Why NPR Will Keep Its Funding

A reader at Commentary breaks down the radio network's funding: "A lot has been written about how the network only gets a couple million from taxpayers. This is very misleading … actually wrong. CPB gives scores of millions of dollars to NPR affiliates which, in turn, use that money to purchase NPR programming such as Morning Edition, All Things Considered, etc. …"

And that's why attempts to doom NPR will probably fail. It's one thing to say you're going to yank funding from that New York-based radio network. But who wants to be the villain who pulled dollars from High Plains Public Radio? Stations out in the Oklahoma panhandle could never be self-sufficient, but they provide a valuable public service nonetheless -- and their constituents would raise holy hell if they were lost.

The Ben and Joel Podcast: Steve Hayward

This week's podcast: "Steven F. Hayward, F.K. Weyerhauser Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, historian and author of The Age of Reagan, co-author of the annual Index of Leading Environmental Indicators, and cookbook aficionado, joins Ben and Joel for a freewheeling conversation about the coming election, the environment, and U.S. foreign policy." Click on the link to download or listen.

The Guardian's Cool iPhone App

My review of The Guardian's iPhone app: "If there’s a success story to be found among “old media” institutions adapting to the Internet Era, The Guardian must be it. The venerable British newspaper has evolved nicely, expanding its audience—and its coverage—to serve U.S. readers who went online seeking alternative news sources. Now The Guardian has moved into the mobile arena, with a $4 self-titled app that ranks among the best in the news business."

More About the Tea Party and Racism

Kevin Drum points out another finding from the Washington Post study of the Tea Party: 11 percent of members contacted admitted that Obama's race, er, colored their outlook on him. Drum observes: "The taboos against admitting that race makes a difference are pretty strong, and if 11% of the tea party groups were willing to admit this in writing, it suggests that probably at least a quarter of them have similarly overt views. Maybe more. That's a helluva lot." Indeed. Wonder if this will change Jason Riley's mind about anything.

Tom Ricks is Wrong About Wikileaks

Tom Ricks has provided some of the most valuable reportage there is about the Iraq War, but this attitude confuses me: "Maybe I'm going soft, but the Wikileaks dump kind of makes me ill. The whole situation strikes me as a bit sordid. I worry that great newspapers are getting played. If the leaks brought great revelations, I might think differently, but so far I don't think I have been surprised by a single thing I've read."

I'm always confused when a reporter seems to be arguing against making more of the record available -- particularly when the argument is, essentially, "so what?" Even if the openness doesn't redraw the broad outlines of a story, the details represented in the Wikileaks dump still offer nuance and texture to what's known. And though I consider myself relatively well-informed about the state of the war, I was still surprised -- and disgusted -- by the level of human-rights abuses committed by the new Iraqi government. I already knew that it wasn't really all that "free" in our usual understandings of the term, but did I know that Iraqi soldiers were cutting off the fingers of adversaries? No, I didn't know that. I'm glad Wikileaks let me know.

Does the Tea Party Even Exist?

The Washington Post tried to contact every single Tea Party group in the nation: "Seventy percent of the grass-roots groups said they have not participated in any political campaigning this year. As a whole, they have no official candidate slates, have not rallied behind any particular national leader, have little money on hand, and remain ambivalent about their goals and the political process in general."

All I'll note is that every time I critique positions that seem to fly under the "Tea Party" banner, I'm told the movement is too diffuse or too young or too something to criticize in conventional terms. Now I wonder if the movement is anything more than barely focused inchoate rage.

The Strikes in France

I usually think the United States could use a little more social democracy. On the other hand, I find it difficult to sympathize with union members in France who are striking to avoid raising the retirement age to 62. I mean: Retiring at 60 sounds nice. I'm not sure it's a fundamental human right.