You’ve got to be completely clueless and totally out of touch not to know that the Public Broadcasting System has a decidedly liberal slant when it comes to programs that touch in any way on politics. Then again…there’s the New York Times:

The Republican chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is aggressively pressing public television to correct what he and other conservatives consider liberal bias, prompting some public broadcasting leaders – including the chief executive of PBS - to object that his actions pose a threat to editorial independence.

Without the knowledge of his board, the chairman, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, contracted last year with an outside consultant to keep track of the guests’ political leanings on one program, “Now With Bill Moyers.”

PBS has been a liberal sacred cow almost since its inception. And while some of its non-political programming – including science shows like “Nova” and “Nature” – as well as its broadcast of the theater and music programs have made invaluable contributions to excellence in broadcasting, only the most willfully self-deluded would argue that its political programming is anything but a recitation of liberal themes and dogmas.

The Bill Moyers show was a perfect example. While Moyers occasionally had conservative guests on his interview show, the questions he asked were of the “How many times did you beat your wife today” variety. Conversely, liberal guests receive the gushy treatment with Moyers carrying on colloquies with guests where the guided conversation could have been lifted out whole and made into a Democratic Party campaign commercial.

The coordinated attack on Mr. Tomlinson by people inside the PBS family is to be expected. After all, these are the same people that sold lists of PBS financial contributors to the Democratic Party. And why not? Surveys show that PBS viewers are more supportive of Democratic positions on the environment, on education, and a whole litany of other liberal causes.

So it should come as no surprise that Mr. Thomlinson’s efforts to bring some balance to the network’s leftward tilt would meet fierce resistance:

Pat Mitchell, president and chief executive of PBS, who has sparred with Mr. Tomlinson privately but till now has not challenged him publicly, disputed the accusation of bias and was critical of some of his actions.

“I believe there has been no chilling effect, but I do think there have been instances of attempts to influence content from a political perspective that I do not consider appropriate,” Ms. Mitchell, who plans to step down when her contract expires next year, said Friday.

Why isn’t it appropriate when the PBS charter requires “balance?”

The corporation is a private, nonprofit entity financed by Congress to ensure the vitality of public television and radio. Tension is hardwired into its charter, where its mandate to ensure “objectivity and balance” is accompanied by an exhortation to maintain public broadcasting’s independence. Mr. Tomlinson said that in his view, objectivity and balance meant “a program schedule that’s not skewed in one direction or another.” Some corporation board members say that complaints about ideological pressure are premature.

Bill Moyers (who left “Now” earlier last year and now hosts another PBS show “Wide Angle”) is not the only blatantly leftist program on the network. The relentlessly liberal “POV” that highlights “independent” filmmakers almost uniformly deals with issues that highlight leftist causes. And the news documentary show “Frontline” has been shown to be as biased in reporting a story as any mainstream press organ.

The “Frontline Election Special” is just one example. The program gave what were supposed to be side by side bios of both Senator Kerry and President Bush. What emerged was a breathtaking model of bias so one sided that it’s a good thing hardly anyone watched it. Not only were the snippets of Kerry invariably accompanied by flattering pictures and worshipful commentary from friends and colleagues but the focus on issues and Kerry’s position on them were from a decidedly Democratic point of view. When the “documentary” for instance, focused on Iraq, the liberation wasn’t even mentioned. Instead, the “issues” were Abu Ghraib, rising casualties, and the futility expressed by commenter after commenter.

Contrasting that portrayal of Kerry and the issues, with images of the President in the most unflattering light imaginable along with backhanded compliments (even from friends!) is what made the piece so fascinating to me. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it. It was exactly like watching a really bad movie. You just had to stick around and see how much worse it could get.

“Frontline Election Special” did not disappoint.

Recently, Tomlinson sought to have PBS stations live up to their charter in deeds as well as words by holding up the contract local stations sign with the Corporation:

Recently, PBS refused for months to sign its latest contract with the corporation governing federal financing of national programming, holding up the release of $26.5 million. For the first time, the corporation argued that PBS’s agreeing to abide by its own journalistic standards was not sufficient, but that it must adhere to the “objectivity and balance” language in the charter. In a January letter to the leaders of the three biggest producing stations, in New York, Boston and Washington, the deputy general counsel of PBS warned that this could give the corporation editorial control, infringing on its First Amendment rights and possibly leading to a demand for balance in each and every show.

As it stands now, Tomlinson can do little except fight a rear guard action on behalf of conservatives. He’s pushed to have Paul Gigot’s excellent “The Journal’s Editorial Report” featuring Wall Street Journal reporters and editors accepted going so far as assisting in lining up the private financing necessary to put it on the air. But such programming is a drop in the bucket compared to the implacable leftist slant that permeates programming on public TV.

I don’t support cutting off all funding for public television for the simple reason there are programs that simply would not find a home anywhere else in the increasingly dull uniformity of cable and satellite channels. But some reform is necessary. And Mr. Tomlinson appears to be doing the best he can.

Anytime you get liberals angry at you, you’ve got to be doing something right.

UPDATE

Jesse Taylor has some intelligent thoughts on relative bias:

PBS hosts/hosted Tucker Carlson and Paul Gigot, who just happen to also be conservative talking heads on 24-hour cable nets – the conservative presence at PBS in one fell swoop has far outstripped any liberal influence the channel might have…but it may still be infected with the dread liberalism.

MMMMM…I don’t know if I buy it. If you have 1 hour of Paul Gigot (Carlson’s show, now cancelled, was as quirky and boring as the host’s ridiculous bow ties) and 23 hours of POV, Moyers, etc. it seems like a stretch to say that the impact of someone as recognizable (?) as Paul Gigot outweighs everything else.

Then again, I’m not used to thinking like a liberal. Now, maybe if I put my tin foil hat on and adjust it like so…

UPDATE II

One more interesting note…A Technorati search reveals that out of 27 blogs posting on this NYT story, I seem to be the only conservative. C’mon guys help me out here!