“The best remedy for this week’s public broadcasting crisis isn’t the dismantling of the ‘objectivity and balance’ firewall but the abolishment of the CPB itself,” argues Slate‘s Jack Shafer, who says public broadcasters should fund their independence from goverment dollars with a massive spectrum sell-off.

Just when you thought public broadcasting was already plenty politically-charged, here comes Tom Magliozzi to add his own two cents. The Car Talk loose cannon took time out of a trip to D.C. this week to tell the Washington Post that “George Bush is a [unprintable vulgarity].”

Big score for social conservatives: Of the nearly 200,000 responses that the Department of Education received after the controversy over lesbian parents in the PBS children’s show Postcards from Buster, the overwhelming majority came from supporters of the American Family Association, according to USA Today.

Public radio station representatives endorsed this resolution by voice vote during NPR’s annual Members Meeting of stations, May 3, 2005. The meeting lacked the quorum necessary to adopt a proposed official resolution. The proposal, offered by Tim Emmons, g.m. of Northern Public Radio in DeKalb, Ill., responded to recent news coverage about CPB activities promoting conservative programming on public TV. Whereas it is the statutory and historical role of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) to serve as a firewall between partisan politics and public broadcasting; and Whereas the Public Broadcasting Act specifically directs CPB to act “in ways that will most effectively assure the maximum freedom of the public telecommunications entities and systems from interference with, or control of, program content or other activities”; and Whereas CPB has in the past respected the First Amendment rights of broadcasters and deferred to the professional judgments of journalists; and Whereas the Public Broadcasting Act requires CPB to distribute program funds by grant rather than by contract specifically to limit CPB interference in the editorial decision-making process of public broadcasting program producers and stations; and Whereas the Public Broadcasting Act requires CPB to create and annually update a plan for the development of public telecommunications services and consult with interested parties when so doing; and Whereas CPB has recently dismissed its President and CEO under uncertain conditions; and Whereas the CPB board recently appointed two ombudsmen without consulting with the public broadcasting system, raising legitimate concerns of an institutionalized process for potential interference in content, and Whereas, such a process within a funding agency is fundamentally inconsistent with the principles of ombudsmen in reference to news organizations; It is therefore resolved that: CPB should follow statutory requirements and do nothing to diminish the firewall between the Federal funds appropriated by the Congress and the public broadcast programming it funds; and CPB should follow statutory requirements and refrain from interfering in constitutionally protected content decisions; and CPB should follow statutory requirements and, before making changes in funding priorities, should engage in a system-wide consultation about the priorities of public radio and defer to the reasonable and legitimate choices of broadcast professionals to build services of value within the local communities they serve.

From a string of news sensations over the past month journalists and progressive activists have discerned the picture of a CPB greatly in need of reform. A May 2 front-page story in the New York Times charged that CPB Chair Ken Tomlinson conducted his own outside review of Now with Bill Moyers, worked to kill a legislative proposal last year that would have required more radio and TV vets on the CPB Board and has made clear that a former co-chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, Asst. Secretary of State Patricia Harrison, is his preferred choice for the vacant CPB presidency.

CPB Board President Ken Tomlinson conducted his own outside review of Now with Bill Moyers, worked to kill a legislative proposal last year that would have required more radio and TV vets on the CPB Board and has made clear that a former co-chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, Asst. Secretary of State Patricia Harrison, is his preferred choice for the vacant CPB president post, the New York Times reports.

Are CPB’s new ombudsmen promoters of healthy journalistic discussion or unwelcome monitors now peering over reporters’ shoulders? It depends whom you ask. As longtime journalists Ken Bode and William Schulz last week issued their first reports, observers both inside and outside public broadcasting questioned their appointments. CPB officials, among others in the system, said public broadcasting will benefit from the new oversight. Bode’s and Schulz’s first missives had only minor quibbles with recent NPR reports on Iraq. It’s unclear how often the pair will review news stories — they won’t tackle non-journalistic content — or how they will split responsibilities. As independent observers, they will make all their own decisions about how to approach the job, CPB officials said.

Corporate leader and philanthropist James Barksdale, a co-chair of the PBS-appointed Digital Future Initiative, previewed his thinking in a Current commentary seven months before the long-delayed publication of the initiative’s recommendations. See also comments by initiative Co-chair Reed Hundt. In a story that has always held meaning for me, Lewis Carroll’s character Alice came to a fork in the road. Which way do I go? she wondered. The Cheshire Cat beamed down from the tree above her and asked, “Little girl, are you lost?” “Well, I just want to know which way I should go,” she said. “Well, where are you going?”

It’s a Big, Big World, a preschool science series from Mitchell Kriegman, promises to be the next big thing for PBS Kids. The series, which will launch with a major promotional push in January, “was an inspiration to us when we thought about what PBS Kids can be,” said John Wilson, PBS co-chief programmer, during the PBS Showcase meeting in Las Vegas. Kriegman, Emmy-winning creator of Disney’s Bear in the Big Blue House and Nickelodeon’s Clarissa Explains It All, unveiled the series during an April 12 [2005] breakfast at the PBS conference. “From my point of view, I’ve arrived in my career” by bringing to PBS a competitive show that will help children learn and grow, he said.

The association includes public broadcasting stations licensed to colleges and universities — largely public TV or TV/radio joint licensees. It is one of several “affinity groups” within public TV that are consulted by national organizations making policy decisions. It is a member of the Affinity Group Coalition. The association also adopted a set of Core Principles, below. Mission The mission of the University Licensee Association (ULA) is to assist public broadcasting stations licensed to colleges and universities in efforts to fulfill individual missions and goals through the sharing of ideas within the association and to speak for the special needs and interests of the licensees during times of national planning and decision-making.

“We must bring the public back into public broadcasting.” In a report outlining financial and political threats to PBS, a consortium of media reform and consumer advocacy groups proposes town-hall style meetings on public TV’s future.

A WashingtonPost.com blogger reacts to the news that “California carpetbagger” KCRW.com is promoting concerts in the D.C. area.

In a report examining CPB’s push to exert more influence on programming, NPR’s David Folkenflik links CPB Board Chairman Ken Tomlinson to controversial decisions to hire ombudsmen and to green-light Journal Editorial Report.

Pitching Cooking Under Fire as “reality TV that feeds your brain” is a “a hunk of fat-blobbed baloney that only feeds your cynicism,” writes a Boston Globe TV critic. The series, debuting tonight on most PBS stations, is “a formulaic show that merely mimics countless niche reality contests all over TV grids.”

This New York Times Q-and-A with Ken Ferree suggests that the current head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting doesn’t watch or listen to much public broad- casting. Ferree later told Current that he was a “little misportrayed” in the interview.