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Jun 1, 2004

Common Cause picked up on today's New Yorker article (see below), charging that CPB is now acting as "the agent of ideological interference" instead of playing its original heat-shield role. CPB is backing two new programs hosted by conservatives at the same time PBS is halving the length of Bill Moyers' program, the lobbying group said.
A Philadelphia Inquirer columnist vents her frustration with the BBC Newshour, which some public radio stations carry. (Via Romenesko. Reg. req. Bugmenot.com is a useful tool for dealing with website registrations, by the way.)
The right wing has stopped trying to kill PBS and is now seeking a larger voice in shaping it, writes media chronicler Ken Auletta in today's New Yorker. "Big Bird Flies Right: How Republicans learned to love PBS" [text not online] reports that PBS plans to add CPB-backed programs hosted by Paul Gigot of Wall Street Journal and conservative critic Michael Medved (co-hosting with a liberal). Auletta says PBS President Pat Mitchell was thwarted from signing Newt Gingrich to host a Friday-night show because Fox News had him under contract. But PBS didn't pursue the idea of a program for middle-schoolers to be hosted by the vice president's wife, Lynne Cheney, proposed by producer Michael Pack before he joined CPB.