The US Needs Better Public Media
A new form of public media in this country should be created to keep the people elected to serve in government and other people who hold immense power in this country accountable.
Among other American deficiencies obfuscated under the rubric of “exceptionalism” is the lack of public, or national, media and broadcasting. Most countries have some form of this public-service oriented concept, perhaps none more famous than the UK with its BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation). The idea is simple: collect funds in the form of a small tax or a licensing-fee that would then be used to fund and operate an independent news or media entity.
While the US does supposedly have some public media, most notably the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) and National Public Radio (NPR), most of their budgets do not come from government funds; they instead come from a combination of membership fees, donations, grants, and underwriting spots or advertisements. While this does make their incentives slightly different from the for-profit media industry whose entire business model is mostly reliant on selling advertisements, public media in the US is still ultimately beholden to private interests in the form of philanthropy. (Political scientist Rob Reich and journalist…
