Public Radio in the Private Interest
Just today, the nexus of public radio and private profits gave us NPR's national political corespondent and "Fox News Sunday" pundit Mara Liasson Liarsson defending Obama's critics like Joe Wilson as no more caustic or irrational than George Bush's critics. Then Katy Clark of PRI's "The World" twice introduced guest John Shiels as a consultant for "the non-partisan" Lewin Group to discuss the threat of the health care bill covering illegal residents.
Thanks, "public" radio, for giving us the Republican party line. Here's what Katy Clark didn't tell listeners:
Shiels is vice-president for Lewin, which supplied the most damaging (and thoroughly discredited) figure used by conservatives to bash the public option. The Lewin Group early this summer released its study claiming that a public option would draw more than 100 million people from private insurance. The report was cited by the GOP and its teabagging shock troops as proof that Congress was about to kill private insurance and institute a government takeover of health care.
Mara Liarsson I just give up on. Her persistently negative analysis of Democrats and Obama makes her a perfect fit for the "Fox News Sunday" echo chamber. Liarsson's mind is as alien to fair play as her other-worldly expression.
I'm sick of the BS I've been hearing on what are supposedly the radio networks of "the people." But I guess it will come as no surprise that PRI is greatly funded by the Medtronic Foundation. That's the PR arm of Medtronic, Inc., the world's largest medical technology company.
Need an expensive fix for an organ gone sour? Medtronic has it. Need Medicare reimbursement for that new part? Medtronic can arrange it. Need to gloss over the fact that Medtronic and Lewin both have skin in reform? Well, that's the role of public radio.
I used to rely on public broadcasting for the truth, but when I contacted WGBH in Boston, where "The World" is produced, I got the usual run-around. My follow-up email got an autoresponder reply.
Public TV is better than public radio at getting it right. I don't think I'd hear such drivel on "The News Hour" and certainly not on Moyers' show. But the corporate interests have penetrated deep into NPR and PRI. "All hail the Baucus plan!" Shit.
It's been too long since I listened to that classic rock station halfway up the dial.
Thanks, "public" radio, for giving us the Republican party line. Here's what Katy Clark didn't tell listeners:
Shiels is vice-president for Lewin, which supplied the most damaging (and thoroughly discredited) figure used by conservatives to bash the public option. The Lewin Group early this summer released its study claiming that a public option would draw more than 100 million people from private insurance. The report was cited by the GOP and its teabagging shock troops as proof that Congress was about to kill private insurance and institute a government takeover of health care.
Mara Liarsson I just give up on. Her persistently negative analysis of Democrats and Obama makes her a perfect fit for the "Fox News Sunday" echo chamber. Liarsson's mind is as alien to fair play as her other-worldly expression.
I'm sick of the BS I've been hearing on what are supposedly the radio networks of "the people." But I guess it will come as no surprise that PRI is greatly funded by the Medtronic Foundation. That's the PR arm of Medtronic, Inc., the world's largest medical technology company.
Need an expensive fix for an organ gone sour? Medtronic has it. Need Medicare reimbursement for that new part? Medtronic can arrange it. Need to gloss over the fact that Medtronic and Lewin both have skin in reform? Well, that's the role of public radio.
I used to rely on public broadcasting for the truth, but when I contacted WGBH in Boston, where "The World" is produced, I got the usual run-around. My follow-up email got an autoresponder reply.
Public TV is better than public radio at getting it right. I don't think I'd hear such drivel on "The News Hour" and certainly not on Moyers' show. But the corporate interests have penetrated deep into NPR and PRI. "All hail the Baucus plan!" Shit.
It's been too long since I listened to that classic rock station halfway up the dial.
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Sorry to pick on a tiny portion of your post but this type of crap really pisses me off. All the more since it is common when discussing female politicians and pundits and rare when discussing male politicians and pundits. Who cares what she or Pelosi looks like? How is that relevant to her analysis of policy? Its just a stupid ad hominum attack.
Since you seem to feel this is relevant information please include a real photograph of yourself in your next post so we can discuss whether you are attractive enough for people here to take your opinions seriously.
September 16, 2009 6:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Quite true. My apologies and I will delete that portion of my post. It was utterly wrong.
September 16, 2009 6:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks ripper. I really appreciate this quick response.
September 16, 2009 8:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have no sympathy whatever for the medical insurance industry.
Medtronic, however, is in the (admittedly rather profitable) business of making pacemakers, insulin pumps, and other such devices that allow people with "organs gone sour" (as you so charitably put it) to live longer and better than they otherwise would. As is Guidant, as is St. Jude Medical, as is Boston Scientific, and others.
To satisfy your quest for ideological purity, would you consign those people to painful, lingering deaths for the sake of eliminating medical device manufacturers and their revenue streams? Because that is what you are implying.
Disclosure: I have in my life done work in varying capacities for the four firms listed above. I may do so again.
Your posts are sometimes valuable. This one is not. You gloss over distinctions that ought to matter to you. They matter very much to many in the real world.
September 16, 2009 6:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
I understand that many of the devices and systems sold by Medtronic are valuable. I also understand that the profit margin on these devices is immense and lucrative for shareholders. And undeniably, the company is invested in the outcome of health care reform.
Nowhere in my post do I suggest that the products Medtronic sells should be discontinued.
I will take your rather harsh criticisms as a misreading of my intent.
September 16, 2009 6:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thinking about your remarks, it seems odd that you would find no value in this post. Clearly, I am making an observation about the extent to which corporate funding and/or political bias seems to influence the content of certain PRI and NPR programs and reportage.
Instead, you jump the shark to assuming I would recommend cutting patients off from life-saving devices. Ouch.
No, but I am saying that, like other for-profit corporations, Medtronic and Lewin Group have a vested interest in promoting legislation that produces the biggest gravytrain for them.
September 16, 2009 7:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
And I will take your singling them out as misdirection. Your intent, as you define it, is muddled, and buried in weak reasoning and weaker writing.
I thus challenge you: Demonstrate the presence of Medtronic editorial control in NPR's programming, using more than innuendo. "Rolodex journalism" it may be, though calling it promotion of Medtronic's presumed agenda requires clear proof, which you have failed to provide.
(I have no great affection for Mara Liasson, nor Juan Williams, another NPR/Fox annoyance.)
September 16, 2009 7:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Grouch, I have no documents that would satisfy you, nor do I think such proof is easily obtainable in the best of circumstances. I simply have worked in media all my life, seen the "breaks" given to big-money advertisers and noticed more and more of that practice in our media as time goes by.
I also know that the various funding sources of public broadcasting have all but dried up, including severe cuts in governmental assistance and corporate donations. This is the perfect recipe for undue influence. Coincidentally, I have noticed an increasing reliance on Right-framed stories on public radio.
So no proof, just an educated guess about why the reporting resonates with the interests of public radio's donor base. Just as your comments on behalf of your former and perhaps future employers also resonates with their interests.
September 16, 2009 7:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for pointing out PRI mis-identifying the Lewin Group. (I have pointed out the Lewin Group bs earlier in the summer, too, and it bugs me to no end.) The World airs later here in Phoenix, but I'll be listening... and will express my displeasure to PRI afterwards.
I also hate to see the journalistic practice of matching up perceived wrongs as a way of trying to appear even-handed. I do not recall any Dems holding up signs and mugging for the cameras when Bush was speaking - let alone yelling out as Wilson did (though at least the Dems would've been accurate).
September 16, 2009 7:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
I used to give my local public station some money now and then, and when they got that big endowment from Mrs Ray Kroc, I hoped they'd return to glory. But they haven't.
September 17, 2009 8:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
I've withdrawn my support to the news programs on public radio, and directed it to local progamming only. This morning it was Bill Frith's former staff member being given the public airwaves for free. Bill Frith! whose family hospital chain defrauded the public. Grrr.
September 17, 2009 9:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Bill Frist?
September 17, 2009 9:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ripper, I agree that public radio (and TV) have lost much of their non-biased funding and have now resorted to what look a whole lot like "commercials". I hate to see their independence stripped away from them. It's our loss as much as theirs.
There is simply no excuse, though, for them to go to the dark side. Much of their funding still comes from ordinary citizens who send money in order to keep quality programming going. Corporate influence takes away from their entire reason for being.
It's too sad.
September 17, 2009 9:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
End the Corporation that sells out the public they "claim" to be there for.
Do the "capital" thing;
off with their heads,
Alice, in Wounderland, would understand : )
It is time to SELL the NPR stations to fund the single payer option.
Use it to provide health care to the public!
What a cause to die for, The Public Interest!
This may be a little over the top
but I bet it gets their attention.
Catching them in their subversive ways
does not seem to shame or bring change.
September 17, 2009 11:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps you could send Bill Moyers an e-mail. He may be interested.
September 17, 2009 11:23 AM | Reply | Permalink