Will the new Republican majority in Congress pull the plug on public television and radio?
Incoming House Speaker Newt Gingrich says he wants to eliminate federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributes some $285 million annually to hundreds of local public television and radio stations across the country. He says the explosion of cable TV stations and niche radio has eliminated the need for federal funding of public television and radio.
That argument confuses quantity with quality. Public broadcasting offers a selection of programs that simply is not available on commercial stations, which must compete aggressively for advertising dollars to stay on the air. "The McNeil-Lehrer NewsHour," for example, was for years the only hour-long news and commentary show on television; not until it proved that an audience existed for serious, in-depth reporting did the networks risk launching their own versions. Similarly, National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" and "Morning Edition" still provide the only comprehensive radio reporting in an era when commercial radio news staffs have been cut to the bone.
NPR, for example, has a national audience of 14 million listeners and a budget of $46 million. But only about 3 percent of that comes directly from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The rest comes from dues from its 500 member stations, and from corporate and foundation grants. NPR's member stations, for whom federal money is much more critical, receive between 4 percent and 40 percent of their budgets from federal grants; the rest comes from listener contributions, and business and private donations.
The real reason conservatives hate public broadcasting is that they consider it a liberal playpen for people whose views they abhor. There is relatively little Mr. Gingrich and Co. can do about the alleged "liberal" slant of mainstream media, with which they also find fault. But public broadcasting offers a convenient whipping boy on which conservatives can take out their frustrations.
They should resist the temptation. Voters elected Republicans to make government more efficient, not to indulge in symbolic gestures tilting against ideological windmills. Changing the shape or size of the public broadcasting agency might make sense, or even converting the money into block grants for the states to distribute. But public broadcasting as a public service should not be short-circuited.