That quote comes from former Washington Post Managing Editor Phil Bennett, now a Duke professor, on why he believes public broadcasting is indispensible and should be preserved in the federal budget. His nose-in-the-air elitist view comes in a Duke Chronicle story about the House vote that, among other things, defunded public broadcasting as part of $60 billion in cuts to begin attacking the monstrous deficit.
The House bill will now go to the Senate where Democrats have said they will not agree with all of the substantive cuts. From there, it could reach the White House where Obama has already threatened a veto. Phil Bennett, Eugene C. Patterson professor of the practice of journalism and public policy and former managing editor of The Washington Post, acknowledged that as long as the deficit remains as large as it does he could not imagine CPB coming out unscathed, but he added that the industry offers an indispensable service to consumers.
“When it comes to news, public media is the eye of the storm,” Bennett said. “It’s the calm, credible [and] intelligent censor of an increasingly chaotic news landscape. The richness of the discussion, of news coverage and of analysis [of] public television and public radio provides a very important news function.”
Apparently Americans have too few sources of news, too little intellect and common sense, and lots and lots of cash. No. No. And no.
