I once always woke to Morning Edition, but I haven't heard a morning broadcast in many years.

I'm wll past missing NPR

and no one else, that was the only review of Obama's speech last night.


Awful, really just awful. If it wasn't for Car Talk and A Prairie Home Companion, I'd be done with them forever.

It has become unlistenable.

Garrison has come back from his health scare as good as ever. Patty Griffin was excellent on PHC a while back.

First of all, there are many programs that you simply wouldn't be able to get anywhere else if NPR weren't in the picture. Prairie Home Companion, This American Life, even the classical music and jazz wouldn't be universally available.

Second, while I agree that the two main news shows, All Things Considered and Morning Edition, have moved to the right, other news shows are still distinctly left wing. This American Life was on top of the entire mortgage/credit default swaps that brought about this recession well before any other news outlet, and explained it all in perfect detail. Bob Edwards continues to be an excellent voice of reason on the left, and programs like To the Best of Our Knowledge tackle social issues in a manner found nowhere else.

Third, have you checked out the other news outlets around? I don't know about you, but on the radio you have Fox News, the standard hate radio, ABC News(Fox lite), and blathering morning DJ's who only interrupt the stupidity they're spewing for one of the many, many commercials that they play. As far as music goes, gagghhh, top forty pop, country, oldies, easy listening, no thanks.

Yeah, NPR has moved to the right over the past decade, mainly because Bushboy decided to play political football with it and install his own sycophant at the top, a move that hasn't been corrected. But far and away, NPR is better than other offerings on the AM and FM dial, especially in smaller markets.

In many areas NPR is the closest thing to sanity on the radio dial. When I'm on the road NPR stations are an oasis in the abyss of hate radio, cookie cutter music formats and lame sports talk. They're still the best radio source for international coverage and many NPR affiliates offer quality local programming. I'm fortunate to have two very good NPR stations...one from Chicago and Wisconsin Public Radio that offer excellent talk and local news programming.

Also keep in mind that a good chunk of public radio funding comes from state governments as much as from the CPB. With so many rushpublicans in control on the state level and funding already at low levels many of the red state NPR stations can and will shy away from controversial content and try to placate the powers that be.

Cheers...

Agreed... Stephen Inskeep and Scott Simon notwithstanding.

On balance it is one of the better sources for information out there. On occasion they can be very good...

Know why? Because you own it. You can make it better. But you've got to do it from the ground up; get control away from all the right wingers and limousine liberals that rule the roost at the local member stations. Stop complaining about how awful NPR is, and go volunteer at your local public radio station. Make it better.

My local volunteerism will make absolutely no difference to those who decide how to frame news stories on nationally run news programs. Bush broke NPR and the people in charge at the network level are now charting a course towards Fox lite.

In the era of Internet radio ther are other alternatives to the increasingly biased propaganda coming from NPR.

Once that money stopped they stopped talking about Diabetes

My other choices would be Rush, hannity and the others. NPR is not Fox.

I don't get to listen all that often, but even when listening to All Things Considered recently, it seemed like a significantly more balanced presentation than any other talk radio network on the air. Take that away and there's pretty much nothing left that any rational person could even come close to listening to.