This is not the kind of post I like to write, as those of you who read my stuff probably know.  No pix, no vids, no quasi-philosophical musings.  But NPR has done it again, and I'm back in the quandary in which I find myself too often these days.

Morning Edition.  The first two items.

1. Democrats Attack Health Insurance Industry

2. Kyl: Health Care Fix Should Be Right, Not Just Quick

Total time, about 9 minutes of trashing the "liberal" grass roots organizations and fluffing the Republican leadership. This is not the way to start a day.

I wrote this inthe NPR comments area.

It is no wonder that at least some of the public is confused, NPR may be the best, but it is the best of the worst. There is no cohesion to the reporting on this story. Your own reporting notices that the insurance industry defends itself by deliberately underestimating its profits using an accounting method which would be laughed off the stage by any other segment of the economy, yet you attach that tidbit by a link and even there give a spokesman for the insurance industry the last word.

This morning you begin with a story about the recess fight pending, never failing to brand those groups advocating for the public option "liberal". You call the criticisms of the insurance company as the enemy, the villain in the piece a "tactic". You never consider whether the advocates of the public option might be right, or whether in fact the public has very good reason to distrust the insurance industry. And once again you give the insurance spokesman the last word. Give any word to a spokesman for the critics? Of course not. Boo!

I trust you less and less. Thank heavens for Bill Moyers and his journal on public television. I wish NPR had great ones on its staff willing to speak truth to power.

(This wasn't the comments area for this morning's trash.  I had to leave for work before it opened--but this story is itself in the same vein).

So what do I do--stuck with the best of the worst? In a way it does more damage than the worst of the worst does, because it has the aura of respectability with out the substance of it.

My preference would be to get NPR out of the news business altogether--it does good work supporting cultural events like the subject of my last entry, the Newport Folk Festival.  And I love the local content of my NPR station, WGBH.  I've been a sustaining member since 1982.  I've survived a number of the hosts.  Kathy Fuller provides me with classical music following the death of Robert J. Lurtsema.  Mae Kramer used to feed me blues--now Brendan Hogan does.  Eric Jackson gives me jazz four nights a week, and I reconnect with my roots on A Prairie Home Companion.

I've always believed in paying for what I get when I can.  So what do I do?

I'm thinking of something like this.  When the August fund drive comes up, I'm going to cancel my sustaining membership with this explanation and offer:   I will return to membership if WGBH allows me to earmark my contribution so none of it goes to NPR radio news.   I will post this offer on the station's website if possible.  This may be a futile gesture.  I've made those before.  But public support should give the public a vote on content. The sponsors (at least they no longer call them underwriters) give money in concentrated doses--which makes them more powerful than any of us individually, even though we provide 70% of the local operating budget.  But the 70% can get more power perhaps if we receive the ability to earmark our contributions.  Minnesota Public Radio used to allow contributors to "sponsor" a specific hour of time--"this hour brought to you by Susie Creamcheese and Howard Bagel".  I'm going to try to get 'GBH to do the same thing.

Any other ideas would be appreciated.

p.s.  It wouldn't be a bad thing for some of you to go to NPR and add your gripes--maybe even recommending mine (I've never asked for that before, and I promise never to ask for it again).