Posted on 08/24/2011 4:21:55 AM PDT by Kaslin
One of the greatest perversions of statism is the use of taxpayer money to push for ever more government spending and intervention. A casual listener to the far-left end of the FM dial, National Public Radio, will quickly conclude that NPR is one of America's leading offenders in this perversion.
Let's just take one show, the Aug. 22 evening newscast "All Things Considered," perhaps one of the most ill named programs in the history of radio. Conservatism is never considered. It is only besmirched, assaulted and rhetorically dismembered.
NPR anchor Robert Siegel was covering the new Martin Luther King memorial statue on the National Mall in Washington D.C. So in order to consider all things, he asked black wacko-leftist Julian Bond if Tea Party activists were racist.
Siegel threw this softball at Bond: "Some people read into the Tea Party's almost neuralgic reaction to government spending, a sense that white people figure black people benefit disproportionately from federal programs. Do you suspect a racial subtext to that whole argument?" Bond said, "absolutely," "there is a racial animus there."
This was actually a little well-behaved for Bond. In the past, Bond has denounced the Tea Party as the "Taliban wing" of the GOP. Speaking of Republicans, Bond stated after the 1994 revolution that the "running dogs of the wacky radical right" insured "white supremacy" was "everywhere in America" and insisted then that in the Reagan years, the Republicans were a "crazed swarm of right-wing locusts." That's who NPR turns to for sober analysis.
Later in the same program, NPR offered a profile of Democrat Sen. Max Baucus, a member of the new "super committee" that will somehow magically reduce the deficit in a way the larger Congress cannot. Only liberals are allowed to analyze.
Liberal number one: "Pat Williams was Montana's Democratic congressman through the 1980s and '90s. While he considers Baucus a friend, he doesn't agree with many of his fiscal policies." Williams said, "most notably, I've been disappointed in that he was the leading Democrat who engineered the passage of George W. Bush's tax cuts, which have been disastrous for the country." (NPR has no time for anyone who thinks the Bush tax cuts were not "disastrous" for America.)
Liberal number two: University of Montana professor Christopher Muste, who put Baucus on the right-wing fringe. Muste "says while Baucus is considered a progressive on many social and environmental issues, he's become a conservative anchor for the Democratic Party on fiscal issues."
To suggest there is a "conservative anchor" in the Democratic Party is to flirt with a mental walk on the wild side. That's like suggesting there's a conservative anchor at...NPR. Muste warned Baucus is "very cautious" and "cautiousness makes him even more moderate in a lot of his policy actions."
NPR suggested on health care that, "Baucus angered many liberal Democrats when he took the public option off the table in a failed attempt to bring more conservative Republicans onboard." Muste added, "So I think he's got to view this bipartisan commission as one of his few chances to actually really come back and reestablish his credibility as one of the key players in deficit reduction in Congress."
Did you catch that? Baucus has to "reestablish his credibility" on deficit reduction by pleasing liberal Democrats. That would mean by increasing taxes and refusing to touch Obamacare, Medicare and Social Security -- anything.
Right after this came another statism story: the endless rerun of billionaire Warren Buffett beating his breast and insisting he's dramatically undertaxed. I'm bored just writing that. NPR anchor Melissa Block interviewed Joseph Thorndike so he could denounce the under-taxation of the rich.
Buffett can pontificate ad infinitum on this, perhaps because he knows NPR will not point out the obvious: Buffett doesn't live by his own credo. He could, but won't, write out his own check to the government. In fact, he does just the opposite, pouring more and more into the (liberal) Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, thus protecting his money from federal taxation. In July, he parked another $1.5 billion there, bringing his total to $9.5 billion.
Buffett and Gates have both argued for a stiffer estate tax, which this foundation craftily avoids. To real journalists, this would be a story, but not at NPR.
Should give all of us a good idea what is going to be required next November, yes??
National Proletariat Radio
I thought the byline was
“NPR: The Stalinist Network”
Never
Praise
Republicans
These two shows would make it in the free market. However, most NPR supporters are too ignorant and arrogant to understand this.
I don’t mind NPR. In fact there are some programs on there I like from time to time. I just wonder why the left always feels that it has to force everyone else to pay for their listening pleasure. If NPR didn’t take federal money, it would not die. If nothing else, the best programs would be picked up elsewhere. I’m pretty sure the lefty news part would die.
Come the revolution, the entire National Endowment for the Arts appropriation, not just the NPR portion of it, must go. And I say that as one who very much enjoys performing with a major community arts organization.
One of the things I despise most about “All Things Considered” is the theme music. IMHO, it communicates both pompousness and superiority to the listener. Of course, in a way its perfectly suited to the program, as the same can be said about the tone of the commentary. One gets the feeling they are being lectured to by someone who considers themself a moral & intellectual superior. Thankfully, the only time I ever listen to it is when I’m driving long distance and there is just nothing else on.
You are totally ignoring the fact that we only one house while the rats have the senate and the White House. Come back if we have all three
Big, shocking surprise: NPR is riddled with liberal bias.
Come on man. If Logic and Reason are your handle, try using it some time.
The house could have passed another bill that would never have been addressed in the senate and certainly never signed by the one.
It would have just given the left one more reason to wail about the crazy pubby congress critters and accomplished nothing.
They didn't turn tail and run, and they had no opportunity to close this thing down, they aren't going to shut down the gummint over funding for npr.
WWDTM is kind of entertaining. Cah Tahk used to be sort of regular listening. I prefer Sam’s Garage. Darn WVOC has knocked it down to one hour for yet another senior care/financial/real estate program.
National People’s Radio, a channel of, for and by the elitists (snobs).
“Car talk is pretty entertaining too.”
If you like listening to three loudmouths all talking at the same time and using junior high humor it can be entertaining!
All of our family road trips include 15 minutes of All Things Considered. Our kids find it hysterically funny--from the effected way the hosts pronounce their name ("I'm MEEEEE-shell NORRRRR-is)to the pretentious goofball Russian immigrant posing as a literature professor. (I must admit that I DO NOT have the courage to try family listening when Terry Gross and "Fresh Air" is on . . .)
This is my philosophically fiscal litmus test for how serious Republicans are about actually reducing the size of government. In this day and age where sources of information are unlimited and delivery systems are omnipresent, there simply is no justification for the government to subsidize any form of media within our borders. The CPB is low hanging fruit for congressional budget hawks.
I don’t blame NPR for being a bunch of lefties. Fish Swim. That they are still being even partially funded by tax dollars after the takeover in ‘94 is liberals way of taunting those of us who keep demanding small government conservatism.
The U of Montana is so far left it is a local joke. A long time ago when I was hiring college geologists for summer help in the area I made it known that UofM students need not apply. In their forest management classes they had a professor who discussed best methods of spiking trees. I dispise the school.
Do these idiots not know that trees are replaceable? All you have to do is for every tree that is cut down plant 4 or 5 new ones. It does not take that long for trees to grow
Three??? Tom and Ray Magliozzi are the hosts, whose the third?
Didn’t know there was a 3rd but I haven’t listened to them in a couple of years. 1 hour of Sam’s Garage is worth 3 of theirs in terms usefulness.
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