Public Broadcasting Board Removes Chairman

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Last Sunday, Xinhua, the official government news agency in China, said it would restrict the content of news and enact registration requirements for Web sites. Now news in China must pass through a government filter to determine if it meets the government’s standard for “public interest.”

China has long restricted access to information it deemed inappropriate. Web sites were blocked, chat rooms shut down, Internet cafes closed. In the past, such actions were ad hoc and unannounced. The latest announcement, though, suggests formal registration processes and institutional censorship, sure signs that China is going to even greater lengths to block news from the West.

One can just imagine a new bureaucracy within the Information Ministry in Beijing offering opinions about which Web sites are in the “public interest.” It is tempting to chide China for the impossibility of controlling information. Surely, the unencumbered flow of information has far more benefit to the Chinese public than any possible government control. In rebutting complaints about its Internet censorship, China might reasonably point to America’s own Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Yesterday afternoon, the board of directors of the corporation met in Washington and decided not to re-elect Ken Tomlinson as chairman. Mr. Tomlinson committed one of the great faux pas of Washington: He tried to document a widely known but unspeakable truth. Mr. Tomlinson had the temerity to ask a consultant to measure political bias in programming sponsored by the corporation. Such bias, naturally, would be contrary to its charter, and it would be the responsibility of the board to weed it out.

But the mere discussion of political bias in broadcast programming generally, and public broadcasting in particular, is a taboo subject in Washington. The suggestion inevitably leads to calls for government review and control of content – similar to the Chinese governmental model. As Mr. Tomlinson has discovered in Washington, and as scores of Web sites may soon discover in China, revealing the truth sometimes has painful consequences.

***

The vocabulary the Chinese use to rationalize government interference with news is eerily familiar to anyone who follows American communications law. For decades, our officials have used the incantation of “public interest” to sanctify decisions, particularly those related to the press. A search for the phrase “public interest” yields more than 160 matches on the CPB Web site.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is not merely an oracle of the public interest, it is a distributor of public funds – all, of course, supposed ly in the public interest. It is a publicly created corporation, distributing $400 million annually for public broadcasters from local stations to National Public Radio.

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with liberal or any other bias to private broadcast programming. Public broadcasting has an apolitical standard by statute, but a political tone in practice. Making an issue of such bias, however, is politically intolerable in Washington. For his act of naivete, Mr. Tomlinson has been widely vilified. Yet no one credibly denies a political tint to public broadcast programming.

Mr. Tomlinson is the subject of an investigation by the inspector general of the corporation. The inspector general will not examine whether there is political bias in public programming, but instead will investigate whether Mr. Tomlinson inappropriately used public funds in hiring the consultant. The political ends of the corporation will tolerate no means of review.

Some uses of the corporation’s funds, intentionally or not, promote one set of viewpoints over another. The question that even Mr. Tomlinson would not raise is why our government sponsors any form of programming: liberal, conservative, or any other flavor.

Public broadcasting has special rules and regulations that give it rights not enjoyed by commercial broadcasters. Public broadcasters rightly insist upon the exercise of those statutory privileges, but these rest on an absence of political orientation. To maintain this legal status, it is difficult to see how public funds can be used for programming.

The Chinese have parroted our phrase, the “public interest.” But we must demonstrate that the public interest in America is faithful to freedom of speech and the letter of laws, and blind to the political views of individuals. China is taking the opposite interpretation. We must do better.

A former FCC commissioner, Mr. Furchtgott-Roth is president of Furchtgott-Roth Economic Enterprises. He can be reached at hfr@furchtgott-roth.com.


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