So, many people are calling for the defunding of NPR. After all, why
should Americans have to pay for something that's so fundamentally
anti-American?

Let's face it: they didn't fire Juan Williams for expressing an
independent opinion, they fired Juan Williams for expressing an
independent opinion that didn't jibe with theirs. And it was worse,
because he did it on Fox News - two words that bring a pained sneer
across the faces of the already contorted NPR listener.

But, hell, everyone can see NPR's duplicity. They never police their
lefty employees, and suddenly, Juan Williams is fired? If it wasn't
because of his views, what was it then? Was it because he's black? Or
because he's black and didn't do what he was told?

Anyway, I'm one of the few to say, keep funding NPR.

Because if we don't, they go away.

And we can't have that. We need them around to remind ourselves what
subsidized failure looks like. As long as NPR drones listlessly on, we
can point to it and say, "yeah, we're letting them live."

It's like allowing the drunk at the pub to wipe down the tables for
pocket change. It's more out of pity, than anything.

Which leads me to that thing with Rachel Maddow. Remember, she accused
a man of having advanced knowledge of the Oklahoma bombing. When
exposed for her error, she blamed it on an "editing" mistake - and
then angrily mocked those who corrected her.

If you want to see the face of the angry and the entitled, that was
it. How else can you explain someone assuming her mistakes are above
reproach?

But hey - what do you expect from someone who had a heads-up on 9/11?

(I kid, Rachel - we'll fix that in edit)

And if you disagree with me, you're a racist, homophobic, editphobe.

http://dailygut.com/

...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, CTO | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |

I love to cook with wine. Sometimes I even put it in the food.

"flipper" wrote in message
...
Fact of the matter is, even without consulting the Constitution there
is no compelling reason whatsoever for government to fund NPR.

NPR actually obtains the vast majority of its funding from non-government
sources these days (what does come from the government mostly comes through
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) -- this might explain while they
figure it's OK if they're clearly a bit liberally biased these days --, so I
expect that if you completely removed government funds most of the stations
would still survive. Indeed, this was tried during the '70s and '80s, weaning
them off of goverment funds... but it looked like they really were about to
die completely in 1983 -- having amassed a $7M debt -- and that was some
shuffling of people and policies (and restored government funding) to keep
them around -- presumably with at least a bit of tacit approval from the
reigning Reagan administration.

Clearly popular conservative talk shows like Rush Limbaugh's far overstrip
anything NPR has to offer in terms of the number of listeners and revenue.

All of this started back in 1967 -- LBJ's administration -- with the Public
Broadcasting Act. Quoting from Wikipedia
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_..._Act_of_1967):

---
When Lyndon B. Johnson signed the act into law on November 7, 1967, he
described its purpose:

It announces to the world that our Nation wants more than just material
wealth; our Nation wants more than a "chicken in every pot"[1]. We in America
have an appetite for excellence, too. While we work every day to produce new
goods and to create new wealth, we want most of all to enrich man's spirit.
That is the purpose of this act.[2]
More concretely:

It will give a wider and, I think, stronger voice to educational radio and
television by providing new funds for broadcast facilities. It will launch a
major study of television's use in the Nation's classrooms and their potential
use throughout the world. Finally - and most important - it builds a new
institution: the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
---

More recently, the CPB has been used for "technology trials" as well -- it's
no accident that in many smaller venues the public radio stations are the only
ones broadcasting in so-called "HD radio:" They were given a grant to change
over their transmitters, to "demonstrate" HD radio's (really not that great)
technology and hence try to expedite its adoption by commercial radio
stations.

---Joel

On Mon, 1 Nov 2010 11:10:38 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
wrote:

"flipper" wrote in message
.. .
Fact of the matter is, even without consulting the Constitution there
is no compelling reason whatsoever for government to fund NPR.

NPR actually obtains the vast majority of its funding from non-government
sources these days (what does come from the government mostly comes through
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) -- this might explain while they
figure it's OK if they're clearly a bit liberally biased these days --, so I
expect that if you completely removed government funds most of the stations
would still survive.

I think you're wrong. Most of NPR's funding is via operation by
universities... OUR tax funds via a different route.

I don't see any reason for publicly funded universities.

Fund education via [competitive] scholarships.

As for PBS, nothing fit to watch except during "gimme" campaigns.

[snip]

...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, CTO | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |

I can see Election Results and Dismembered Democrats :-)

Joel Koltner wrote:

"flipper" wrote in message
...
Fact of the matter is, even without consulting the Constitution there
is no compelling reason whatsoever for government to fund NPR.

NPR actually obtains the vast majority of its funding from non-government
sources these days (what does come from the government mostly comes through
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) -- this might explain while they
figure it's OK if they're clearly a bit liberally biased these days --, so I
expect that if you completely removed government funds most of the stations
would still survive. Indeed, this was tried during the '70s and '80s, weaning
them off of goverment funds... but it looked like they really were about to
die completely in 1983 -- having amassed a $7M debt -- and that was some
shuffling of people and policies (and restored government funding) to keep
them around -- presumably with at least a bit of tacit approval from the
reigning Reagan administration.

Clearly popular conservative talk shows like Rush Limbaugh's far overstrip
anything NPR has to offer in terms of the number of listeners and revenue.

All of this started back in 1967 -- LBJ's administration -- with the Public
Broadcasting Act. Quoting from Wikipedia
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_..._Act_of_1967):

---
When Lyndon B. Johnson signed the act into law on November 7, 1967, he
described its purpose:

It announces to the world that our Nation wants more than just material
wealth; our Nation wants more than a "chicken in every pot"[1]. We in America
have an appetite for excellence, too. While we work every day to produce new
goods and to create new wealth, we want most of all to enrich man's spirit.
That is the purpose of this act.[2]
More concretely:

It will give a wider and, I think, stronger voice to educational radio and
television by providing new funds for broadcast facilities. It will launch a
major study of television's use in the Nation's classrooms and their potential
use throughout the world. Finally - and most important - it builds a new
institution: the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
---

More recently, the CPB has been used for "technology trials" as well -- it's
no accident that in many smaller venues the public radio stations are the only
ones broadcasting in so-called "HD radio:" They were given a grant to change
over their transmitters, to "demonstrate" HD radio's (really not that great)
technology and hence try to expedite its adoption by commercial radio
stations.


On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
listen to them.


--
Politicians should only get paid if the budget is balanced, and there is
enough left over to pay them.

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
m...
On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
listen to them.

Indeed. As with HDTV, it seems that HD radio was rolled out a bit too quickly
without enough field trials or good engineering behind it (i.e., HDTV doesn't
handle multi-path distortion very well, HD radio doesn't handle picket
fencing -- as commonly experienced in an automobile! -- very well). It's
actually rather fantastic when you consider that the FCC handed a monopoly on
the technology to one company (iBiquity) for all time -- every single HD radio
receiver and transmitter made requires royalty payments to iBiquity.

That being said, for city dwellers, at least in a stationary environment HD
radio is a nice little upgrade to traditional AM/FM.

---Joel

Joel Koltner wrote:

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
m...
On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
listen to them.

Indeed. As with HDTV, it seems that HD radio was rolled out a bit too quickly
without enough field trials or good engineering behind it (i.e., HDTV doesn't
handle multi-path distortion very well, HD radio doesn't handle picket
fencing -- as commonly experienced in an automobile! -- very well). It's
actually rather fantastic when you consider that the FCC handed a monopoly on
the technology to one company (iBiquity) for all time -- every single HD radio
receiver and transmitter made requires royalty payments to iBiquity.

That being said, for city dwellers, at least in a stationary environment HD
radio is a nice little upgrade to traditional AM/FM.


Sure, if you want 57 stations with the same talk radio.


--
Politicians should only get paid if the budget is balanced, and there is
enough left over to pay them.

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
m...
Sure, if you want 57 stations with the same talk radio.

At least it'll scroll the name of the talking head across the radio's display?
:-)

Fred Abse wrote:

On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:47:12 -0400, Michael A. Terrell wrote:

? On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
? listen to them.

WTF is HD radio, anyway?

I can understand high definition images, but sound?



Marketing hype for another overpriced and unwanted technology.


--
Politicians should only get paid if the budget is balanced, and there is
enough left over to pay them.

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
...
Fred Abse wrote:
WTF is HD radio, anyway?
Marketing hype for another overpriced and unwanted technology.

It's wanted by the folks who stand to profit from it. :-)

Interesting history -- if of course rather slanted, being on a web site called
"StopIBOC.Com"! -- he http://stopiboc.com/ibocstory.html

On Tue, 2 Nov 2010 11:15:00 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
wrote:

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
...
Fred Abse wrote:
WTF is HD radio, anyway?
Marketing hype for another overpriced and unwanted technology.

It's wanted by the folks who stand to profit from it. :-)

Interesting history -- if of course rather slanted, being on a web site called
"StopIBOC.Com"! -- he http://stopiboc.com/ibocstory.html



Don't know that it matters. Internet radio is where the action is...
I have 18 presets from all over the world :-)

...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, CTO | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |

Make the world a better place, dismember a Democrat.

On Tue, 02 Nov 2010 09:45:35 -0700, Fred Abse
wrote:

On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:47:12 -0400, Michael A. Terrell wrote:

On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
listen to them.

WTF is HD radio, anyway?

I can understand high definition images, but sound?

AM radio for audio-phools :-)

...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, CTO | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |

I can see Election Results and Dismembered Democrats :-)

"Fred Abse" wrote in message
news
WTF is HD radio, anyway?

I can understand high definition images, but sound?

The official (iBiquity, courtesy of CEO Bob Struble) party line is that HD
stands for "nothing at all" -- although some people claim that early-on it
officially stood for "high definition" (gee, 'ya think?) or "hybrid digital"
(since it's transmitted simultaneously with the traditional analog signals).
In fact, there's some law firm trying hard to drum up a lawsuit against
iBiquity, and one of their claims is that consumers were misled to think "HD"
implies "high definition" audio quality when, in actuality, the quality on FM
is not always that much better than a good analog FM signal. (The chances of
this lawsuit ever going forward are pretty much nil IMO, though.)

HD Radio has something like 300kbps total -- probably about half that after
error-coding/control channel info is subtraced -- and use some kissing
cousin-of the AAC codec. Now, ~128kbps AAC actually sounds quite good... but
then they added [initally] a 2nd and 3rd channel and these days they can
support up to 7 channels... so every additional channel they add (if a station
chooses to use them -- and from an advertising revenue point of view, many do)
compromises the quality of the main ["HD1"] channel.)

---Joel

On Tue, 02 Nov 2010 09:45:35 -0700, Fred Abse wrote:
On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:47:12 -0400, Michael A. Terrell wrote:

On the bright side, there aren't people screaming to buy HD radios to
listen to them.

WTF is HD radio, anyway?

I can understand high definition images, but sound?

I think "HD" is just the latest marketing hype - I recently saw an ad for
"HD" sunglasses. ?:-/

Cheers!
Rich

On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 02:33:22 -0500, flipper wrote:
On Sun, 31 Oct 2010 11:07:59 -0700, Jim Thompson

So, many people are calling for the defunding of NPR. After all, why
should Americans have to pay for something that's so fundamentally
anti-American?

That shouldn't be a consideration. Freedom of the Press, you know.

Freedom of the press, sure, but NOT ON MY DIME!

In other words, don't confiscate my money (i.e., tax) to pay a bunch
of socialist propagandists to spew their redistributionist dogma. Let
them spew their dogma at their OWN expense, not mine.

Thanks,
Rich

On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:23:15 -0500, flipper wrote:
On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 10:45:16 -0700, Rich Grise
On Mon, 01 Nov 2010 02:33:22 -0500, flipper wrote:
On Sun, 31 Oct 2010 11:07:59 -0700, Jim Thompson

So, many people are calling for the defunding of NPR. After all, why
should Americans have to pay for something that's so fundamentally
anti-American?

That shouldn't be a consideration. Freedom of the Press, you know.

Freedom of the press, sure, but NOT ON MY DIME!

In other words, don't confiscate my money (i.e., tax) to pay a bunch
of socialist propagandists to spew their redistributionist dogma. Let
them spew their dogma at their OWN expense, not mine.

And in the parts you snipped out I said there is no compelling reason
for government to fund NPR so you are arguing to no purpose.

Yeah, OK, I reacted first thing; but if you're going to say something
inflammatory like that, it'd be polite to give the disclaimers first.

Thanks,
Rich