The July 2 edition of Slate’s “What Next” podcast, “Is This the End of NPR and PBS?” began its argument for continuing to fund public television and radio with an ancient 1969 clip of Fred Rogers testifying before Congress. Before being officially introduced, guest Brian Stelter, CNN media analyst and all-around defender of the legacy media, was heard calling the clip “mesmerizing.”
Podcast host Mary Harris: I called up Brian Stelter, the media analyst at CNN, because this footage is so unlike anything we’re seeing this year when once again, conservatives have put public media on the chopping block.
Defunding NPR and PBS isn't ending them. Stelter reminisced about the good old days of congressional hearings (dominated by Democrats) in the Sixties.
Brian Stelter, CNN’s “Reliable Sources”: That hearing back then, it was a truly good-faith discussion. It’s what I think we grew up being told congressional hearings were actually about versus the reality of what they are now in a polarized America.
So it's not "reality" that PBS has a dramatic liberal bias? For one, PBS displays it by putting on Brian Stelter and no conservative media critics. After a clip of Rogers reciting lyrics to a song for children about controlling one’s feelings:
Harris: Back in 1969, it took just six minutes for Mr. Rogers to win his audience over. As soon as he was done reciting those lyrics, his funding seemed to be secured.
So enamored with Rogers they were, they skipped right over the blatant "transphobia" from one of Rogers’ other recitations.
Fred Rogers: ….for a girl can be someday a lady and a boy can be someday a man.
Harris continued the mawkish approach.
Harris: Do you feel like there’s going to be any kind of Mr. Rogers moment this time around?
Stelter: No. The short answer is no, and the longer answer is no because there’s no figure like him. There’s no desire to hear from a figure like him. There’s very little desire to have preconceived notions and impressions and assumptions challenged….
But digging up old Mister Rogers clips misses the source of conservative anger, which is directed at the political lean of PBS news programming, not an ancient feud with the children’s show Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, which went off the air in 2001.
Stelter laid out the details of Trump’s efforts to strip funding from PBS and NPR via a “rescissions package” by July 18, before a history lesson regarding the creation of public broadcasting in the late 1960s. Stelter offered up his own approximation of what conservatives think of PBS and NPR -- a little overwrought but basically accurate.
Stelter: If you’re a part of the MAGA movement. You believe PBS and NPR are part of a liberal agenda to undermine what you believe is right and just in America. You believe the PBS NewsHour exists to get Democrats elected and to get Republicans out of office. You believe NPR is pushing a transgender agenda and hurting children. You believe that all of this programming is fundamentally against your way of life.
There is a narrative against public media that is very loud and convincing. And even though I think it does not hold up to scrutiny, there’s a lot of evidence to the contrary of everything I just said, you know [frustrated noise] that’s where we are.
But Stelter transformed the perfectly mainstream push to cut taxpayer funding from PBS and NPR into a sinister quest by President Trump to squelch dissent, an idea he delivered over doleful piano tones:
Stelter: ….And that’s part of a much broader push that we’re seeing against the American news media. Trump wants people to trust Trump. He doesn’t want other sources of information. He doesn’t want people watching 60 Minutes. He doesn’t want people trusting ABC or the New York Times. If he could, he would sue them, and he’s already sued some of them. So this push against public media, it’s part of a broader attempt to strip away independent arbiters of what is true and real and reliable….
Those outlets are just as liberal as PBS and NPR, so wouldn’t it be natural for Trump or conservatives not to trust them as well? But in Stelter Land, the most flagrantly liberal outlets are the definition of "independent arbiters."
