I have never been a morning tv person. To this day, the only famous American morning anchor I know is Katie Couric, and it has to be at least three years since she quit Today. Instead, I grew up with the sound of the BBC "pips", the Greenwich Time Signal which marks the precise start of the hour on Radio 4, and a vastly different program, which coincidentally is also called the Today show, but which offers content of a somewhat higher caliber.
Arriving in the States, back in 2000, I searched for something equivalent to wake up to, and to get me prepped for the day. It may be rabid nationalism, but in my opinion it is hard to equal the BBC as a news source. CNN is pretty good domestically, but fails miserably to cover international events in any kind of detail. The major national papers (for me, this means the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal) do a great job, but I can't digest quite so much print early in the morning. Surfing the net at 7am for the online versions of these (or anything else) is also not my deal - I need coffee before I can log on.
And so it was that I found my way to NPR. My relationship with public radio goes back to an earlier stint in the States, when I briefly lived in Florida. It was then that I was first sucked into the vortex. There is a weird relationship (chronicled brilliantly in Slate, earlier this year) between public radio and its listeners. We fear that it may disappear, and so, reluctantly we provide dollar support, to ensure that the mad eclectic mix of news, politics, music, car talk, sports and intellectual quiz shows will remain.
In Santa Cruz, the local station is KUSP. I have been listening religiously every morning since I arrived in the county. And when the call to volunteer came, I answered it.
Anyone who knows public radio, knows and hates the pledge drives. They interrupt programming, and are a blatant ask for funding dollars. In New York, I used to avoid the situation entirely by giving a monthly amount, so that I could turn off the radio during the drives with impunity. Here, since we are saving our pennies for a house downpayment and I did not plan to give, I figured that the very least I could do was answer the phones. So this morning saw me, coffee in hand, at the ready to answer an old-style rotary telephone and take pledges (in any amount), that would sustain the local station.
The death of the press, and the fragmentation of interest among consumers is being chronicled on a regular basis elsewhere. We all have a choice to make about keeping our politicians honest by ensuring the existence of the investigative press. But wherever you source your news (and there are readers of this blog who rely on fair and deeply unbalanced Fox and the National Review - you know who you are - as well as those who only watch Jon Stewart), it is incumbent upon us all to ensure the variety and richness of the sources available to us remains...
So my question to you is: Have you pledged yet? Whatever your news source is, are you truly committed? Do you subscribe? Do you watch on a regular basis? Are you listening?
Because after answering only a very few pledge calls in two hours this morning, I am concerned that regular folks have stopped paying attention. And democracy does not rest only upon the three branches of government enshrined in the U.S. constitution. It requires a fourth, the existence of a free, critical and vibrant press.
No comments:
Post a Comment