Government Broadcasting

A thumb on the scale

NPR and PBS are no longer receiving federal government funding. For many people, this change is long overdue. It is not an end to free speech. There is no change to the licenses for all the public radio and TV stations that have been carrying this material. They can continue to broadcast and share their opinions. But taxpayers are no longer involuntary supporters.

In 1922, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was established under a royal charter. Initially, various funding mechanisms were attempted, but a general household fee was adopted. Other commonwealth nations have similar systems. Canada has a CBC. Australia has an ABC.

The United States government granted licenses to private companies to operate stations in a specific location at a particular power level. Since signals travel farther at night, some licenses included the requirement to reduce power at night. Some stations had no other stations in the country on their frequency at night and were referred to as “clear channel.”

In conjunction with international rules, we coordinated the allocation of call letters. At first, stations could start their “name” with “W” or “K” anywhere in the country. Eventually, that changed, and stations east of the Mississippi had to use W while those to the west had to use K. Pittsburgh’s KDKA was allowed to keep its “K” name.

Individual stations signed agreements with national networks for programming. In the early decades, there were four networks: Mutual, CBS, NBC Red, and NBC Blue. Mutual wouldn’t survive, and the government would eventually force NBC to sell its blue network, which became ABC.

All of this happened in the world of AM radio. In the early 1950s, an increasing number of consumers began to own televisions with VHF channels 2 through 13. The three radio networks entered television and were joined briefly by Dumont. With only 12 options, there were limited channels available. UHF technology opened, but until the sets could tune in channels 14 through 83, it made no sense to broadcast on those. In 1964, Congress mandated that all new sets be equipped with UHF-capable tuners.

Radio options also increased, and the quality improved. By the mid-1970s, car radios had both AM and FM channels, and mid- to upper-priced cars had multiple speakers for full stereo sound. These new stations had improved sound quality.

Until the new UHF and FM stations were widely used, they were available for tinkerers. Eventually, the major players moved in. Some regions lacked three VHF stations. One or more of the three major networks worked with an affiliate willing to use a UHF slot. AM music stations saw no reason to stick with poor-quality transmissions when FM was available. They either switched or added FM. Sometimes they kept the AM station as a talk or sports channel.

The United States had made various efforts to support the transmission of educational material in rural areas over the years. Foundations were also active. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting [CPB] was created on November 7, 1967, when U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. On February 26, 1970, the CPB formed National Public Radio (NPR), a network of public radio stations that began operating the following year.

CPB was established as technology opened opportunities for many new entrants in radio and television.

There is always a problem with government-funded broadcasters. They support the prevailing, or fashionable, view on issues. Media members are increasingly drawn from a narrow segment of society. They don’t feel the impact of specific policies. When national networks like the BBC and CBC endorse large-scale immigration, expensive energy, and net-zero policies, they appear to overlook or disregard the impact of these policies on a significant portion of the public.

The now former long-time NPR editor Uri Berliner made the case that NPR is biased. He starts by describing how far to the left he is and then explains that he has grown increasingly uncomfortable with the fact that he is not left enough to be comfortable with his coworkers. He notes that it wasn’t always that way.

It’s true NPR has always had a liberal bent, but during most of my tenure here, an open-minded, curious culture prevailed. We were nerdy, but not knee-jerk, activist, or scolding.
In recent years, however, that has changed. Today, those who listen to NPR or read its coverage online find something different: the distilled worldview of a very small segment of the U.S. population.

He says the change happened after Trump’s 2016 victory. NPR bought the Russia collusion story completely and played it at full volume. “But when the Mueller report found no credible evidence of collusion, NPR’s coverage was notably sparse. Russiagate quietly faded from our programming.”

In 2020, they ignored the possibility of a "lab-leak" cause for COVID-19 and the Hunter Biden laptop story. After the George Floyd incident, NPR went for the systemic racism approach full-bore. They even saw their institution as racist and part of the problem. He ends his article by citing the extremes of identity group participation in setting style guide rules at NPR.

[T]he NPR union, of which I am a dues-paying member, has ensured that advocacy groups are given a seat at the table in determining the terms and vocabulary of our news coverage. … [W]hat’s notable is the extent to which people at every level of NPR have comfortably coalesced around the progressive worldview.”
And this, I believe, is the most damaging development at NPR: the absence of viewpoint diversity.

Members of Congress and the President who don’t share those views are not inclined to spend government money to spread opinions in opposition to their own. However, that raises a larger question. Why were we doing this in the first place? Free speech is that. Free. That means your speech is free to me. If you want to put your ideas on the radio or television, use your dime. There is no reason to fund these stations publicly.