My PBS story

Terpsboy has a post today about how PBS plans to hire that humorless, no-talent hack Bryant Gumbel for some show. Apparently, PBS felt they weren't presenting enough left-wing bias with Bill Moyers.

Here's a confession: I used to give money to my local PBS and NPR stations. It wasn't just temporary insanity – I had a good reason. In 1997, I was so impressed by a Frontline special called "Once Upon a Time in Arkansas" about the Clintons' shady land deals, that I opened my checkbook wide. (Plus, my young kids were watching "Barney" and "Dragon Tales" at all hours). At the time, I thought maybe PBS wasn't a hopeless bastion of liberal thought.

Then, all the old stereotypes about public television resurfaced in 1999 when it was revealed that PBS stations were sharing donor lists with (as CNN noted) "partisan groups -- usually branches of the Democratic Party or groups associated with Democratic causes." That was the end of my charity.

To this day, I still get letters from the local PBS station. Even worse, I get solicitations from groups like the ACLU and, true or not, I'm convinced my name got on their list via PBS. So pay heed to this warning: let the buyer beware because a zebra doesn’t change its spots. Something like that.