The Putsch at Public Broadcasting

[SOURCE: The Nation, AUTHOR: Eric Alterman]
[Commentary] An investigation by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's inspector general, Kenneth Konz, found that its former chair, Kenneth Tomlinson, consistently violated its statutory provisions and the Director's Code of Ethics. Thanks to Konz, we now know that Tomlinson was receiving advice and possibly instructions directly from the top--(acting President) Karl Rove. It's hard to believe America's second most influential politician (just behind Dick Cheney), while being investigated for possibly illegally leaking the name of CIA agent Valerie Plame, cared enough about PBS's prime-time programming to plot the overthrow of Bill Moyers. But the e-mail traffic appears to bear it out. The only sensible explanation is the meta one. Bush II brooks no dissent from anyone anywhere in government or the media, whether it comes from CIA agents' husbands, EPA scientists, Medicare economists or public television broadcasters (including, it turns out, cartoon rabbits). But much remains unanswered. Why did Tomlinson go to so much trouble to funnel money in secret to the Fred Mann? Is there more, as yet unreleased, in the report? What, ultimately, was its intended purpose -- another McCarthy-style blacklist or just a Nixonian "enemies list"? Did Wall Street Journal Editorial Editor Paul Gigot make any unpublished promises about lending the Journal edit pages to these purposes? And why did Tomlinson feel compelled to lie to Senator Byron Dorgan when questioned about the secret Mann deal, falsely insisting that another CPB executive had "approved and signed" the Mann contract when in fact he had signed it himself? And finally, what else are they hiding?
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20051219/alterman