Memo to Congress: Go Ahead and Kill Big Bird!

While conservative commentators such as Brent Bozell & Tim Graham , Joel Pollak and Tammy Bruce  have rallied around President Trump's call to de-fund federal cultural agencies such as PBS, NPR, and the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities, the "organs" have predictably begun their illegal scare campaigns for funding, by threatening to "kill Big Bird".

Twenty years ago I worked on this issue for the Heritage Foundation and David Horowitz, and discovered that although PBS, NPR and the cultural agencies spent much of their time and money attacking the GOP, they were protected by Republicans from budget cuts. Indeed, after Congress "zeroed-out" funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, the Senate restored it in conference--despite the "Piss Christ" fiasco

Now, twenty year later, arguments made on behalf of the cultural agencies in the 1990s are revealed to have been hollow lies. Free speech? Not so much...the NEA for some reason never funded an exhibition featuring a photograph titled "Piss Mohammed." Non-Commercial? Again, not so much, as the Muppets are owned by Disney and Sesame Street airs on HBO. Providing resources not available elsewhere? Nope. YouTube, Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Pandora, Spotify, iTunes, and podcasts of all kinds  provide free or low-cost educational programming that once was the purview of PBS. Current affairs? Sorry, Charlie, the American public has access via C-Span and a plethora of online public service options dedicated to everything from city council meetings to university lectures. Education? Available free from EdX, Coursera, OpenCulture, Harvard's Open Learning Initiative, and dozens of other providers. Children's programming? Any iPad has more educational software available than your local PBS station.

So, what do PBS, NPR and the cultural agencies provide that can't be found elsewhere? The answer is simple: political propaganda of a predictably progressive tilt, combined with lucrative paydays for politically-correct and politically-connected cadre...all wrapped in a package with British sitcoms, antiques shows, and costume dramas -- now available directly from the BBC and ITV on Britbox.com.

Add to this the realization that in some 50 years of broadcasting, Sesame Street has not eliminated the achievement gap in education--its declared purpose as a Great Society Program--there is simply no rationale other than interest group politics for the continuation of federal funding. Sesame Street may be a great business success at selling toys and other merchandise, but it has clearly and demonstrably failed in its educational mission aimed at the underprivileged.

Sadly, the impact of the twin Endowments since the GOP saved them from extinction in the 1990s has been to further the transformation of the art world and humanities into Politically Correct wastelands, phenomena documented extensively by authors like Bruce Bawer and Roger Kimball.

Bottom line: In the past 20 years, American culture has gone from bad to worse, thanks in no small part to the record of federal cultural agencies saved by the GOP in the 1990s. To begin a turnaround around, start by cutting off funding to the CPB (PBS, NPR & Pacifica), NEA & NEH, to send a strong signal that the new Administration is serious about change.  Far from fearing the charge of killing Big Bird, Republicans should embrace it, as an example of Schumpeterian "creative destruction," in order to make room for something better.

Kill Big Bird?

Go ahead, make my day.

Hillary Clinton's Fingerprints Evident on Russian Hacking Charges...

Visiting the International Spy Museum bookshop in Washington, DC a while ago, a paperback on one of the tables caught my eye. It was titled: The Plot to Hack America: How Putin's Cyberspies and Wikileaks Tried to Steal the 2016 Election. Author Malcolm Nance is a career intelligence agent who has written for The Huffington Post and heads an organization called TAPSTRI: The Terror Asymmetrics Project on Strategy, Tactics & Radical Ideology. His book was published in October 2016, before current headlines charging Russian hacking on behalf of the Trump campaign, indeed before the victor of the 2017 election had been decided. That was curious. How come I haven't seen this book mentioned in press coverage of President-Elect Trump?

I didn't read the book, I confess, but judged it by the cover, and after a quick flip of the pages decided it resembled a file produced for Hillary Clinton in another era:  Chris Lehane's "Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy" memo (originally called the "Communication Stream of Conspiracy Commerce"), which appeared during the Monica Lewinsky scandal in 1995 to discredit critics of President Clinton.

Which is to say, even without reading it, Hillary Clinton's fingerprints were all over Russian Hacking allegations, because it fit her M.O. during the Impeachment of President Clinton, a conspiratorial--dare one say Nixonian--world view in which dark forces were conspiring to undermine her. They were out to get the Democratic Nominee...

The Russia Card is America's Trump Card

Opponents of President Trump have forced the resignation of General Mike Flynn as President Trump's National Security Advisor--by playing the Russia Card.

It is the second time Russian connections have led to a resignation of a top Trump official, since Russian intrigues brought down Paul Manafort as campaign chairman shortly after Trump had secured the Republican nomination for President.

It looks like history has repeated itself.

However, the Russia Card cannot be understood out of context. In fact, the Russia Card is about more than Russia--for it is also the flip side of the Muslim Card, which Trump deployed against Hillary Clinton and President Obama.

Interestingly, Russophobes also tend to oppose Trump's travel ban, "extreme vetting," and efforts to add the Muslim Brotherhood to the list of terrorist organizations. Likewise, they expressed little public objection to the foreign connections Huma Abedin, whose parents were active in the Muslim Brotherhood, and had alleged links to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, serving as a top aide to Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, nor to the Clinton Foundations ties to repressive Islamist regimes. Nor did they object when the so-called "Arab Spring" installed Islamist governments in the Middle East.

This is not a double standard, because it is a single standard, indeed an Islamist standard--because Russia has been at war with Islamic fundamentalists since at least the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Although Islam is one of the officially recognized religions of Russia, some would say the history of Russia has been one of confrontation with Islam since the conquest of Persia in 651. In the 19th Century Tolstoy wrote about fighting Chechens in Haji Murad. They are still fighting Chechens today.

Islamist supporters play the Russian Card like this: Unable to directly defend Islamic terrorism, ISIS, or unlimited Muslim immigration to the United States, they choose to attack Russia to achieve the same ends, playing on ancient--and I believe obsolete and inappropriate--grievances.

They take advantage of lingering resentments among Republicans who are still anti-Russian because Russia was once Communist. When these Republicans see Putin, they see him a Communist commissar, a former KGB officer,  a "thug." When they see Russia, they see it as if it were still the Soviet Union--even though Russia voluntarily withdrew from its former Soviet satellites, allowed some of them to join the EU, and dissolved the USSR.

On the other side, leftist Democrats have lingering resentments that Russia rejected Communism. They are as strongly hostile to Putin as Stalin was anti-Trotsky. When they look at Putin, they see a turncoat KGB agent who sold out to capitalism, suppresses LGBT causes on behalf of Russian Orthodoxy, and who encourages the very Russian nationalism that the USSR suppressed with its "Friendship of Peoples" doctrine (Soviet multiculturalism), therefore another kind of "thug" (like Cuba calls its refugees from Communism "gusanos"--worms).

As a result Russia experiences significant enmity from both the Right and the Left sides of the American political spectrum.

Similarly, Right-wingers don't credit Russia for its support of American troops in Afghanistan, for Putin's crushing the Communist Party, or for co-operation in fighting terror--including unheeded warnings about the Boston Marathon bombers. And Left-wingers don't care that Russia enjoys good relations with China or Cuba.

Additionally, since 9/11 American strategic planners have been unwilling to undertake a full alliance with Russia against Islamist fundamentalism because of objections from Arab Gulf states, and European allies in NATO are suspicious of Russian designs in Europe.

Compounding the problem has been the taboo on public discussion of Islamist terrorism in both Europe and the United States (there is no such taboo in Russia). Since discussion of the actual enemy has been repressed, it is my belief that anti-Russian sentiments have actually been symptoms of psychological displacement--unable to criticize the actual enemies of the United States, the public has been licensed to oppose imaginary enemies, such as Russia, "Global Climate Change," Israel, and "White Privilege."

Exacerbating this phenomenon has been a US foreign policy that is totally unsuited to the dangers facing the country since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Instead of crushing Islamic extremism, America has chosen to pursue essentially an updated version of Britain's 19th Century "Great Game" in the Middle East and Central Asia, attempting to reduce Russian influence, including in Afghanistan, once a Soviet satellite, and Iraq, once a Soviet ally. Seen in that context, wars in the former Yugoslavia, Ukraine, Libya, Syria, the 'Stans of Central Asia, have privileged Islam in order to undermine Russian interests.

Unfortunately, America's strategic planners failed to realize that after the end of Communism, Russia's enemies were also America's foes. They wished to "divide and rule" by setting Russia against the United States, in order to establish an Islamic Caliphate in the contested zones.

This remarkably successful policy has led a number of previously pro-American nations to turn back to Russia for protection and support--including a number of former Soviet nations in Europe as well as Egypt, most recently. Turkey may well be joining them, unless American policy shifts dramatically--endangering NATO itself. Ironically, Britain had supported the Ottoman Empire, the "sick man of Europe," as a bulwark against Russian expansion during the 19th Century.

Today it would appear that good relations with Russia could change the dynamic of international relations in our favor, given the manifest failures of America's pro-Islamist foreign policy. With Russia as a full and equal partner in American foreign policy, the West could make short work of Islamic terror. Russia has a proven track record of success, little discussed in the USA--in Chechnya, of all places, where Putin ground Islamists to dust on the orders of Boris Yeltsin. The same sort of Russian tactics are working in Syria...just as they worked against Hitler during World War II.

That is why the Russia Card is the flip side of the Muslim Card. Attacks on Russia are support for ISIS. There is no "Third Way." There are no "Syrian Moderates." Putin is no more of a thug than American allies such as the King of Saudi Arabia, the so-called "Syrian oppostion," or the leaders of Iran who signed a deal with President Obama. Indeed, one could make the case that he is far more civilized.

While General Flynn's resignation is his own fault,  he is also a casualty of the Great Game between Islam and the West, in which Russia has played and will continue play a central historical role. No victory in this struggle is possible without Russian support. Flynn realized this, and so must any successor.

It is clear from the failure of American policies since 9/11 that only a full alliance with Russia can defeat Islamic terrorism. So after Flynn's resignation, it has become crystal clear that America is at a crossroads:

We must accept Russia as an ally in the struggle against Islamic terrorism, or surrender to an Islamic Caliphate.

Bottom line: the Russia Card is in fact America's Trump Card.
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Memo to the President-Elect: Time to Establish a Cabinet-Level US Department of Industry

It's the time of year when think-tanks, political consultants, lobbyists, corporations, unions, and NGOs are busy developing recommendations to the incoming administration which might help their cause.

Knowing that the inboxes and Twitter feed of the Trump Transition are filling up with white papers, memoranda, reports, and articles suggesting agenda items for the first 100 days, I've taken the liberty of coming up with one of my own to help Make America Great Again:

*ESTABLISH A CABINET-LEVEL US DEPARTMENT OF INDUSTRY.

Here's the rationale:

The de-industrialization of the United States did not happen by accident. Rather, it was the result of deliberate policy decisions to encourage development of a Post-Industrial Society made over at least the past half-century, based upon theories of economic development which held that as societies progress they inevitably evolve from agricultural, to industrial, to service economies in a sort of Darwinian evolution. To re-industrialize America after fifty years of Post-Industrialism will require a laser-like focus that only a Cabinet-level Department could provide.

There is ample precedent for this step: President Nixon created the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Administration; President Carter created the Department of Education; President Reagan created the Department of Veteran's Affairs and elevated the Office of National Drug Control Policy to the Cabinet; President Clinton did the same thing for the Federal Emergency Management Agency; President George W. Bush created the Department of Homeland Security.

In each case, serious issues required the attention of the President and his Cabinet--and the only way to insure that attention was with a new Department. Today's Manufacturing Crisis is obviously as severe as the Energy Crisis, the Environmental Crisis, the Education Crisis, the Veteran's Crisis, the Drug Crisis, hurricanes, fires, earthquakes, or floods, and the Terrorism Crisis after 9/11.

The almost total destruction of American Industry wasn't built in a day--it took several generations of hard work, beginning in the late 1960s, popularized by Harvard professor Daniel Bell's 1974 The Coming of Post-Industrial Society, which reflected concepts discussed in French intellectual Alain Touraine's 1971 The Post-Industrial Society. Tomorrow's Social History: Classes, Conflicts and Culture in the Programmed Society and Ivan Illich's 1973 Tools for Conviviality. 

In this manifesto, the Rousseau-like author of Deschooling Society declared his opposition to Industry:

I want to show that two-thirds of mankind still can avoid passing through the industrial age, by choosing right now a postindustrial balance in their mode of production which the hyperindustrial nations will be forced to adopt as an alternative to chaos.

Illich added:

A society committed to high levels of shared learning and critical personal intercourse must set pedagogical limits on industrial growth. 

Sound familiar? Likewise, Alain Touraine's book reads like another May '68-inspired manifesto:

A new type of society is now being formed. These new societies can be labeled post-industrial to stress how dif­ferent they are from the industrial societies that preceded them, although-in both capitalist and socialist nations­ they retain some characteristics of these earlier societies. They may also be called technocratic because of the power that dominates them. Or one can call them programmed societies to define them according to the nature of their production methods. and economic organization. This last term seems to me the most useful because it most ac­ curately indicates the nature of these societies' inner workings and economic activity. 

Finally, we have Daniel Bell's conclusion that a post-industrial society would be a "communal" society:

It seems clear to me that, today, we in America are moving away from a society based on a private-enterprise market system toward one in which the most important economic decisions will be made at the political level, in terms of consciously defined "goals" and "priorities." The dangers inherent in such a shift are familiar enough to anyone acquainted with the liberal tradition. In the past, there was an "unspoken consensus," and the public philosophy did not need to be articulated. And this was a strength, for articulation often invites trials by force when implicit differences are made manifest. Today, however, there is a visible change from market to non-market political decision-making...

...Whether such a change will represent "prog­ress" is a nice metaphysical question that I, for one, do not know how to answer. This was a society "designed" by John Locke and Adam Smith and it rested on the premises of individual­ism and market rationality in which the varied ends desired by individuals would be maximized by free exchange. We now move to a communal ethic, without that community being, as yet, wholly defined. In a sense, the movement away from governance by political economy to gover­nance by political philosophy-for that is the meaning of the shift-is a return to pre-capitalist modes of social thought. But whether this be progress or regress, it clearly makes it incumbent upon us to think more candidly and rigorously about our values, and about the kind of world we wish to live in.  

You don't have to be a sociologist or an economist to realize that the 60's intellectuals were calling for a program of de-industrialization in order to bring about socialism, although at the time they apparently didn't feel free to say so directly.

The problem seemingly, was that the working-class had become insufficiently revolutionary and too individualistic, materialistic, and competitive. In the 1960s, the American factory worker had become a problem--so the factories would have to close. To bring back that pre-industrial lifestyle...

Now comes the moment where we realize the Utopian fantasies of the socialist intellectuals were dependent upon something rather darker. For, just as in Stalin's time, or Hitler's, if you weren't going to pay workers a living wage, someone would have to do the job for free (or as close to it as possible): thus, Slave Labor.

So, the export of American jobs to realize the "Post-Industrial Society" was, like the leisurely lifestyle of the Ante-Bellum South, dependent upon the ruthless exploitation of slave labor abroad and illegal alien labor at home paid sub-standard wages. Because it might offend the sensibilities of Americans to see this, the slave system of industrial production was kept off-shore, or in the case of illegals, in the shadows--out of sight, out of mind.

However, as Milton Friedman has noted, in economics there are always trade-offs, even for a "Post-Industrial Society." In this case, one trade-off in addition to the dependence upon slavery or virtual slavery, was increasing impoverishment of what was once the world's most affluent working class...for jobs sent abroad did not recycle dollars into the American economy, did not pay taxes, and did not stimulate growth. Rather, they "milked" the existing system, transferring wealth from one place to another, with profits skimmed by the new class of "symbolic manipulators" working in the professional, technocratic, and financial sectors.

Paradoxically, the "Post-Industrial Society" turned out to be dependent upon a traditional industrial base--factories and workers--just located in other countries or illegal sweatshops. Likewise, the vaunted high-paid technical and "knowledge sector" jobs started to follow the factory jobs elsewhere.   The "Post-Industrial Society" wasn't post-industrial after all. It was in reality a slave society dependent upon an exploited working class located somewhere else, or not legally acknowledged.

Result: increasing frustration and resentment among the American population left out of the bubble economy created by what Ross Perot called a "giant sucking sound." When the numbers affected eventually hit a tipping point in 2016, the country gave Donald Trump a mandate for change.

However, to implement this mandate will be extremely difficult for President-Elect Trump. All entrenched beneficiaries of the status quo will fight very hard to protect their current privileges. That goes double for existing government departments.

Traditional "conservative" attempts to cut government frequently mean that only the hard-core "burrowed-in" opponents of change survive the RIFs in federal agencies--then work night-and-day to undermine, subvert, sabotage, block and defeat the initiatives of the new President.

That is why it is imperative to create a new Cabinet Department, reporting directly to the President, in full view of the public, dedicated to the primary mission of the Administration: Making America Great Again. New hires for this large department--which could do for American Industry what the US Department of Agriculture did for American Agriculture, all joking and complaints aside the most successful agricultural sector in the world today is American--would have what are essentially lifetime government jobs and thus be better able to continue the Trump vision long end-of-term. In this regard, the bigger the agency, the better, given the way Washington works. Like the EPA, once planted, the Department of Industry would prove difficult to uproot.

A US Department of Industry could work with both the for-profit and non-profit sectors of the country to develop the eco-system necessary to restore American industry to pride of place in the world--able to compete and beat the Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Mexicans and anyone else when it comes to productivity, quality, price, and convenience.

In addition to economic benefits, there are serious national security implications to having the US military dependent on foreign manufacturers for high-tech and often classified weaponry, control systems, and software. Long supply-lines, transit times, and vulnerable supply chains make the country susceptible to economic warfare. Domestic production could give us peace of mind--and leverage in international negotiations.

Finally, there is the sociological benefit to be derived from a focus on Industry. The "Post-Industrial Society" was also a "Leisure Society." But as Max Weber pointed out in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, that there is a moral element to capitalism, quoting Benjamin Franklin:

Remember, that time is money. He that can earn ten shillings a day by his labor, and goes abroad, or sits idle, one half of that day, though he spends but sixpence during his diversion or idleness, ought not to reckon that the only expense; he has really spent, or rather thrown away, five shillings besides.[...]Remember, that money is the prolific, generating nature. Money can beget money, and its offspring can beget more, and so on. Five shillings turned is six, turned again is seven and threepence, and so on, till it becomes a hundred pounds. The more there is of it, the more it produces every turning, so that the profits rise quicker and quicker. He that kills a breeding feline taint, destroys all her offspring to the thousandth generation. He that murders a crown, destroys all that it might have produced, even scores of pounds.

That is, the Protestant Work Ethic is both a cause and an effect of Industry. The answer to idleness, is work; the answer to poverty, is work; the answer to despair, is work.

A re-industrialized America will be an America that works, and a Department of Industry can therefore be an important catalyst to Make America Great Again. To quote Weber again:

We shall nevertheless provisionally use the expression 'spirit of capitalism' for that attitude which, in the pursuit of a calling [berufsmäßig], strives systematically for profit for its own sake in the manner exemplified by Benjamin Franklin."

And that is an old Republican struggle--dating to the battle between Free Labor in the North and Slave Labor in the South that created the Party of Lincoln. 

Even a "Never-Trumper" like Richard Lowry has pointed out Lincoln's belief in the Work Ethic on Breitbart.com:

This country needs a revival of both Lincoln’s appreciation of work and his protectiveness of its proceeds. It needs, again, to be a country where you can earn your way and where you have to earn your way. It needs to be a country–to borrow the terms Lincoln’s Whigs used to describe their electoral base–of “sober, industrious, thriving people.”

Another "Never-Trumper" even proposed establishing a Department of Business: President Barack Obama floated the concept in 2012:

Under the president's original proposal, six different commerce and trade agencies, including the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and the Export-Import Bank, would be brought under one roof. The president also said the SBA should be elevated to a Cabinet-level position. Obama blamed Congress for inaction on the proposal. 

"The reason we haven’t done that is not because of some big ideological difference," the president said in his interview, taped Saturday and aired Monday. "It has to do with Congress talking a good game about wanting to streamline government but being very protective about not giving up their jurisdiction over various pieces of government.

I bet Donald Trump could succeed where Obama failed, by fine-tuning the proposal to focus on rebuilding American Industry. He could tweet the words of President Lincoln in defense of his industrial policy:

"No country can sustain, in idleness, more than a small percentage of its numbers. The great majority must labor at something productive."

Which might be an inspirational quotation to carve in stone at the entrance to the headquarters of the US Department of Industry, when President Donald Trump cuts the ribbon on Opening Day in 2017.

One speculative postscript: Someone like Peter Thiel might make an inspiring choice for the first US Secretary of Industry.

Harvard Campaign Catfight!

Public Broadcasting v Steve Bannon

One of the more obscure aspects of the 2016 post-election season has been participation of public broadcasting, both television and radio, in personal attacks on Steve Bannon, currently chief strategist for President-Elect Donald Trump, formerly Trump Campaign CEO, and executive chair of Breitbart News Network. 

Recently, NPR Ombudsman Elizabeth Jensen proposed that the network no longer permit conservatives to be interviewed live on-air, following a Morning Edition interview with Steve Inskeep in which Breitbart senior editor Joel Pollak responded forcefully to charges against Bannon as a "white nationalist" -- with his own accusations of NPR racism. After published criticism in Breitbart News as well as elsewhere, an NPR executive announced the network would continue to interview conservatives live on-air, despite the ombudsman's recommendation. 

Not discussed was the possibility that perhaps NPR had only allowed Pollak on-air because PBS had not permitted a response to earlier attacks on their air? 



Only two days before the NPR interview, PBS Newshour had broadcast a television segment moderated by John Yang in which outgoing Minority Leader Harry Reid denounced Bannon on the Senate floor as a racist: 

SEN. HARRY REID, Minority Leader: If Trump is serious about seeking unity, the first thing he should do is rescind his appointment of Steve Bannon. Rescind it. Don’t do it. Think about this. Don’t do it. As long as a champion of racial division is a step away from the Oval Office, it will be impossible to take Trump’s efforts to heal the nation seriously.

This was followed, without rebuttal, by an interview with Bloomberg reporter Joshua Green, who stated: "Breitbart publishes a lot of things that are vaguely racist, anti-Semitic, far, far outside the bounds of what would ordinarily be considered acceptable in U.S. politics." 

Yang then joined in for himself:

JOHN YANG: You talk about Breitbart News. We have got some headlines that we can show to give people an idea of what Breitbart News is.

“Bill Kristol, Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew.”

“Gabby Giffords, The Gun Control Movement’s Human Shield.”

“The Solution to Online Harassment Is Simple: Women Should Log Off.”

How much of Breitbart is Steve Bannon, and how much of Steve Bannon is Breitbart?

In response to this list of putatively extremist headlines,  Green qualified his original attack by backpedaling slightly: "He reminded me a lot of other Wall Street bankers I have encountered, sort of testosterone-addled and vaguely sexist, but certainly not racist or anti-Semitic or some of the more serious charges we have seen thrown him and at Breitbart News." 

In other words, although Bannon supposedly published racist and anti-semitic extremist articles, Green hadn't seen any personal behavior of that sort...which somehow made Bannon sound even worse because it appeared calculated rather than sincere.

Again, there was no response from any Breitbart defender, before Yang went on to discuss the appointment of Reince Preibus as Trump's chief of staff. 

Bottom line: One segment featured three personal attacks: (1) from a clip of the Senate Democratic Leader; (2) from testimony by a Bloomberg reporter; (3) from headlines read by the moderator. 

These three accusations were permitted to air without any defense whatsoever, although PBS could have invited pro-Bannon journalists to balance the critics. Therefore, one may conclude the segment had been calculated to leave an impression that Bannon was a racist, sexist, anti-Semite who ran an extremist publication, and deprive him of a right-to-reply.

Likewise, the following Friday, PBS's character assassination against Bannon continued in the weekly analysis segment featuring David Brooks and Ruth Marcus. 

Incredibly, the purportedly "conservative" analyst took pains to personally denounce Bannon even before defending an anodyne proposal for increased infrastructure spending, declaring: "Bannon is the interesting case. He is, of course — I do not approve of his news organization or his judgments..."

To which Marcus added her own insinuations of racism and anti-Semitism: "I’m kind of having a hard time seeing the Steve Bannon silver lining here, even with a big infrastructure program, because his Web site and his own history has been so divisive, so hurtful to people of — minorities, people of other faiths. I think having somebody like that in the White House — I understand, to the victor go the spoils, but bringing someone like that inside the White House who you’re going to be listening to is a bad thing."

Yet neither Brooks nor Marcus cited a single example of supposed prejudice from Bannon or Breitbart News, nor did Woodruff ask them to back up their characterization of Bannon with evidence, an indication that she accepted them.

In conclusion, it is clear that the PBS Newshour's recent unfair treatment of allegations against Steve Bannon violated legal requirements that public broadcasting adhere to objectivity and balance in all matters of public controversy, a commitment reiterated in a CPB Board resolution of November 19, 2002:

CPB Board Reaffirms Commitment to Objectivity and Balance 

Unanimously

WHEREAS,

It is especially important in these extraordinary times for public broadcasting to provide information to the public about issues of national import in a manner that represents multiple points of view; and

WHEREAS,

The Public Broadcasting Act recognizes the need to treat subjects of a controversial nature in a fair and balanced way. (47 U.S.C. 396(g)(1)(A))

NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED,

That the Board of Directors hereby reaffirms its commitment to carrying out this mandate; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED,

That CPB Management must ensure that programming CPB funds comports with this statutory mandate. Management also must continue to work with the system to collectively ensure that all programming is produced in a manner consistent with the high editorial standards that the public expects of public broadcasting.

Resolution Date: 

Tuesday, November 19, 2002

Filed Under: 

Objectivity and Balance.

One first step to remedy this problem might be replacement of David Brooks as a conservative analyst with a Breitbart News editor, as well as regular inclusion of Breitbart News reporters in the PBS Newshour's roster of hosts, moderators and guests.