House of Eratosthenes

Also, props to our friend in New Mexico for finding the cartoon below. He possesses only a fleeting interest in this story — sees all of the foolishness in NPR’s move, and subsequent “homina homina” backpedaling, but only in a “now, back to football” way.

To me, it’s much more serious than this. All of our nation’s founding documents are clear on this point: Our legislative branch gets to boss us around, make new laws that will bind us, oblige us, tax us and prohibit us…they get to do this for a two-year term. For the enduring expression of our values, from now on into the generations ahead, that kind of “legislation” is left up to The People. Congress does stuff and then We, The People get to tell them what we think about it.

The danger that is involved in such a machinery working properly, is the same danger you have in any electrical circuit: It cannot run in circles. Government cannot be allowed access to any tool that tells the electorate what it should be thinking. It simply is not to be allowed.

This is why the First Amendment proscribes against the establishment of a state religion…and if all of the concepts of talk radio were crystallized and agreed-upon in 1791, the First Amendment would carry a statement about state radio stations as well, and for precisely the same reason. In fact, this is why we have a Second Amendment as well. And a Tenth. Government is not to be put in charge of re-electing itself through The People.

Which is exactly the situation we have, without some “wall of separation between radio and state” if you will.

So people like the quiet, sonorous tone of commercial-free radio. They claim it’s less noisy. I’m sure they’re right about that…not that I’d know…but they miss the point entirely. There’s just no call in this country for “public radio.” It is a constitutional aberration and abomination.

The point I think a lot of people miss when things like this happen, is that when you centralize a decision you create more conflict, and when you localize it you prevent the conflict from ever coming about. I remember many years ago I read a Thomas Sowell column — which I tried to find, subsequently, and have never been able to pin it down. But he was discussing, coincidentally, the idea that we should have some federal agency to decide what we should listen to on our car radios. Just laying it down as a hypothetical. Today’s official radio station is 92.7 FM, and all your car radios will be turned to it; tomorrow’s will be 88.9, and the day after we’re all going to be listening to 102.3. So if you don’t like country music you’re just going to have to learn to like it, and if you don’t like rock & roll you’ll have to learn to like that.

Can you imagine how much bickering there would be? But his point was: We don’t do things this way. You tune your radio to what you want, I tune mine to what I want, and we never even get into a fight about it.

Folks, that is exactly the way it should work!

I submit that this fighting Sowell was writing about a few years back as a theoretical, here in 2010, is precisely what we’re seeing happen in real life. We’ve centralized the decision about who is to be abhorred as a potential threat; as I said at Buck’s place a few minutes ago, if Juan Williams said it makes him nervous when fellow air travelers are tea party activists, I doubt like hell he’d be fired over it. So we’ve centralized the decision about who is to be perceived, on a personal level, to be a potential threat…and, here we are bickering. Ah, as predictable as a sunrise.

De-fund NOW. If there are teeming masses that absolutely must have their Car Talk, then that means there is a market for it. There is no call for “public” radio; no call, no need and no point.

…as I said at Buck’s place a few minutes ago…

Heh. I knew no good would come of that and that your comment at my house wasn’t the end of it. But it’s late, I’m half in the bag, and I’m in no mood to continue our “discussion” except to say you have your opinion and I have mine. And yours is wrong. 😉
- bpenni | 10/25/2010 @ 01:48
I notice when you’re right and I’m wrong, which seems to be quite often, the point of disagreement is not terribly well-defined. “De-fund,” you know, does not & can not mean “destroy”; as I understand your defense of NPR, it is a statement that they are not overly much dependent on lucre from the public treasury anyway. Well, okay then. The effect of de-funding would be negligible. One would think it would be difficult to call for such a de-funding with sufficient speed to stay ahead of such a de-funding becoming a reality; the controversy cannot be comfortable to those embroiled, and this would effectively gut it like a fish…without doing anything similar to our wonderful NPR.

Why isn’t it a done deal?
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 09:21
If you want to be charitable, my take on NPR is “nuanced.” If you want to be uncharitable — or just realistic– it’s incoherent. On the one hand, a state-run propaganda network is antithetic to our most basic freedoms. On the other hand, it’s transparent, pathetic propaganda, and the only people who would be swayed by an NPR newsatorial are those who either already believe the hype, or are just tuning in to get today’s version of goodthink to spout at the organic, free-trade, shade-grown water cooler . On the third hand (if you’ll allow me three hands for rhetorical convenience), NPR actually serves a useful function in my daily life — it highlights the twits. Just as anyone who publicly claims their favorite book to be The Catcher in the Rye or Atlas Shrugged is announcing himself to be an impossibly pretentious pissant or a shrill, humorless dogmatist, respectively, so anyone who says “I heard on NPR this morning…” is broadcasting to all and sundry that he has never had an original thought in his life and can be dismissed out of hand as a basic regulation latte-slurping Obamaton.

[I note that this is exactly how it is phrased in every conversation: “I was listening to NPR this morning…” or “I heard on NPR that…” Never “I heard on the radio” or “I heard that.” NPR must be identified as the source; how else would we know that our interlocutor is very, very Smart?]

[I also note that this is yet another illustration of Morgan’s basic dictum about liberals vs. conservatives. A conservative doesn’t like what’s on the radio, he changes the station; a liberal doesn’t like what’s on the radio, he wants that station banned forever].

When it comes right down to it, I hate paying for propaganda, but the fact that NPR has to be subsidized — that is, nobody would voluntarily part with cash to hear it — is about the clearest proof one needs that we’re right and they’re wrong when it comes to basic economics.
- Severian | 10/25/2010 @ 09:49
…anyone who publicly claims their favorite book to be The Catcher in the Rye or Atlas Shrugged is announcing himself to be an impossibly pretentious pissant…

Heh. You haven’t been hanging around these parts too long, have ya Severian? Which is an indirect way of saying you just stepped on a sensitive body part… one attached to your own body.

One doesn’t speak ill of La Rand… St. Ayn… in these parts. You’re in for a whuppin’.

I’ve given money to public radio for about 25 years or so. Just sayin’. WDET in Dee-troit used to throw one helluva cocktail party for their donors, back in the day, and they had some cute young thangs on staff, too. That could have all changed; I left the Motor City in ’97.

I notice when you’re right and I’m wrong, which seems to be quite often…

Wow! I’ve noticed the exact same thing! 😉

The thing about defunding NPR? Most of the money goes to local stations. Most all of the major metropolitan market stations wouldn’t have any issues with survival… NYC, Boston, Atlanta, St. Louis, yadda, yadda… it would be the small-market stations that would have to fold. I think my local NPR outlet, which is in a town of 17,000, would probably go out o’ bid’niz and I’d hate to see that. And I could think of others I listened to in my drive this summer across fly-over country… those small, rural, university campus stations (which is what my public radio station is)… that would be in the same boat. Because of some ultra-con’s dumb-ass principles? Spare me. Literally.
- bpenni | 10/25/2010 @ 10:29
Buck,

oh, I noticed the Ayn Rand fixation — I’m just yanking chains. 🙂 Besides, I like her ideas as much as I can like any Huge Elaborate Theory of Everything…. which isn’t much, but if we’re going to subordinate all of life to a dogma, I’d rather it be based on free markets than, say, dictatorships of the proletariat or the requirements of Hegelian capital-H History.

I could argue the NPR / the local equivalent of NPR thing all day. I can honestly see both sides; I really just don’t care that much. It depends on what fights one chooses to have, and which parts of what principles one chooses to defend most vigorously. Since even dimwit liberals admit that NPR is liberal propaganda, its continued existence doesn’t bother me much — I’d much rather focus my attention on getting liberals to admit that CNN and MSNBC are equivalent leftard propaganda outlets. Your mileage may vary, however. Personally, I just get a kick out of watching people on the right have real, substantive debates about this kind of stuff while the left’s hive-mind has smoke coming out of its ears trying to argue that a) NPR is liberal boilerplate but b) must continue to be publicly funded because its message is so important yet c) Fox is an evil propaganda outlet that must be banned.

In some ways, I’m a small, petty person.
- Severian | 10/25/2010 @ 10:50
I think my local NPR outlet, which is in a town of 17,000, would probably go out o’ bid’niz and I’d hate to see that…Because of some ultra-con’s dumb-ass principles? Spare me. Literally.

So your local NPR outlet cannot survive unless some dumbass principled ultra-con is forced through our tax system to subsidize propaganda for the other side…which said dumbass principled ultra-con would never do in a free market?

I wonder if you can skip forward to the part where you show how much more right you are about this than I am. So far, you seem to be doing a brilliant job of proving my point: “Public radio” is a euphemism for the state using the airwaves to tell the citizenry the way it’s gonna be, as opposed to the other way ’round.

Tune in to Mr. Thompson’s speech at eight o’clock tonight, he will address the national crisis…
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 10:54
Personally, I just get a kick out of watching people on the right have real, substantive debates about this kind of stuff while the left’s hive-mind has smoke coming out of its ears…In some ways, I’m a small, petty person.

I suspect this is true of all three of us, at least in some way.

For the record, I’ve found much fault with Ms. Rand in these pages, mostly for her snooty brand of atheism and her extra-marital indiscretions. As far as her philosophy, I view it as a direction…like “head westbound on Highway 50” when your intended destination is West Sacramento and your current location is El Dorado Hills. It is correct. There certainly are other ways to get to B from A…and if you were to take her up on her advice, the directions would ultimately require refinement as you passed I-5. But it is rather silly to debate those things when you haven’t even climbed in the car yet, or upon the motorcycle, and you’re still sitting on your haunches in El Dorado Hills.

In fact, applying this analogy to the current situation, we started in El Dorado Hills and now we’re in South Lake Tahoe wondering how the heck we got here. “Head West on 50” is a sensible, well-thought-out strategy for getting where we want to go. To say “Yeah, but if you do that, once you hit the Yolo Causeway it won’t be the right plan anymore” is pure sophistry, and that’s what the statists have been saying about Ayn Rand.

Besides, I tend to think of Kristin Kreuk in a pair of librarian-glasses as Dagny Taggart. Rowr.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 11:13
How much for Nina Totenberg? 😉

Well, I’ve been “funding” them through donations for 19 years, but I just put an end to that. I really haven’t listened to it for years anyway, though I’ve continued to donate.

Now, here’s the deal …. if only 1 to 2% of their funding comes from the Feds (which they argue to make us think, “oh, it’s not that much, I guess it’s ok), I gotta wonder then what *is* the argument for the Feds continuing to fund it?

If you can get 98% of your budget from other sources, more power to ya. Go at it and live on 2% less. I have to do it whenever my health insurance goes up or my retirement package needs a supplement. In this day and age of “what to cut?” and you’re progresives using the Washington Monument Ploy whenever we argue for less government and lower taxes — Hmmmm, cut National Park Funding or NPR? I’m goin’ for NPR. National Parks don’t have an ulterior political agenda I’m funding, for one thing.
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 12:12
Kristen Kreuk in librarian glasses is the stuff of which bipartisan consensus is made. I’m totally with you on that one. And as I say, if someone must lecture me on the Correct View of Everything from the very tippy-top of Mt. Pious, I’d rather it be in a libertarian direction than just about any other….

I’m ultimately against de-funding NPR, at least at the present time, because this has to be the easiest thing in the world for the left to demagogue. The left loves the “conservatives are anti-intellectual” card even more than they love the race card*, so trying to de-fund NPR gives them all the trumps. Just like they yell “conservatives don’t want children to learn!” every time the right questions the necessity of PBS, so to will they yell “conservatives want to restrict access to classical music!” or some such if we try to de-fund NPR. The only reason NPR exists is so that dim-bulbs who fancy themselves intellectuals can use the argumentum ad verecundiam;** why give them more ammo?

*because, I suspect, most leftists are closet racists — note how quickly they move to the whitest suburb they can find when the wife fails her pregnancy test — and because being Smarter Than You is the entire point of being liberal.

**if you listened to NPR more, you wouldn’t have to google this… wingnutz. 🙂
- Severian | 10/25/2010 @ 13:01
Tune in to Mr. Thompson’s speech at eight o’clock tonight, he will address the national crisis…

I’d sooner sit for having my fingernails pulled out one by one. Yer Man (IS he Yer Man again? What happened to La Palin?) screwed the pooch yet again with his most-recent outburst about “elites.” But leave us not digress or descend into the muck.

Severian, you made some good points above.

“Public radio” is a euphemism for the state using the airwaves to tell the citizenry the way it’s gonna be, as opposed to the other way ’round.

Oh, for Christ’s SAKE. Yep, I hear the heirs of Ol’ Doktor Goebbels on NPR every frickin’ day, and I am SO tired of all that. “The State” using the airwaves? Are you frickin’ serious? You’ll see and hear more of Obama and his frickin’ message on Fox News than you will on NPR. I’m one up on ya here, Morgan, in that I actually LISTEN to NPR and you don’t. Tell me I’m wrong about that.
- bpenni | 10/25/2010 @ 16:34
With blatant propaganda like this being pumped out, who needs to listen?

Once again: If it’s de-funded, the entire controversy goes away. So why not do it. We can sidestep the whole business of “if you just listen you’ll see how wonderful it is”…I fell for that when some libs tried to tell me Boston Legal did a great job of presenting both sides.

I see no reason to make it that complicated this time ’round. Just de-fund and be done with it. Like Phil said, let ’em live with a piddly two percent budget cut. If it’s negligible, then what’s the problem?
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 16:51
Many good points here – Buck’s are well taken, but then again, so are Morgan’s and mine. Especially since it’s such a piddly amount, what’s the problem? And if it’s not, then I do have a problem with George Soros and leftists in power working together on a media venture.

They clearly “push a particular point of view” as the President says … and if they’re going to do that, why not go private like Fox?

As to the Left and “anti-intellectual” — I’ve got a few things to say. Why should we expect NPR to be any more intellectual than a private media outlet? If the prevailing outlook is to ingnore honest talk about human nature and the effects of fear in a war with an enemy that hides behind religious freedom and behind the skirts of women and the pouting faces of innocent children? An insidious enemy that uses things like the West’s humanity as expressed through Geneva Conventions against us by hiding among civilians and killing other civilians as a primary tactic in the name of Allah, and the throngs of “moderate” Muslims who are proud Americans can’t seem to get too worked up about that, but squishy liberals, if not they themselves, will become outraged at the slightest percieved slight — while offenses 100 times worse to the religion that gave birth to our culture are treated as “ho-hum” … why should we call that, or believe in any way, that that is “intellectual”? (wow, where’d that come from? Guess it was pent up.)

“Intellectual” would be to talk about it frankly and honestly in the open so that we can figure out how the hell to deal with it without comitting cultural suicide.

And while we’re on it, no, it’s not Goebels … now. But we have here a structure that is begging to be abused by statists of whatever flavor, and we have people whose propensity to statist philosophy is thinly veiled at best. Now that it’s under scrutiny and we can talk about it (and before it’s not PC to talk about it again) … let’s talk about it.

So take that 2% away, and let the “intellectuals” fund it. After all, if it’s so goddam important to the “intellectuals”, then they should have no problem coughing up that extra 2%. To them, paying taxes is patriotic, and they have no problem ~~asking~~ commanding others to cough up money for their own moral vanities.

But, to the point that liberals will wig out over its defunding — I noted that even some of my hardest left friends agree with me that Williams’ firing is PC run amok, and shouldn’t be tolerated. So maybe that and the 2% argument (I don’t know that it’s only 2% for sure, but that’s what I’m hearing from NPR fans to argue that it isn’t that much anyway) … maybe it’s not such a hard sell.

I listened to NPR for years. I helped fund them privately for years. I stopped listening to them several years ago. There’s no reason for me to continue, anyway.
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 18:19
The left loves the “conservatives are anti-intellectual” card even more than they love the race card*, so trying to de-fund NPR gives them all the trumps. Just like they yell “conservatives don’t want children to learn!” every time the right questions the necessity of PBS, so to will they yell “conservatives want to restrict access to classical music!” or some such if we try to de-fund NPR.

True enough, but I say “pull the plug” anyway…assuming conservatives could get enough of the new Republican Congress (next year) on-board for doing so.

They’ll whine and piss and complain no matter WHAT we propose or enact, Severian. Remember back in 1995 when the new Republican Congress delegated speed-limits back to the state level? They said the GOP obviously were not concerned about highway safety, in fact, that we wanted more people to die in freeway wrecks. Similarly, every time some GOP congressman proposes loosening gun control or handing out CCW permits, some organ of the left (the media OR their allies in Congress/a statehouse) start issuing woeful predictions about bullets flying hither and yon, and/or that that nasty NRA is obviously in-charge of the Republicans.

Our job, Sev, is to make the case why NPR, PBS, and other propaganda organs have outlived their usefulness. I would like to see the National Endowment for the Arts eliminated for the same reason. Morgan nailed it when he said that if this stuff can’t succeed on its own in the marketplace, it doesn’t deserve to exist. (For that matter, I’d say the same once more about federally-subsidized alternative energy technologies and mandates….but I’m getting off-topic.)

I also agree with Morgan that it’s little more than a propaganda arm for the federal government. Every time there is a disaster in some Third World country, I notice the article says, “….such and such, so and so, according to state-run media.” I always shudder when I read that phrase. “You mean that’s one of those countries where the government presumes to tell the media what to report? That’s just evil, sorry.”

My point is simple. Let the Left throw all kinds of nasty untrue charges; they’re going to do that anyway. That’s all they have – name calling and such. We have the facts. Let’s take our case to the American people on the floor of the US House and Senate, and shut NPR down once and for all.
- cylarz | 10/25/2010 @ 18:29
Cut the two percent of indirect federal spending for NPR and it still thrives, Morgan. It’s barely a publicly funded federal program, I don’t get the angst.

Your bone of contention is purely ideological and completely irrational.

Has it occurred to you that Mr. Williams is quite delighted with with his new found Fox wealth?
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 18:41
I got this thing going on, cupcake. I’m much more bothered by the idea of one nickel of tax money — collected at gunpoint or threat of same, might I remind you — is used to finance the state’s side of the story, than I am by Juan Williams pulling in a trillion dollars. So long as he’s earning it honestly.

See, as far as I’m concerned this country is a place where state propaganda is a searing scandal, and personal wealth is not. Other countries might work differently, and as far as I’m concerned they jolly well can. But the USA is different, and that is what makes it great. If that isn’t rational, then neither am I.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 19:13
Both of you… Severian and Morgan… fail to address my point about where the money goes: member stations, specifically on the point that it would be the SMALL outlets that would go under.

Some of us out here in Flyover Country would NOT be pleased if you had your way. But, Hey. “Ideological purity,” and all that. It’s what’s for dinner.

Speaking of ideological purity and ideological puritans… Screw you, cylarz. That was just for old times’ sake.
- bpenni | 10/25/2010 @ 19:19
…where state propaganda is a searing scandal

So, Morgan: what was NPR during the eight years of the Dubya administration? Was it state propaganda then, too? You want your cake and you want to eat it, too.
- bpenni | 10/25/2010 @ 19:22
I’m tempted to deploy my extra-snarky response to liberals: “You need to restate my opinion on my behalf, in order to engage it; I claim victory!” It would fit.

Since it’s you, I’ll just say I have never sympathized with state-financed, state-run radio or television in this country. Nobody has been able to give me an adequate justification for it. All I hear is “it’s such a slight amount of money it doesn’t matter.” There’s a reason we don’t respond to this, Buck: It contradicts the other point that is made alongside of it, that the funding is somehow critical and disaster would ensue if it went away.

Pick one of those. You can’t have both.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 19:39
But, Daphne (of the wonderful name) — this isn’t about Juan Williams or shutting down NPR. It’s about public funding going to fund what is supposed to be “unbiased” news … but there is no unbiased news. The Federal Government shouldn’t be in the news business, at least not domestically.

It’s just barely in the news business (so far) … at least monetarily speaking so the question becomes — if it’s questionable whether the government should be in the business anyway, and it’s only paying a miniscule amount of the budget … and it is in the business of squelching reporters who bring up issues that are just facts, but facts that run contrary to a particular point of view — what the hell do I want my tax money going toward it anyway, especially if the point of view they refuse to challenge is the opposite of mine?

Buck’s point about local stations in small markets? I understand it. Our market is crappy for Jazz and Classical. The only place you can get classical is our local NPR affilliate. And the “Jazz” shows are sparse and lean heavily toward the New Age direction … but I digress.

In fact, the main reason I gave to our local afflliate was because (ok, I admit it, I was a little in to some of the new agey crap way back when), plus I loved Thistle and Shamrock (I won’t apologize for that .. BUT, they dropped it!) And I used to listen to their news because I bought into the “oh so intellectual”-ness of it all.

Hey, I was young and naive and just out of grad school.

But face it … we don’t have government programs to make rare cheeses available in small communities .(again, YET) .. so why should the government, especially the Federal government … provide free music there isn’t a market for just because it would be nice? What, then, shouldn’t government fund?

Me, I ended up buying records and CDs of artists I like and frankly I hardly listen to the radio at all anymore. If small communities want a local jazz station, they can pass the hat and maybe the FCC should be less stingy — or give a discount — to locally funded non-commercial radio stations for obtaining licenses. Or they could run their own non-profit. They could rip AP and Reuters off the wire, or give a DJ subscriptions to newspapers of their choice — or have them surf the web for news and read it on the air.

One has to wonder why NPR continues to hold on to that 1-2% from the government. It would seem to be a point of pride. But you have to remember who we’re talking about. Making it on your own means your exploiting someone somewhere else in the Progressive worldview — a worldview that is held by the vast majority of NPR employees and the vast majority of their listeners. Not all of them, mind you. But the vast majority.

My solution for people who want to spread other people’s wealth around is to tell them, fine … get your own volunteer network of like-minded people and spread all’y’all’s own damned wealth around. Same goes for institutions.
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 19:45
Give me a couple of decent posts on reducing the defense budget and cutting ag subsidies, then I’ll take your measly defund the NPR seriously.

This is a little bit of nothing, Morgan. Aim higher if you’re looking to take a chunk of out taxpayer funded behemoths.
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 19:52
Oh yeah? Well, let NPR keep their 2% and send some federal subsidy money to a bunch of parochial schools. And maybe direct to the Boy Scouts just to make things really interesting.

There’s all kinds of things that cut both ways.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 19:56
Philmon, npr is essentially a privately funded entity. Nearly everything you watch, consume or throw in the trash is publicly funded by either direct assistance or tax breaks.

If you don’t like their bias, don’t listen. Going berserk because they fired Juan is just silly. The man signed a $2M contract with Foxx – getting canned from that shithole was probably the best thing that ever happened to his bottom line.
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 19:58
So, Morgan: what was NPR during the eight years of the Dubya administration? Was it state propaganda then, too? You want your cake and you want to eat it, too.

This is a trap we fall into sometimes. Now, if you ask … that particular super-progressive member of my family, nobody criticized GW Bush ever ever ever during his tenure. The media gave him a total pass. And she listens to about nothing BUT NPR.

However, I think somehow she had a funky filter on her brain. But again, digressing.

Progressives are cheerleaders for “Social Justice”, which is a euphamism for state-run favoritism and basically Marxist central planning. (So it’s not technically exactly “S”ocialism. — but again, beside the point.)

When you have conservatives in power (in America, where conservatism is the home of classical liberal originalism) — they’re not generally after statism — and believe it or not tend to leave the media to do its own thing…. which unfortunately tends to be to rail against conservatives and conservatism.

When the Progressive Statists are in power, the cheerleaders are rooting for the home team.

This is dangerous.

It isn’t so much that it’s State Media, but it’s State-Funded, Statist run media. A synergy we just don’t need around here.

It’s a free country. Start up your own damned statist media outlet. Like Air America, or somethin’. Maybe if Air America were more like NPR, it would have succeded. Which is fine. As long as I’m not paying for any of it.
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 19:58
Try taking that money from the NEA and the other sources indirectly funding npr, Morgan. Not gonna happen. Find a more relevant hobby horse to beat.
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 20:01
Daphne, seriously, if you’re so concerned about withholding sympathy from people who’ve got it made-in-the-shade…how about letting Juan William’s bank account straighten itself out, and train your attention instead on all the various means and methods the federal government has to get its point across without NPR? I’ve said before many a time that our current President has had more of a fair shot to “tell His story” than perhaps any carbon-based biped that ever walked this planet…and that might very well be true.

Your point as I understand it is if NPR is kicked off the public teat, it won’t event make a dent. Okay then. Let’s stop fighting about it, and just kick them off.

If the feds feel they’re being shut out and not allowed to make their point…they get to win all the arguments they want to, every 15th of April. You don’t feel sorry for Juan? Well, I don’t feel one bit sorry for Uncle Sam. Nobody’s muzzling him.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 20:04
How about we send that 2% to private islamic schools or green peace?

Get serious, Morgan. That was just silly.
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 20:05
No, I’m not wound up because they fired Juan. That was a symptom of the larger problem. It’s WHY they fired Juan. Again, this isn’t about Juan. Juan is fine. Juan is more than fine.

Me, I haven’t been listening AND I’ve been funding them anyway. I stopped funding to the extent I could. I was thinking of doing it anyway, for at least a year, frankly, but the hoop I had to jump through to stop the payroll deduction was too inconvenient to work up the gumption to get off my ass and go do it. This is why they like payroll deduction. It doesn’t hurt any one particular month when you spread the money out over a year, and you have to walk across campus to their (the radio station’s!) office to get the paperwork to change it. Yes, it was my own lazy butt’s fault. But this incident … again, a symptom of why I don’t listen anymore in the first place — lit that extra bic lighter under my butt I needed to make the hike.

It was a nice day for it.

Re: Military spending …. it’s one of the enumerated powers for the Federal Government. Funding “art” and media isn’t.

I see my neighbor’s cigarette butt in my driveway, it’s easy to pick up and throw away, so I do it. Yeah, I need to pull the weeds in the cracks in the concrete and maybe seal them up … and I’ll get around to it, but the damned cigarette butt is no brainer. It doesn’t belong there, it’s easy to pick up on my way in and chuck it in the trash. I’m not gonna leave it there until after I do a weed’n’seal job on my driveway.

I’m sure there’s waste in military spending, and I’m sure we’ve gotten into conflicts that perhaps we shouldn’t have. But I’m not charged with defending the nation, and I’m not an expert on what they need.

So lemme reccomend picking up the cigarette butts. I know where they belong.
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 20:11
How about not send it anywhere?
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 20:12
I couldn’t give one shit if they yanked npr’s measly funding, what’s amazing is that you and everyone else in the right wing blogosphere is actually hyperventilating about this small, stupid issue. It’s a Patty conflagration that deflects from the very real systemic financial issues we need to address.

It’s past time for smart bloggers like you, who deal with political issues on a daily basis, to stop playing marbles and start talking about what really matters, Morgan.
- Daphne | 10/25/2010 @ 20:20
Daphne, this really does matter, because its a cultural issue, in the end. It is not only a teachable moment on conflicts of interest, it is a teachable moment on what the purpose of the Federal Government is actually for.

And what it isn’t for.

And also why more government programs is almost never a good idea — at the very least they should be more gravely considered — because once in place, and some people get “their” fair share of Other Peoples’ Money, everybody wants to cut spending but nobody wants their little piece of pie cut — even if it’s a relatively measley piece of pie.

We don’t have a tax revenue problem, we have a spending problem.

How can we cut spending on really big things if we can’t cut it on something that’s pretty much (according to them) supported by its own audience? (except for 1 or 2% … which again I’m expected to eat when my insurance goes up or I have to contribute more to my retirement which I somehow manage to do and survive anyway.)

On top of that, it is a teachable moment on the pitfalls of political correctness, and the obstacle to open discussion of serious cultural problems we face.

If we don’t change our friends and families and coworkers attitudes, and thus the culture’s attitudes, about the proper roles of government at different levels — we’re screwed. This has gotta be a bottom-up thing.

It’s a very big deal.

When an issue comes up — pick a program … make an argument, as Hamilton, Madison, and Jay did in the Federalist Papers … for why it must (or does not need to be) a role the Federal Government. “It’s only this piddly bit” doesn’t cut it. Tell me why. I might be wrong, and you may convince me. I have talked about why not. All I’ve heard from the why side is that Juan is not unemployed and making a lot of money, “it’s not that much” federal money anyway, it might deprive some small community of something nice it’s getting from someone else’s forced contributions, “it’s no big deal” and we’re “hyperventilating” so we should just not talk about it … and frankly the best one (seriously) I’ve heard is that it’s a bad tactic at this time to defund it at the federal level because there might be some backlash against a fiscal conservative movement that is just building up a good head of steam.

None of these has anything to do with the proper role of government. The last one, at least, is an argument that picking the defunding battle at this particular time could backfire on the move toward more constitutionally (and fiscally) sound responsibility and hinder its effectiveness.

And again, this is not just about the defunding issue, but the larger cultural issue of what we can and can’t talk about publicly when it comes to matters of the current Islamist war on the West. (And the East, for that matter. They don’t like Buddhists or Hindus, either. It’s kind of a war on everybody who isn’t them.)
- philmon | 10/25/2010 @ 21:18
That’s awesome, Phil. But one thing left uncovered…as it happens, I was opining on it just last night…

Liberalism, in this day and age, seems to always have two goals with regard to everything it ever tries to do. The first is to establish rules and precedent such that vast numbers of people are forced to do things a certain way, as a consequence of judgment calls made in very few offices. The second is to staff these offices with people who represent the least mature among us. Those who have the least of what real people call “character.”

Now seriously — seriously — who would you rather have watch your kids over a weekend? Who would you rather have sitting your house while you go on a two week cruise? Juan Williams, or Vivian Schiller? Through the magic of state run bureaucracies, it is the latter who is able to authoritatively comment on the mental health of the former, and impose a direct influence upon his position in the “free” market. Because of her personal likes and dislikes. Her sensitivities and sensibilities mean everything, his mean nothing. And she has the intellectual maturity of an eight-year-old.

That’s the way it keeps on going. You have these positions of limitless power, and the people we find to fill them are…people who like that sort of thing.

I wouldn’t trust this woman to sweep my sidewalk.
- mkfreeberg | 10/25/2010 @ 21:36
Go to hell, Buck. I still have no idea why your presence is tolerated here…or why you continually go out of your way to provoke me. Morgan completely destroyed you here, and yet you fight on.

Idiot.
- cylarz | 10/25/2010 @ 22:50
Give me a couple of decent posts on reducing the defense budget and cutting ag subsidies, then I’ll take your measly defund the NPR seriously.

Defense is a Constitutional, legitimate function of the federal government. Public radio isn’t.

As for ag subsidies, you’ll get no argument there.
- cylarz | 10/25/2010 @ 22:52
Wow. Some people must just rub each other the wrong way. I continue to like Buck. And I seem to get along quite well with cylarz. But boy, the two of them in a room toghether, and … Ever had friends you had to keep separated? Truce, fellows.
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 07:38
Another symptom:

Man fired for wearing commerative aircraft carrier clothing

The left has largely succeeded in painting the right as the home and champion of intolerance. But I think it’s just a lot of moral puffery.
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 07:58
I can at least see the rationale behind just about every comment here (don’t worry, this isn’t one of those namby-pamby “we all have good points, let’s all get along” kind of posts. I like partisanship, actually – it makes things nice and clear). On the meta-level, I agree with Morgan — any amount of taxpayer money spent on state-run propaganda is too much, be it 2% or 2 cents. On the practical level, however, the perfect is the enemy of the good, and we have bigger fish to fry than NPR. I’d much rather, say, repeal Obamacare and endure the ensuing 25+ years of liberal lamentation on NPR and elsewhere about America’s last best hope for embracing socialism, than I would de-fund NPR and be forced to drive my Mom to Mexico for routine mammograms.

De-funding NPR is — if I may stretch the metaphor a bit — like cutting off a hangnail while the patient is dying of cancer. The left is always going to have the emotional high ground — and a megaphone through which to announce it — because their arguments are nothing but emotion. This is how I explain the rise of socialism to my students: It’d take me several pages and quite a few man-hours to lay out the complete case against Marxist economics, and even then it would be dense and abstract. The Marxist, on the other hand, just holds up a picture of a child chained to a power loom. I’m right and the Marxist is wrong (not least because the kid is still chained to a power loom in some laogai in Outer Mongolia), but who wins the emotional battle?

We’re going to have only so much political capital in the coming few years. We need to use it to maximal effect. One clip of Dear Leader talking about bitter clingers is worth 10,000 words on the enumerated powers of the Constitution. Let’s throw the commies out of Congress first, then deal with the third-string spirit squad that is NPR.
- Severian | 10/26/2010 @ 09:31
We’re going to have only so much political capital in the coming few years. We need to use it to maximal effect.

I have to say I’m very much jaded against the “limited capital” school of thought, post-both-Bushes. This is a staple idea of the whole Bush dynasty, is it not? Bank your capital, count your capital, then spend all the capital you have but not one bit more (capital is useless if it is not spent). I still think there is something to it — the most prestigious Freeberg on earth toils in lowly serfdom compared to the most humble Bush. But the dynasty has given us the first father-son presidential duo in 180 years…and in the long run, how’d that work out? What would happen if a Bush ever ran for president again? How about installing their ideas for good governance? I do believe history will clean up W’s name somewhat…he’ll be remembered as a better president than Obama…but really, is any sitting president, in our lifetimes, ever going to say “re-elect me because I’m going to do what Bush did”?

Going by what I’ve seen, I’d say this has been given a fair try and it’s failed. People don’t trust it. I think deep down, what they’re thinking is — if you’re going to fight Congress about confirming Ashcroft on principle, it isn’t very principled if you’re not also going to fight Congress about confirming Chavez. They see the calculation, “I have enough capital for one but not both, so I’m going to spend it on Ashcroft” as a cynical political ploy, which in a way it is. And then they figure that must not be a principled decision. If it were principled, Chavez would be worth the fight just like Ashcroft is worth the fight.

I live in a state that is purple. It is filled with farmland…red, red farmland. I wear anti-Obama tee shirts every single weekend, and I get thumbs-up and pats on the back wherever I go. Some days it’s hard to move through a mall. But we keep electing these blue-state dipshits. Why? Because of a bunch of machinery. Hollywood; unions; colleges; illegal aliens voting; shuttle buses for lazy assholes who don’t care; free smokes for homeless; out-and-out fraud; MoveOn; Rock The Vote; dude, I could just add to this list all day long. Some of these things concern free speech, and the sacred right to be stupid, and must be tolerated in a free society. Most of these items, though, do not fall into that category.

If I try to use taxpayer funds to put a big marble cross in front of the capitol, it is NOT going to happen here or anywhere else. The Left will fight me and they will win. I’d say, sure, they should win — but my point is, they will not have to use so much as a single gram of “political capital” to do that. Is that because their protests will be completely non-offensive? NO. They will march around and call faithful people stupid, all day and all week; people will get pissed, then they’ll get past it. They’ll roll their eyeballs for a little while, then we’ll all do what the lefties want, same as we always do. Next controversy, we’ll do that again. And again and again and again…capital will not enter into the equation.

Why is that? Because the lefties believe they are right, and they are unapologetic about it. They think they’re fighting for something bigger than themselves. They think a cross in front of the capitol, erected and maintained with public money, is an encroachment on all our freedoms…and they don’t question this for a split second. They M-U-S-T win. So they do.

Such a dictum fits just as well, I would say even better, with a state funded mouthpiece. We cannot be free if our elected government is going to tell us what to oppose and what to support, on our dime. So people look around to see if someone will stand up to oppose it, and they don’t see anyone opposing it, so they figure…well, this must be okay.

If it’s self-sustaining, or sustained through voluntary private donations, it really is okay. But Buck and Daphne, for reasons I don’t understand, seem to harbor great passions against that ever happening. They seem undecided about whether this is important or not. Their argument that we need to leave well enough alone, they’ve both said, Daphne in particular, is that it doesn’t matter. But they clearly think it matters a lot.

Phil got it right — make it like Air America. If people really do want this around, it will enjoy a different outcome.

But I want to see how many people are really comfortable with this Vivian Schiller woman running something. I’ll bet there are a lot more people comfortable with Sarah Palin running something than Vivian Schiller running something. And I think it’s pretty dang odd that we never get to put that to the test.
- mkfreeberg | 10/26/2010 @ 10:09
Fair enough. I take your point against the “political capital” school of thought. It does seem like a cynical political ploy, because in a lot of ways it is a cynical political ploy. Cynicism is what politicians do….

…which speaks to a larger point that is coming up implicitly in this NPR discussion; namely, that leftists intermix their lives with politics in a way conservatives simply don’t. I don’t think this is due to the superiority of our position — I wish we’d fight longer and harder — but we seem to just be wired that way. The old Sixties slogan “the personal is political” had it backwards — for them, the political is personal in a way we just can’t rise to.

Like with your Tammy Bruce post above. As we’ve seen, the left is actually quite racist, sexist, and homophobic. “Principle,” such as it is, has nothing to do with it; conformity is all. As you yourself put it, Morgan — it often boils down to “I hate this thing over here; come help me hate it.” So much of their identity is tied up in this that they can bring the pain 24/7, 365 until we cave.

On the other hand…. I’m a Krazy Kapitalist Konservative, yes. But I’m also a son and a brother and a lover and a teacher and a colleague and a sports fan and a zillion other things, none of which have anything to do with politics. It wouldn’t bother me in the slightest to find out that my favorite team’s quarterback was a big Obama supporter, or that the bartender at my favorite watering hole was passionately in favor of single-payer healthcare. I simply can’t bring myself to care that much, or to invest the huge amount of effort it would take to align my life in that way. As I often say (which is mostly true): I don’t have a problem with liberals, but they sure as hell have a problem with me.

And that’s why the “political capital” argument is so appealing. Maybe we should rename it to “political energy” or “political opportunity cost” or something? As in, I have only X hours in a day to devote to politics; I have to figure out the best allocation to get the maximum bang for my buck. Cynical? Sure. But it’s simply the best I can do. I just can’t go to the mattresses on NPR.
- Severian | 10/26/2010 @ 10:27
Drooler sez: I still have no idea why your presence is tolerated here…

Heh. The self-defining quote. Mission accomplished.

Nice back and forth on the subject at hand. I really LIKE the way ya think, Severian. You, too, Phil… but I’ve said that before; Severian is relatively new to the House.

I think we’re done here but I have one final thought. Admit it Morgan… you just don’t like NPR’s ideological stance, so you wrap yourself up in the Constitution and scream “subsidy! Out, damned spot! Out!” If NPR’s news and opinion programming were right wing this would have never even come up. Pick and choose, but don’t forget to feed the stalking horse.
- bpenni | 10/26/2010 @ 11:19
All this being said, am I “gun ho” about getting NPR “de-funded”?

No, I’m not. I’m fer it, and I don’t think it would bet that hard a sell right now, in this moment, given the right argument (and conservative politicians seem to be lousy at this – either that or we’re given that impression by a media not eager to relay their messages intact) — it wouldn’t be that hard a sell.

With the Obama administration kicking around the idea of extending state support to certain newspapers to keep them from going under (and my bet is they’d pick their newspapers like they did their GM dealerships), this is certainly a legitimate line in the sand to draw.

Just listen to Obama’s FCC Diversity Cheif Mark Lloyd talk about how Chavez’s “incredible” revolution didn’t take the first time because he didn’t take the media seriously — since it was privately owned. It was an obstacle to “social change”.

Don’t think for a second that an administration that is doing its best to marginalize any opposition — including Fox News and conservative talk radio — wouldn’t command them off the air if it had the legal authority. I believe it is actively looking for ways to set up a legal framework to do just that — below the radar if they can. For now.

Meanwhile, it is doing everything in its power (and the power of its friends, like George Soros) — to marginalize our point of view and media outlets that are not hostile to it — to the point of telling people not to do interviews with Fox and probably discouraging and intimidating, say, NPR reporters and commentators … from lending their “legitimacy” to the network by appearing on it.

Which is what Juan’s firing was really all about. The Muslim comment is just the cover they were waiting and hoping for.

This administration is not going to make the same mistake Chavez made the first time around. It is taking the media seriously. Don’t think it can’t happen here. It can, if we let it.

But no. De-funding NPR isn’t on the top of my list of things to do. I won’t lose a lot of sleep over it, which is a good thing because it probably won’t be defunded (which is actually again, a pretty strong term for 1-2%).
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 11:56
I’m in the doghouse with Buck, for not treating both sides of an ideological fence exactly the same way.

I. Me. Morgan Freeberg. A private citizen with no power or authority whatsoever, beyond the right every citizen has to cast a vote.

The U.S. Government, on the other hand, with the police power of the state at its disposal, is not in trouble with Buck…even though they have repeatedly committed precisely the same sin, and in this case abused their authority. I’m under inspection and in trouble — they’re not. This is something I find interesting.
- mkfreeberg | 10/26/2010 @ 12:05
Also, I’d like to state for the record, in response to the question Buck should be asking me —

No, I am not out to silence Vivian Schiller or Barack Obama, the same way they are out to silence people with whom they disagree. Where I have real confidence in the conclusions I’ve reached about things, I am equally confident those conclusions will withstand an honest argument. They, obviously, do not feel the same about theirs.

I find that odd, too, since President Obama is supposed to have a rep for prevailing, overwhelmingly, in any verbal match-up with anybody else under the sun. He has constitutional authority, He has power, He has a nice lilty sonorous voice, He has the following of a rock star still, kinda…He has planted whores in the audience fainting on cue. Why does He need to shut people up, and why does He need my tax dollars to make sure His side can get the last word?
- mkfreeberg | 10/26/2010 @ 12:26
All this being said, am I “gun ho”…

The Resident Pedant emerges to say: it’s “gung-ho, Phil.” Your garden-variety Marine would take serious issue with one of their favorite phrases being misused. 🙂

Also, I’d like to state for the record, in response to the question Buck should be asking me –

Heh. Don’t be puttin’ words in my mouth, Morgan… please. You KNOW I have serious issues with our president. I also have serious issues with the knee-jerk, overly ideological right, too. Don’t get the two confused or conflated.

I’m done with this. The “Jane, you ignorant slut!” point-counterpoint thing has been well and truly exhausted.

One other thing… before I go… these sorts o’ threads are highly entertaining with the notable exception of certain droolers. But, Hey… droolers have a right to speak. But not to be taken seriously.
- bpenni | 10/26/2010 @ 16:37
Hey Phil, mister hot lycra wearing bicycle man

The Federal Government shouldn’t be in the news business, at least not domestically.

Or internationally. The government has no business funding media period. They also have no business funding, subsidizing or regulating through legislation or taxation policy most of what congress occupies themselves with in the name of public governance.

As I’ve said, I find this small NPR issue to be of negligent concern and I agree with Buck that it’s an ideologically driven tempest in a teapot.

I’m much more interested in reading political pieces that focus on fixing our entitlement programs, balancing the budget, addressing our monetary policy, alleviating the debt and rolling back government overreach and intervention in what should be state issues.
- Daphne | 10/26/2010 @ 16:59
Daphne, it occurs to me what what you’ve just rattled off is exactly what we’re discussing here. Shouldn’t we start where the abuse is most obvious? Where the oppositional argument is the least defensible?

NPR is slipping on their shit here. It’s just like the University of East Anglia e-mail scandal.

Myself, I probably wouldn’t be “gung ho” about NPR’s public funding either. I just don’t accept the premise that it’s separate and distinct. I see all those things I listed, the dead people “voting,” the illegal aliens being drafted, the homeless people voting for smokes, as tentacles of a common Kraaken. I see it all as one big piece of meat, and yes, this piece of meat should have priority.

As to ‘fessing up that I’d be all in favor of NPR if it were more conservative…a lot of liberals are operating on the assumption that it is. And I don’t accept the implied obligation on my part. Buck knows perfectly well I think the democrat party is thoroughly anti-American and should be outlawed. I see no reason why I should spent 50% of the time pretending the tangent of 45 degrees is something other than 1.

Why should I equalize my opposition to a radio network that says it’s 1, to match my opposition to a radio network that says it’s 2? Right is right, wrong is wrong.

But no, I’m not going to get behind public “talk” radio no matter what it says. The situation is as Sev said: Public state-managed or state-run radio is incompatible with a free society.
- mkfreeberg | 10/26/2010 @ 18:34
Thanks for the correction, Buck! You know, I always said it right growing up as a kid, but I started second-guessing myself after I became an adult and changed it to “gun”, thinking I’d had it wrong all along.

I figured it meant “Let’s go, and bring your gun!”

You can bet I’m going back to “gung” now that I’ve been duly imformed! 😉
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 18:38
Daphne … I was leaving the door open for Radio Free America, pretty much, but other than that … and maybe even with that, I’m with ya.

Not saying we oughtta go in and rip out every contrary government program overnight, but I think we ought to go about judicious pruning with the Constitution as a philosophical guide.
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 18:41
As to ‘fessing up that I’d be all in favor of NPR if it were more conservative…a lot of liberals are operating on the assumption that it is.

And that right there is another part of the tangled skein of problems that is the Great NPR Debate of 2010, and another reason I think “defund NPR” is a sucker bet. I honestly don’t mind “media bias” – I think partisanship is great, as it clarifies issues. I’d be thrilled to see out and proud partisan papers like they had in the 19th century. Problem is, only one side is willing to play the game. I’ll freely admit that Fox has a rightward bias (although not nearly to the extent liberals assume it does (assume, because they never actually watch the frokkin’ thing)). But I’ve been trying for years to get a leftist friend to admit that any news organization, anywhere, tilts even slightly to the left. New York Times? Washington Post? LA Times? All bastions of right-wingery, according to my buddy, on the theory (I guess) that they’re all corporations, and, you know, corporations are by definition Republican. Some idiot from The Nation actually wrote a book to that effect a while back…. which, come to think of it, is the only publication I could get my buddy to admit is even sorta kinda left-of-center, but since they’re an opinion journal (unlike the NYT, snort chuckle snicker guffaw) it doesn’t really count.

We can’t defund NPR for being biased, since lots of folks would deny even that. It is simply impossible, in the minds of Smart People everywhere, to be biased in favor of the left… to them it’s like being pro-gravity. As Philmon says, they’re all of a piece… but I think there are easier targets of opportunity out there.
- Severian | 10/26/2010 @ 19:14
Excactly, Sev. It’s not the bias. It’s the state-fundedness.

We already have a more conservative network. More than one, really, since we’re talking about radio. It’s just that they’re not on the public dole. Don’t need a conservative “NPR”, nor do we want one if “NP” implies that the state funds it.
- philmon | 10/26/2010 @ 19:42

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