THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, December 28, 1994 TAG: 9412280422
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: Medium: 63 lines
Newt Gingrich and his camp aim to gut federal aid for public broadcasting.
By raising sponsors' fees, public broadcasting could operate without government help, they assert.
Their bland reassurances recall the feigning of fairness by members of the Virginia General Assembly as they are about to kill a bill through ``the shad treatment.''
They liken the treatment to somebody holding the shad under the blade in his hand and saying: ``Don't worry, little fish. All I'm going to do is disembowel you.''
That is what Gingrich and Co. want to do to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which they call ``biased and elitist.''
It is neither. It is a model for conveying information in an impartial, enlightening way.
What some right-wingers regard as non-biased are ranting talk-show hosts spouting personal agendas. Or cable TV panelists wrangling over issues, shouting each other down, a bedlam of fractious brats.
They are to journalism what professional wrestlers are to sports, a free-for-all of amateur hams.
For calm, rational analysis listen on public radio each Friday at 8 p.m. to Washington Week in Review as five working newspaper reporters from a stable of two dozen or so discuss the week's news.
There are no former office-holders, or jobless political hacks, syndicated pundits, flaks for perennial candidates or erstwhile campaign managers such as populate the airwaves, teeming roaches skittering on the floor when the light goes on.
On Washington Week, honest-to-God newsgatherers offer the fruits of a week's harvest on Capitol Hill.
And tune each weekday at 7 p.m. to MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour as it pits congressmen from opposing sides to discuss a bill or, if it reaches into a think tank for a grouper, it finds one of an opposing view from another tank.
It offers authorities from universities, foundations, business, industry, unions, all walks of life. They are experts, not elitists.
The other night foreign aid was explored on MacNeil/Lehrer.
On one side was Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell with a bill to reshape foreign aid. Of his mind at times was Alan Keyes of the Heritage Foundation.
Opposite were Brian Atwood of the U.S. Agency of International Development, which McConnell would ban. Alongside was Catherine Gwin of the Overseas Development Council. She saw common ground for McConnell and Atwood.
Viewers get insight into foreign aid. At least, in such debates, they learn an issue cannot be dismissed by a bellowing talk-show host. Congress created Public Broadcasting in 1967 to assure more variety in programming. Right-wingers contend cable TV now fills that void.
But, with the exception of C-Span, cable TV debates tend to be more similar than diverse. Public broadcasting still leads the lot in pioneering news, children's shows, drama, imports. It deserves our support.
What bothers its foes is not bias. They fear the light of the truth. MEMO: The published version of this story in the Final edition did not contain
the last sentence. by CNB