When Bill O'Reilly said as much years ago I thought he was exaggerating. It is certainly no exaggeration now, if it is lamestream, 'woke'-captured, Democrat shill outlets such as National Public Radio (NPR) and the Washington Post (WaPo) we are talking about. Here:
But we can thank Uri Berliner, a senior business editor at NPR, for revealing the main reason for journalism’s dire situation: Americans these days just don’t trust the news.
Berliner’s first-person account of the past near-decade at NPR – from Donald Trump’s first presidential campaign through the present – reveals a litany of reasons for this loss of faith. Berliner argues that NPR’s increasingly leftward tilt, lack of transparency, ideological groupthink and prioritization of diversity of identity and physical appearance above other values have led the organization astray.
If you like NPR programming, as I like some of it, write them a check! Just don't demand that they receive taxpayer support. We are in fiscal crisis, and budgetary cuts must be made. If such inessentials as NPR, PBS, NEH and NEA cannot be defunded, where will the cuts be made?
So one good reason to defund NPR is that we cannot afford it.
But even if we could afford it, NPR in its present configuration should not receive Federal support. And this for the simple reason that it is plainly a propaganda arm of the Left.* If you deny the increasingly leftward tilt of NPR, even unto 'wokery,' then you are delusional and not worth talking to. So I'll charitably assume that you are sane and admit the bias. The next question I will put to you is whether you think it is morally right that tax dollars be used to push points of view that half if not most of us in this land find objectionable. I say that it it is not morally right that you take my money by force and then use it for a purpose that is not only inessential and unconnected to the necessary functions of government, but also violates my beliefs.
So that is my second reason for defunding NPR.
Perhaps, if NPR were balanced like C-SPAN, it could be tolerated in times of plenty. But we are not in times of plenty and it is not balanced.
Note that a reasonable liberal could accept my two reasons. I am not arguing that government must not engage in any projects other than those that are strictly essential such as those connected to the protection of life, liberty, and property (the Lockean triad). I am arguing that present facts dictate that defunding NPR is something that ought to be done.
As for WAPO, see here for their egregious mis-reporting of the Dexter Reed shooting. Had Dexter read my Substack entry, What to do if a cop stops you, he might be alive today.
But he is dead, having foolishly, illegally, and immorally brought about his own death, as is journalism!
_________________
*I stand not only for the separation of church and state, but also for the separation of leftism and state.
