PBS and NPR should never have received public funding

Congress has been mulling the future of publicly-funded television and radio. Here’s a spoiler alert: that funding is toast.

There is no way a Republican-controlled House and Senate will keep pouring money into networks they believe hate them. They know that hatred is warmly reciprocated.

The debate about partisan bias at PBS and NPR is important – the bias itself is obvious – but that’s not the most important point. What matters most is that democratic governments have no business funding or controlling news channels directed at their own citizens. Those channels should be privately owned and operated. Every single one. They should not only be private: they should be beyond the scope of government censorship and intimidation, the kind the Biden administration exerted on social media giants during Covid.

Why is it important to end public ownership of radio and TV networks? Because that is the best way to encourage robust debate about public policies. In a constitutional democracy like ours, the proper role of a government is to foster that public debate by 

• Providing as much information as possible;
• Avoiding the suppression of differing views unless they violate the law; and
• Letting citizens and their elected representatives control the discourse without government interference, except to enforce the law

To facilitate that debate, public officials have a core responsibility: they should share information that citizens need. They should except only disclosures that would violate personal privacy or harm national security or ongoing law-enforcement operations. No one argues about this exception on privacy grounds. No one says those people abused by Jeffrey Epstein should be harmed again by the FBI releasing their names.

There is much more debate, however, when the secrecy involves national security or law enforcement. The issue here is that the reasonable requirement for some secrecy gives bureaucrats and public officials an excuse to go much further, to keep almost everything secret, including information the public is entitled to see.

It’s hardly surprising that government officials take that extra step. It’s one way of keeping power and avoiding oversight. That’s why presidents, their aides and executive agencies routinely “over classify” documents and prevent their disclosure. They misuse legitimate security concerns to prevent investigation by Congress and the public.

Both over-classification and public funding for radio and television channel are ways that government officials amplify their power by controlling the flow of information. This excessive control harms democracy because citizens need good information to make informed choices. Newspapers, networks and websites providing that information and opinion should be beyond the scope of government control.

This principle applies only to publicly-funded channels directed at domestic audiences. Others, designed specifically to reach audiences abroad, are legitimate elements of American foreign policy. The issues for them are whether the channels are really aiding US policy and whether they are worth the cost. If the US government wants to broadcast news to Cuba and the money is well spent, go right ahead.

These issues about publicly-funded news are different from those affecting educational programs. There is a long-standing consensus that education is a public responsibility and that a good education should be available free, at least through high school. That consensus began with free public schools for younger children and was later extended through grade 12. It has now been extended even further to include subsidies for higher education and loans for students in college, graduate schools and professional training, though the scope of that support (and the integrity of that education) are hotly debated.

The US did have an educational TV network in the 1950s and 60s, but that ended long ago. The National Educational Television began in 1952 as more families bought small black-and-white sets for their living rooms and wanted programs for their baby-boom kids. That network was replaced in 1970 by PBS, which included some children’s programming but had a far different focus. The network’s change of name reflected its change of purpose. The question now is two-fold: why should taxpayers fund that new purpose, which is mostly entertainment, and why should they fund news coverage at all? 

The same two questions apply to public radio, which never had much educational content. For years, it has essentially been a liberal and progressive alternative to conservative talk radio, which thrived solely on private stations. If listeners and advertisers want to fund a progressive alternative, they should do so on their own dime. There’s no excuse for dunning taxpayers or putting the government’s official imprimatur on those stations. 

By contrast, public funding for educational content is perfectly fine, whether it’s done at federal, state or local level. But it may not be necessary. Today, it’s easy to find that content free on the internet or syndicated on various channels, both commercial and non-profit. That market will content to grow as home schooling expands.

If public radio and television are not providing much educational content, what’s the rationale for tax dollars to fund them? Why should taxpayers underwrite talk shows, mysteries or costume dramas? Those programs are not a public responsibility.

The real problem, though, is not a broadcast schedule filled with talk shows and entertainment. Nor is it the cost to taxpayers to sustain PBS and NPR. It’s not even the problem of bias, obvious as that is. The real problem is that a democratic government should not sponsor news programs directed at its own citizens. Cut the funding and sell the stations to the highest bidder.