CPB Ombudsman Yearender Posting
Ken A. Bode
January 4, 2011
In the Ombudsman's mailbag over the past month there continue to be expressions of concern about the firing of Juan Williams, often accompanied by promises never to send another dollar to CPB/PBS/NPR, and, further, to contact state, local and federal representatives to demand an end to all funding for public broadcasting.
Example: "I will dedicate my short life to de-funding you socialist bastards." (unsigned)
If the majority leadership of the incoming Congress acts on its pledge to de-fund public broadcasting, or the Obama Administrations endorses the Simpson-Bowles Commission recommendation to drop CPB by 2015 (which is unlikely), it doubtless will generate more expressions of that opinion.
On the other hand it appears that the community is preparing to mount a strong, coordinated case in support of public broadcasting. NPR and PBS have deep roots in most of the country's congressional districts. It may be that even those members of Congress who come to Washington disposed to de-fund the system entirely will be open to persuasion about the value of public broadcasting and receive a strong message from constituents who support it.
Remember, after the 1994 shellacking delivered to the Democrats in the mid-terms, Newt Gingrich took over as Speaker promising to end funding for CPB. His plan failed and later, even Gingrich was persuaded to concede that NPR was a lot less leftist than he thought, adding that he "no longer considers it the enemy within."
That said, allow me to end the year 2010 with some thoughts about the public affairs sector of public broadcasting.
Frontline: A program I admired before taking up my ombudsman duties, now the one I consider to be the consistently best, long-form journalism done anywhere in American broadcasting. For what he has created and sustained for over 600 programs, David Fanning, the long-time executive producer, ranks with Don Hewitt, whose comparable brainchild was the CBS program, 60 Minutes.
PBS NewsHour: This is the only quality, daily news program with magazine length reports available anywhere on television. Over the years I have served as ombudsman, the PBS NewsHour has been remodeled and improved. Now, seasoned senior correspondents are given more time at the anchor desk. Margaret Carlson and Ray Suarez have developed into remarkably good foreign correspondents; Kwame Holman is a more frequent on-screen presence; Hari Sreenivasan's regular news updates are clear, concise and masterfully delivered.
It is the mother ship of fair, accurate and balanced journalism, and hanging a collar of bias on the PBS NewsHour is a real stretch. Often, however, it is criticized for being the voice of the establishment, under representing those without status or power. This became a serious concern in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, when pro-war advocates heavily outnumbered skeptics and those who believed that the Bush Administration was trumping-up and overselling its intelligence about WMDs.
But PBS NewsHour is what it is, and its nightly contribution to the news environment is especially welcome in the overheated, over-partisan atmosphere stemming mostly from cable.
Friday Evening: Gwen Ifill runs a steady ship on Washington Week in Review, regularly enriching her longtime commentators with a mix of new talent. The format is unchanged, consisting of reporters who actually cover the news, then arrive live on Friday evenings to empty their notebooks. Unlike the weekend interview shows, nobody comes on Ms. Ifill's program with a partisan axe to grind or to defend or attack a policy. The panel just gives you good information and smart analysis.
With the departures of NOW and Bill Moyers Journal the intellectual inquisitiveness, investigative reporting and thoughtful commentary remain diminished. The new offerings on Friday are thinner, less interesting and less challenging. One hopes these offerings find their footing or that PBS is willing to make a change.
NPR: Recently officially re-branded from National Public Radio, this is the gem in the crown of public broadcasting and perhaps the division most vulnerable in a campaign to end public subsidies.
For many years before my Ombudsman stint began, NPR's public affairs programming was a staple in our household. Diane Rehm, Terry Gross, Marketplace and Morning Edition, All Things Considered and Weekend Edition were part of our daily routine ranging from often to always.
For the past five years, radios at home, in the office and the car are all tuned by default to NPR. Our primary local stations were WFYI in Bloomington, IN and WYSO in Yellow Springs, OH. Programs like Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me and This American Life became regulars.
Primarily at WYSO—somewhat less so with Bloomington—I came to admire the commitment to cover important issues in the station's local broadcast area. This is a longtime goal of NPR, and my Ombudsman experience tells me there are places where it truly is being met.
"The sound of sanity," is how the critic James Wolcott described NPR, saying it precariously props up the collective I.Q. of the country with reliable reporting, wry commentary and whimsical humor. That is an apt and agreeable description.
NPR came on the air in May 1971. Morning Edition was added in November 1979. Soon America began its familiarity with the names Susan Stamberg, Noah Adams, Linda Wertheimer, Cokie Roberts, Bob Edwards, Nina Totenberg and many others.
Now, there are nearly 700 local stations. In some places of low population density, like Alaska, NPR is the major agent connecting the towns and cities of the state. Together they generate nearly $1 billion in revenues.
As other major news outlets worldwide—networks and newspapers alike—are cutting personnel and closing bureaus, NPR is expanding its coverage, adding bureaus. It also has sent correspondents—and even its program hosts—to report directly from war zones—Central America, the Balkans, Gulf War I, Iraq, Afghanistan—for example, along with sites of natural disasters—Three Mile Island, Katrina, the earthquake in China, the tsunami in Indonesia, the earthquake in Haiti.
Consider the foreign and wartime coverage of just these few reporters:
Scott Simon: El Salvador, Iraq, Afghanistan
Tom Gjelten: Balkans, Central America, Cuba
Anne Garrels: Soviet Union, Iraq, Afghanistan
Jason Beaubien: Darfur, Haiti
Deborah Amos, Jacki Lyden, Neal Conan and Scott Simon all covered Gulf War I, and behind them were veteran producers and technicians. Silvia Poggioli won a Peabody for her coverage of ethnic cleansing during the Balkan conflict and remains the most respected correspondent anywhere for her coverage of Eastern Europe, Italy and the Vatican.
One person merits special mention in this regard. Loren Jenkins, a Pulitzer prize-winner as a print journalist, has directed NPR's foreign coverage since 1996. NPR reporters tell stories of the gutsy calls Jenkins made over the period of two wars, most often about respecting their judgment and approving requests to stay and report even as situations became more dangerous.
As the world changes, NPR has recognized the need for expertise in investigative and enterprise reporting, creating specialized beats in areas like the environment, health care policy and counter-terrorism. This has resulted in reporting excellence on the mental trauma of soldiers returning from Iraq, investigative reporting on the financial meltdown and the crash of the housing market.
An interesting measure of the success and public reception of NPR over the years may be found in comparable audience statistics. In 1980, total radio listeners were 172.5 million. NPR's listeners numbered 2.6 million. In 2010, total radio listeners were 238.2 million, an increase of 38 percent. NPR's listeners jumped to 22.5 million, a vastly larger percentage.
In a new volume published by Chronicle Books entitled This Is NPR: The First Forty Years, the current NPR president and CEO Vivian Schiller says this: "Americans spend more time with NPR than with any other news source. And yet I feel that NPR is America's best kept secret. We've got it all, but yet, somehow we haven't penetrated the consciousness of a lot of people that we are an incredibly powerful—if not the most powerful news organization in the country."
It may not yet be the most powerful, but in my considered judgment, in the present atmosphere of news broadcasting, it is the most thorough, most balanced and the best.
