Everywhere she goes, PBS CEO Paula Kerger makes the preposterous claim that there's "nothing more American than PBS." That's not an answer to anyone asking about the network's inevitable left-wing tilt. It's a way of changing the subject.
Last week, PBS and San Francisco PBS station KQED hosted a "Reframe Festival," and "PBS News Hour" anchor Geoff Bennett conducted a scandalously sappy interview with Nancy Pelosi, Democrat "speaker emerita." He began by gushing to the crowd that Pelosi, who did the interview remotely from Boston, is "known for her political leadership, her sharp insights and her real singular ability to keep Democrats united."
Nearly every question Bennett teed up for Pelosi requested the "Democratic counterargument" to Donald Trump, and no questions about forcing out Joe Biden. He began by proclaiming Trump was slashing "a vast array of climate, education, health and housing programs that primarily benefit the poor. What is the Democrat counterargument" to Trump's vision?
Bennett then suggested there were two arguments for how Democrats should proceed: attack Trump now, or hold off and wait for Trump's unforced errors to accumulate? Pelosi the Wonderful Uniter said, "Both." Her answers could go on for three minutes without interruption, a sure sign of a softball session.
But this question was the most ridiculous. Bennett wondered out loud why didn't the Democrat message win in 2024? "I mean, I hear Democrats now say we have to focus on the middle class, and have policies that benefit the middle class. Having covered Democratic policies, you can say objectively that Democrats did have policies that benefited the middle class! And Joe Biden spent a lot of political capital passing them into law and yet it didn't seem to resonate, didn't connect with the American people in this last election."
The silence you hear is jaws dropping among everyone who's watched this. "Objectively," the Democrats served the middle class? With prices going up 21% while Biden was president? You can just tell Bennett is both puzzled and upset that Democrats didn't win.
On May 2, the "News Hour" played part of Pelosi's answer: "When somebody doesn't get a message, it's not because of them. It's because of us who are delivering the message, that we did not deliver it clearly enough." The "we" would include the Democrats and their media allies. Several times Pelosi suggested that black voters and union voters just "didn't get it."
Pelosi also bashed Trump, as a Democrat does: "This guy comes along and says he's going to lower prices. He hasn't. He's going to do this. He's going to do that. All a smokescreen. But we have to make sure the public knows what is in their interest."
This didn't feel like a "newsmaker interview." It felt like a journalistic version of "Driving Miss Daisy."
Bennett also threw toughies like "How do you think about generational change?" and "What was the hardest vote to whip, to push through. What vote are you proudest of?" She said Obamacare, and said the Republican resolutions against it were like "doggy doo, and they tried to sell it as chocolate ice cream."
After a half-hour of fawning, Bennett told Pelosi, "You might not be able to hear it, but there's a lot of applause in the room here for you!"
Pelosi oozed, "Thank you, PBS!" As if a crowd gathering in San Francisco organized by the PBS station was going to be politically diverse.
The Democrats can routinely say in the cheeriest of voices, "Thank you, PBS!" Their government investment in "public" broadcasting pays dividends year after year after year.
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