SwiftVets.com

[PhantomSgt]

From the NPR website:

Public radio stations and producers received $86 million from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is funded by Congress (that amounts to only 30 cents per American to support local public radio stations). The appropriation from Congress accounts for only about 14 percent of the cost of operating local public radio stations, and the remaining 86 percent must be raised from a variety of sources, most importantly contributions from listeners.

My research:

Over the next three fiscal years nearly 1.2 Billion Dollars in Federal Government appropriations are destined for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting that supports through “Grants” such independent non-profit organizations such as National Public Radio (NPR), the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) and several other left leaning non-profit broadcast entities. I don’t know about you all, but I am tired of flushing this money down a toilet of disinformation and liberal bias.

The latest scandal is the outrageous treatment of Mrs. Cheney by Terry Gross on NPR.

Read the story here:

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/2/18/133724.shtml

The time is long overdue to pull Taxpayer dollars out of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and dismantle it forever.

Feel free to send a brief e-mail to your Senators and Representatives telling them how you feel about the use of your tax dollars. Need the e-mail address?

Go here for Senators on the web:

http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Or here for your Representatives:

http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml


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Retired AF E-8

Independent that leans right of center.

[Uisguex Jack]

Given time I have more than two cents to add here. I'm short on time. As some of you have 'come out of the closet' about this 'freeper' thing..... well how many of you actually worked for NPR.... I did for eight months.

More to come.... I guaranty some illumination and entertainment.

[PhantomSgt]

[GM Strong]

One of the highlights of the PBS/NPR braodcasts are the insufferable "Begathons" every few weeks pleading for your money. HellsBells, they already get enough from Uncle Sugar's trough. Better they actually make the advertising official and take the bucks. If the Libs love them they should spend their own advertising dollars and not our taxes.

The crux of it is, the reason CPB was created doesn't exist anymore. It is an anachronism and should be dropped.
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8th Army Korea 68-69

[Uisguex Jack]

Long ago and far away I yearned to work as a 'broadcast journalist'. The work seemed quite pleasing and for me--- current events of any genre keep my mind engaged. I'm not easily bored reading news.

I'd been listening to NPR while commuting extensively around the beltway for the past eight or so years. I found the stories interesting and illuminating.

Many years later I learned that all I had to do was read the Wall Street Journal or the Economist and I'd already know most of the NPR 'in depth' content weeks before it came to air. In short the NPR guys.... (then at least) seemed to just work on the foundations of stories already researched by hardworking diligent reporters in the Financial press.

I wanted to work in TV but learned quickly the best thing to do was to get a internship or volunteer anywhere that might let you in the door. The time frame for this was around 1986. NPR was always advertising for 'listener volunteers' so that's where I went.

I called them up and found myself marching off to, if memory serves me, 1020 M street NW DC, the old NPR building. Here I was greeted by a very nice lady who was in charge of all 'volunteers' . It was clear that to get anywhere I'd best impress her and do whatever they ask to the best of my abilities.

Earlier that morning my father pulled me aside and explained how he supported me in this endeavor but that I shouldn’t be unrealistic. First off he felt my writing skills were way remiss for any such daily grind of actually doing anything with news coverage.... ( at the time he was very much on the mark). His second point seemed absolutely delusional/ paranoid and insane.

Dad launched into this long lecture of whatever I did, absolutely do not ever tell anyone what my father did for a living, period, ever, period. To do so he explained would be a certain end to any hopes I might have invested in my future there.

My retort was that this was absolutely ludicrous..... there was no way anybody would give a damn that I was a 'Army Brat'. Dad just laughed and reminded me to not discuss anything about what he did.

I knew full well not to discuss what he was doing at the time as he was one of the keystones in rebuilding the NSC (part of the clean up crew) after the total mess of Oliver North. Dad had most of North’s old jobs and was actively accumulating evidence to be used in the ongoing Iran/Contra hearings, then the daily focus of all the worlds media.

My schedule at NPR soon became to go there every Thursday... or more when there was a opening and answer telephones. The phones I was answering were the ones you called if you wanted to get a audio tape copy of any story you'd ever heard on the radio. This was a fairly simple task.

People would call, they'd describe the story. I had in front of me a outline of all the shows from the past couple of weeks and I'd take the pertinent information write it down on a form which was oriented to finding the original audio tape in the buildings archives and someone else would come along and make these tapes.

Soon into this endeavor I became frustrated. First off I had no problem instantly I. D. ing any story asked for. Sometimes people were confused and they would ask for stories not covered on NPR. What Irked me was that the copy's of these tapes were being marketed for about one dollar a minute with a $15 minimum. Secondly we were months in arrears on accomplishing what I explained to them was a very simple task.

No one ever appreciated my telling them I could easily exhaust the backlog on one day if given access to the machine for duping the tapes from reel to reel to a cassette.

I did garner enough respect of my abilities where they began to send me down to the archives... or tape library to actually pull the tapes in question, put a memo on them explaining what story off each specific tape was wanted and in what quantities. All this coordinated with the notes taken by me and many others from answering those phone calls upstairs.

This is when it started getting weird. In the tape library were two Archivists. Two ladies, maybe five and ten years older than I who would do nothing but transcribe the shows to some sort of stenographic machine.

These ladies were as cool to my presence in this library as anyone could be. There was no way to charm them, period. They subtly made it clear that they did not want to ever hear or speak to me at all. This was awkward as the room wasn't all that big and there would just be the three of us. God forbid I asked them if they knew anything about the dozens of show tapes which would be missing from the shelves.

These two spent most of the eight months discussing between them the prospects of their costumes for the upcoming Halloween march that October. Always with what they were going to dress up as and then sometimes someone else would come in and they'd discuss what some other NPR person would be dressing up as.

This was beginning to irritate me, as I was not allowed to ever speak in the tape library about anything. I learned on the first day down there to never ask about anything that wasn’t directly related to finding the tapes I was looking for.... and after the third day or so I learned, just don't bother talking at all.

Many years later and a few dawns wiser to the ways of the world I know today that much of the hostility was that these two ladies were of a far 'farer' sex than I could possibly imagine. These ladies had the exact opposite of misogyny as there personal cross to bear. If I'd been paying closer attention to the nuances of the Halloween costumes they were discussing and the personalities of other NPR employees they would vilify I might have put two and two together a little sooner.

All the while I was actively studying History at night school in College Park and working two jobs to keep the money coming in. I worked for a high end caterer at fancy parties and I worked as a very formal waiter in what was then Washington’s most ridiculously expensive restaurant 'The Potomac'...... now known as Sequoia.

http://www.arkrestaurants.com/section_home.cfm?section_id=1&location_id=2&restaurant_id=15

There were two people at NPR who were very nice to me, They'd take me out to a sandwich place for lunch and actually engage me in dialogue. Each of them were very well informed and intelligent. One was a man named Allan Stone... the other was a cute girl who Allan was actively pursuing and seemed she did research for a variety of other 'on air ' reporters.

Each of them were very nice and I am grateful for this. I have no clue who Allan Stone was or is, but the lady who was my boss kept making a big deal about him..... either he was rich or powerful or both.... no one ever explained this to me. What was clear and getting clearer was that these two were sort of dating and I was asked along as a buffer of some sort. No mind they were good company.

One day at lunch the three of us are eating our deli fare and the young lady started talking about the Iran/Contra hearings.... there was some 'new' spectacular angle to a Drug cover-up. Somewhere in the testimony the day prior there was mention that special forces or some pilot had been issued amphetamines in order to remain awake for more than 24 hours while performing some duty.

This was incidental and innocuous testimony about some other much larger issue. The thing was the girl had seized on this thing as a Huge Drug Scandal for the Reagan administration.... Allan got excited and was deciding who to get started on doing further research.

I looked at her and said something like 'what are you crazy, this is not news.... not at all. For as long as amphetamines have existed they have been used in the battlefield. I explained how the street drug Crystal Meth was nothing other than the particular formula NAZI pharmacology had developed to produce 'speed' at very little cost, using what are generally accepted household items. This was not news I explained, this aspect of 'crystal meth' had already been covered extensively in the Washington Post.

Well eventually they believed me, with some disappointment they let it pass. I was left dumbfounded at the blatant and arrogant ignorance of the day to day operations of the military. This was when I came to realize that 'Huh, dad was right' These guys just plain hate the armed forces and they don't know squat about squat..... at least when it comes to general history and the military.

Well now that was a Thursday..... the following Sunday I find myself at work, slinging hash on Sunday Brunch wearing my ill fitting Tux and selling coffee for $2 a cup (mind you this was when coffee generally cost a quarter). The section I was working sucked..... but it did afford one of the better panoramic views of the Potomac river there is. A sort of turret of windows above the beautiful fountain in Washington Harbor.



I was about three stories up on the right side of this picture. The table in question was the 'deuce' on the right side of this picture. Allthough for some reason this picture from the curent restaurants website is fliped backwards.

Well my day was drawing to a close when damn I get a new table.... but this is a pleasant surprise, it's the girl I eat lunch with when she and Allan take me out at NPR. She's with some guy who makes me at 5'7" look very tall. The guy is dressed casually to the nines.... very casual and very expensive, clearly out to impress the lady. My favorite sort of customer, maybe/ hopefully he will throw some cash around my way in a reckless attempt to impress the lady.

Immediately I know something is wrong as the lady in question is giving no acknowledgement that we know each other...... Odd, but as a waiter I'd seen odder and didn't think that much of it. Then low and behold the man spoke and I immediately knew I was waiting of the Star of NPR Scott Simon. His voice was unmistakable..... I was excited but realized I couldn’t mention I too worked there, cause there was something up. For some reason the girl was acting as if she and I had never met, much less ate lunch together at least once a week for the past six months or so.

Well it gets better. Scot Simon has just returned from a three day in-depth interview with Les Paul. Les Paul! a personal hero of mine...... big time.

I've been the tecno geek from way back when and was keenly aware of who Les Paul was and what he had contributed to modern technology.... lots and lots. I'd seen him give a very special performance at the Baird Auditorium in the Smithsonian about five years prior to this ill fated Sunday afternoon.

When I hear Mr. Simon mention he's just returned from spending three days with Mr. Paul I exclaim that I'm immensely impressed and list off about a dozen things that Les invented to make it clear that yes I did understand who he was talking about, very well indeed.

So's I say..... "you know in three days of staying with him I have to ask how does Les get dressed, eat, dining and the like with his right arm being fused at elbow.

This is common knowledge about Paul, he'd been in a horrific auto accident leaving his arm unable to bend at the elbow and some time afterwards he had it rebroken to enable him to again use his right hand to pick the guitar strings.

Scott Simon looks at me with some astonishment and says.....' what are you talking about'. I explain about the arm, the accident, the rebreaking and ask if he really didn’t notice the guys right arm is permanently bent at about 90 degrees..... well now it's getting awkward.... and me I'm working for tips, so I quickly change the subject .

"Well" I ask, "how’s his lawsuit with Radio Shack doing over the patent violations on his 'Les Pulveriser?"

When I saw Paul at the Smithsonian this was the invention he was demonstrating and he went on and on about lawsuits with Radio Shack.

Scot Simon looks at me and again asks what the hell I'm talking about and that was that. I was dumbfounded. I couldn't stop asking myself 'who the hell does this guys research" and Me I'm stuck in this damn room with two men hating archivists and now that I see this girl is clearly two timing Allan Stone...... Holy Guacamole, Hey Zeus chimi chonga.... me I'm screwed...

I never went back to NPR and they never called to ask where I went to.

Sorry the story is so long. Next I'll post what all this means to me today and how it relates to Teri Gross's abuse of Mrs Cheany.

Two start with I think it's a safe $100. bet Gross never bothered reading Mrs. Cheany's book prior to the interview..... a very safe bet.
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God I'm curently listening to the interview in it's entirety and it's much more abusivie than the transcript lets on.

No Gross does'nt do allot of reading of the books she references.

Appairently she never read 'Rebecca' either.... Listen to the whole interview. This will be a big deal eventually.

[PhantomSgt]

OK Jack let's have the goods on NPR.


_________________
Retired AF E-8

Independent that leans right of center.

[Uisguex Jack]

I'm pressed for time this moning, but here are a few thoughts which just fell onto my keyboard, sorry for the sloppy writing.


About NPR
That's all I got. It's not the most interesting story but it's fact. My point is none of my experience involved 'politics'.

What I learned about by this exposure was that they were and are extraordinarily incompetent.

First off the story about the use of amphetamines in certain disciplines of the military. This was not news in 1986 and it's not news today.

This story of pilots who fly 24 hour missions today being issued some sort of speed is still trying to be hawked by the press. I heard multiple mentions in the last two years of how this is a huge drug scandal of Bush's. It isn't and there is no excuse for the ignorance therein.

Secondly for Scot Simon to have done a three day interview with Les Paul and not have taken note of two of the most important things in his life is so incompetent it's ridiculous. Those two things quite clear at the time..... The guy was permanently disfigured with a right arm fused at the elbow in a 90 degree angle. The auto accident which caused this had been legendary. Secondly he was involved in a major lawsuit with one of America's largest electronics retailers over patent theft.

That is news. How is it possible to have done a three day interview with someone and missed all this. Incompetence.

My reasons for leaving were that I couldn’t face the girl in question again, and I had just humiliated the #1 honcho at the time. I had no future there.

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Now look at how this applies to today. NPR's mission is one of communication of news to the populace..... at tax payers expense. I don't see where they are accomplishing this at all.

First off look at the Lynn Cheney episode in it's entirety: