise to cut funding for the CDC just to save already wealthy billionaires a few more dollars on their taxes? Where is the sense? Money only has value because of what you can do with it. If billionaires get to hold on to more of it, it goes into Swiss banks and finances development in 3rd world countries and that means more jobs leaving the US and going to those 3rd world countries. Why is that a good idea? Why not tax them the same rate they paid under President Clinton and get not only all these good services we need (SEC, FDA, CDC, etc) but employment right here in the USA and all those payrolls being spent here rather than in Indonesia. It seems so obvious. A billionaire buys 3 or 4 yachts, he employs 100 maids and sailors and chauffeurs and chefs and armed guards, good for them! Yet wouldn't it be better to have, say, 100 accountants examining the books on Wall St, stopping the criminals from stealing your life savings? Or finding a vaccine against some virus that can turn you into a pile of bleeding meat? What will be will be. If America can figure this out, figure out to start taxing the rich again, it has some chance of continuing. If not, it will continue decaying, less education, lower incomes, lower living scales, poverty for the vast majority, it will be like what India and China have been struggling to get away from.

The country was wealthy and at peace and with surpluses as far as the eye could see under elected President Bill Clinton. It did well under elected President Eisenhower, too, those were the golden years, when America had strong unions and high wages and people (again I say) could afford their own homes, to send their kids to college, medical care, and comfortable retirements, unlike today, when all that money has been taken by billionaires.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Funny how the same people who were upset at NPR firing Juan Williams for speaking his mind are ready to crucify Ron Schiller for speaking his mind.

However - I agree with his departure from the network (early departure, I should say - he had already resigned but wasn't leaving until May); his statements were unprofessional, to say the least. Fortunately, his position had nothing to do with the network's news content.

In addition, the departure of CEO Vivian Schiller (no relation to Ron) after the two afore-mentioned "embarrassments" seems like the right thing to do; it's what many of us demanded of other corporate heads who screwed up in the past couple years.

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FYI - the board of directors of CPB is appointed by the President; the current makeup of the board is three Democrats and three Republicans. So much for CPB being a political puppet.

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So the dude says they get 80 mil from the gummint. And Obama wants to give them 451 mil this year? That would be over half of the 800 mil that the dude says is their operating budget.

Wrong math, Tim. First, people need to grasp that most of the CPB money that gets to NPR comes from individual stations who purchase programming from the network; the CPB dollars go primarily to the stations themselves, and the money NPR gets from CPB makes up about 1.5% of their total revenue, in the form of grants (a competitive process; NPR gets NO direct funding from the federal government).

The "451 mil" to which you refer is the total CPB allocation, NOT money going to NPR. NPR's budget is around $161 million at present; where Schiller got the $800 million figure is - to say the least - puzzling.

[buzz1941]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Funny how the same people who were upset at NPR firing Juan Williams for speaking his mind are ready to crucify Ron Schiller for speaking his mind.

Likely the difference between a private, off-the-record conversation and one that was highly public.

[Kaonohi]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Why not tax them the same rate they paid under President Clinton and get not only all these good services we need (SEC, FDA, CDC, etc) but employment right here in the USA and all those payrolls being spent here rather than in Indonesia. It seems so obvious.

The country was wealthy and at peace and with surpluses as far as the eye could see under elected President Bill Clinton. It did well under elected President Eisenhower, too, those were the golden years, when America had strong unions and high wages and people (again I say) could afford their own homes, to send their kids to college, medical care, and comfortable retirements, unlike today, when all that money has been taken by billionaires.

Exactly what I was looking for. Kalalau, you hit the nail on the head.
Eisenhower was not a perfect president, but he did his country good.
Same with shifty-eye Bill - he wasn't perfect, but he did us some good. More better than Bush II, for real.

Those were the 'good old days.'

May they come again.

[Kalalau]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

I think "the sky is falling" is incredibly appropriate. We had a system that was chugging along just fine. Not glamorous, not perfect, but delivering a good life and a fairly stable economy and then we abandoned it. Somebody shouted "the sky is falling" and collectively we abandoned the system that had worked so well. The imaginary WMDs were clearly a case of "the sky is falling" but so too was the insanity of cutting taxes for billionaires to let everything fall apart. I just don't know if it is possible to ever get back to those stable, prosperous years.

[Kalalau]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

When Air America existed, voicing the leftish viewpoint, conservatives were so eager to see it fail. "You can always get the leftish viewpoint on NPR" they said, and now they want to shut down NPR too, leaving America's airwaves only with Limbaugh & clones spewing right wing propaganda and outright lies. We drove thru Eureka, Cal, once, and Limbaugh was on 4 stations at the same time! Under such unrelenting right wing propaganda it is no wonder the people have consistently voted against their own interests for so many years, it is no wonder there has been a massive transfer of historic proportions from the middle class to the wealthiest privileged elite, it is no wonder we as a country are choosing to not operate schools, public health, the CDC, FDA, SEC, all of it, all in favor of giving even more money to people who do not need it and who do not create jobs with it. Defunding a broadcaster that specializes in reality only tightens the noose, its just one more nail in the coffin.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

The move to end federal funding of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting will have wider-reaching effects than just cutting off a small portion of funding to the Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio.

Another area that would suffer - development of HD Radio advances. From Radio Magazine:

Proposed CPB De-funding would Hurt HD Radio
By Mark Krieger

By now, nearly everyone has heard about the conservative congressional initiative to de-fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). In fact, as this article is being submitted for publication, a house rules committee is conducting a hearing over a proposed bill to achieve that objective, even as a similar bill is in preparation for introduction in the Senate.

Of course there's nothing new about this controversy. That federal funding of the CPB has been a political football since the organization's establishment in 1969 is a matter of historical record. And even if one of the current bills to cut the cord should pass through the Capital to the White House, it's still likely to be tabled in the oval office -- at least for now.

Even so, populist outrage over burgeoning public debt suggests that the perennial proposal to eliminate all federal funding for public broadcasting may finally find its legs in the halls of Congress -- and that could well be causing some discomfort for those whose interests align with the advancement of HD Radio.

Consider the following:

* A substantial number of HD Radio conversion projects over the past seven years or so have been funded with CPB digital technology grants. In 2009 alone, roughly $6 million was awarded to CPB-eligible public radio applicants for digital projects. Much of that money found its way to broadcast equipment manufacturers and vendors struggling through turbulent financial times.
* During the 2010 grant application cycle, CPB stated clearly that it would give priority to public radio stations looking to upgrade their transmission facilities in order to accommodate newly increased IBOC digital power levels.
* The contribution NPR Labs has made -- and continues to make -- in terms of IBOC-related R&D cannot be overstated. And NPR Labs relies directly on the CPB grant engine for many of its projects.
* All of this comes at a time when radio's private sector has nearly flat-lined on fresh capital investment in IBOC-related projects.

So regardless of their political differences, or their opinions about IBOC technology, one thing all broadcasters -- public and private -- can probably agree upon is that de-funding CPB now would be bad news indeed for HD Radio.

NPR Labs has been working on developing HD radios that are accessible to the blind and disabled communities, something that would greatly increase the opportunities for Radio Reading Services (such as my employer) to better serve those segments of the population. These are the kinds of things that politicians who want to de-fund for purely political purposes tend to be ignorant of.

[matapule]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

NPR Labs has been working on developing HD radios that are accessible to the blind and disabled communities, something that would greatly increase the opportunities for Radio Reading Services (such as my employer) to better serve those segments of the population. These are the kinds of things that politicians who want to de-fund for purely political purposes tend to be ignorant of.

This post dovetails nicely with the "Americas War on the Poor" and disabled thread. The majority of the US population has entered the selfish and self-centered stage of our civilization. Some on HT say the disabled just aren't trying hard enough and if they did, they could provide for themselves. "Screw the blind and disabled, what's in it for me?" A short review of world history will reveal what happens next!

[Ron Whitfield]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Too bad they also feel there is no need to review history...

They voted on defunding today, but no doubt it died.
The cons are coming apart at their lock-step seams, and this latest bums rush at defunding was a sad attempt at stiching the rotting parts back together in hopes their Frankenstupid moster can stumble into some kind of partisan success.

[TuNnL]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Many smaller stations serving rural or otherwise hard-to-reach populations of Americans depend on CPB funding to assist them with equipment upgrades required by technological changes. A number of radio stations have even said that they would have to shut down if they lost CPB funds.

I wonder — did CPB pitch in when KTUH Radio (the 24-hour radio station run completely by students of the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa) was upgrading its broadcast towers in the last two decades? That would be a reason for me to care about this. As far as NPR, I most recently have found it boring, irrelevant banter by cerebral academics who would do well to take a page from 60 Minutes (national), Civil Beat (local) or even wikileaks (international) and actually investigate something.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

I wonder — did CPB pitch in when KTUH Radio (the 24-hour radio station run completely by students of the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa) was upgrading its broadcast towers in the last two decades?

I don't know - did you ask KTUH if they applied for PTFP funding as part of their tower upgrades? If it was within the past 20 years, the answer is very likely to be "yes." (CPB doesn't step in - stations and producers must apply and compete for funds; it's not just a handout factory.) PTFP funding is one of the first things that Congress planned to eliminate, so funding for a project like KTUH's would be gone.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

Informational UPDATE:

The text of legislation, H.R. 1473, to fund the federal government for the remainder of this fiscal year was released earlier this morning and contains:

• The two-year advance appropriation mechanism for CPB (page 171, Section 1118) for FY 2013 funded at $445 million, which represents level funding from the FY 2012 advanced appropriation;
• $6 million for CPB’s digital transition program (page 330, Section 1847);
• No restrictions on stations' use of federal funds;
• An across-the-board rescission of 0.2 percent.

As previously reported, PTFP funding at a proposed $20 million for FY 2011 was eliminated during a previous CR extension. Congress will vote on the spending bill this week to keep the government operating through September 30th.

The other funding references in the legislative text on page 330, Section 1847, are to expenditures already made by CPB ($25 million for the final congressional appropriation for PRSS’ 3 year improvement and $25 million appropriated by Congress for station fiscal stabilization grants) and have no bearing on any existing CPB funds.

For comparison purposes, CPB’s main appropriation for FY 2011 was $430 million and for FY 2012 is slated to be $445 million, which is also the funding level contained in H.R. 1473 for FY 2013.

Funding for the system’s digital transition drops from $36 million to $6 million for FY 2011.

[Ron Whitfield]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

NPR, I most recently have found it boring, irrelevant banter by cerebral academics

who would do well to take a page from 60 Minutes (national), Civil Beat (local) or even wikileaks (international) and actually investigate something.

Yes, their weeekend programs are in serious need of revamping/reinvigorating.

They used to, but that's why the cons are still in such a raging mouth foaming tizzy over them or anybody that still does ANY true unbiased investigative reporting, because every time a big pile of wrong is found, guess who's typically sitting smack in the middle of it? We know why they don't like truth.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: ‘Tea Party’ Comments Force NPR Resignation

They voted on defunding today, but no doubt it died.
The cons are coming apart at their lock-step seams, and this latest bums rush at defunding was a sad attempt at stiching the rotting parts back together in hopes their Frankenstupid moster can stumble into some kind of partisan success.

Once again, worthless political posturing by the GOP members of Congress ends in a whimper, as public broadcasters emerge relatively unscathed in the latest budget compromise. Article