James Poniewozik offers a critique in the latest TIME of James O’Keefe’s recent hit piece on NPR.
For the purposes of this entry, we’ll ignore the shaky argument that O’Keefe’s selective editing differs substantially from most of what runs daily in the New York Times.
Instead, I’d like to highlight the following excerpt, using another bit of selective editing:
There are plenty of valid arguments you could make against public-media funding without being misleading: that donors can pick up the slack, that there are far more media options today, that NPR and PBS are boutique products we can’t afford. There are plenty of valid counterarguments: that it’s a tiny sliver of the budget, that private markets don’t always pay for important news coverage, that cuts will hit rural red-state audiences far harder than urban elites.
While this list of arguments is not necessarily exhaustive, it’s hard to believe the pro-NPR arguments could carry the day. Poniewozik says he wants an “argument on honest terms.” He should be careful about expressing that wish.
