Despite the latest call from conservative politicians to cut the small part of taxpayer funding allocated to NPR and PBS, both of these media institutions have beefed up their resources for being watchdogs on the questionable doings of corporations and divisions of the government.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110305/ap_on_en_ot/us_public_media_investigative_journalism
This article contains comments from your usual complainers against 'government supported media', all the while ignoring the many times NPR or PBS reporting has embarrassed various agencies or officials. I remember city, state, and federal agencies all catching some from for the Hurricane Katrina response AND its aftermath. One lasting lesson I learned included the entrenched political project-making that the Army Corp of Engineers has been used for beyond that event. More recently, NPR has demonstrated some of the coziness between federal regulators and the speculation firms dealing in credit/mortgage swaps. And it was NPR digging that uncovered the for-profit prison industry's role in shaping Arizona's controversial immigration laws, which politicos in other states have deliberately tried to emulate.
I for one appreciate the first class reporting that comes from programs like Need to Know, Frontline, and All Things Considered, as they manage to remember to give us a healthy dose of the news we need to hear more than just the stuff we want to. (Here's looking at you, 20/20 Charlie Sheen special.)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110305/ap_on_en_ot/us_public_media_investigative_journalism
This article contains comments from your usual complainers against 'government supported media', all the while ignoring the many times NPR or PBS reporting has embarrassed various agencies or officials. I remember city, state, and federal agencies all catching some from for the Hurricane Katrina response AND its aftermath. One lasting lesson I learned included the entrenched political project-making that the Army Corp of Engineers has been used for beyond that event. More recently, NPR has demonstrated some of the coziness between federal regulators and the speculation firms dealing in credit/mortgage swaps. And it was NPR digging that uncovered the for-profit prison industry's role in shaping Arizona's controversial immigration laws, which politicos in other states have deliberately tried to emulate.
I for one appreciate the first class reporting that comes from programs like Need to Know, Frontline, and All Things Considered, as they manage to remember to give us a healthy dose of the news we need to hear more than just the stuff we want to. (Here's looking at you, 20/20 Charlie Sheen special.)