Tomlinson works for balance in PBS, NPR

WASHINGTON - Flying into unauthorized territory will get you noticed in this town. The poor fellow flying a small two-seater Cessna learned that quickly on Wednesday, as did the rest of the city, when his flight path put him en route toward the White House.

Kenneth Tomlinson, chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, has entered unauthorized territory by trying to bring balance and objectivity to the news coverage on PBS and NPR, which, for too long, has been dominated by liberal bias.

His efforts have drawn the retribution of The New York Times and have prompted some Democratic members of Congress to call for an investigation to determine if he crossed the line by trying to influence news coverage.

I chatted with Tomlinson Tuesday night at an event where he would receive a lifetime achievement award for his long career in journalism. To read much of the coverage about him one might conclude that he is just some Republican political hack appointed for the singular purpose of gutting public broadcasting.

He comes to his current position with years of journalism experience. The native Virginian, who says his accent has brought accusations of being from Texas, started at the bottom in 1965 as a reporter for the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Then he began his whirlwind career. He traveled the world as a reporter covering Washington, Vietnam, Europe, Africa and the Middle East for the Reader's Digest.

In the early 1980s, he served as the director of the Voice of America, only to return to Reader's Digest in 1984 where he retired after 12 years of serving as the publication's editor-in-chief. President Clinton confirmed him as a member of the CPB Board in September 2000. He was elected chairman in September 2003.

At the center of the firestorm was his decision to appoint two ombudsmen to regularly do a post-op of the network's news coverage. William Schulz, a former Reader's Digest editor, presumably a conservative, and Ken Bode, a former NBC and CNN reporter and a former host of "Washington Week," a liberal, will fill the new slots.

Tomlinson's decision to appoint two ombudsmen drew criticism from some of the public broadcasting crowd. Apparently, some in PBS's leadership didn't see the need for two. Why two? Tomlinson said it was very simple; the network needs more than one assessment of its news coverage.

After he provided documented evidence of leftward bias in PBS's news lineup - the main offender was Bill Moyers who until recently hosted the newsmagazine "Now" - the network's leadership decided to make achieving balance a priority. Now a small percentage of stations carry "Wall Street Journal Editorial Report," which has a conservative bent in addition to "Now," which continues with what he calls its "liberal advocacy."

Good liberals who love their programming on PBS fear not. The idea, according to Tomlinson, is not to remake existing shows to bring balance, but to bring a variety of programming to viewers. "We need liberal viewers," he said.

"I have no hidden agenda," he said. He insists he has been open and up front about the need for balance and that is all he wants. He believes the idea of fair and balanced news coverage started at PBS years ago with "McNeil-Lehrer Report," not Fox News.

Does all this newfound attention bother Tomlinson? No.

He laughs off some of the predictions of his demise. He jokes that one Washington pundit said Tomlinson would soon be working a city garbage truck route.

I guess that's the price one pays for flying into new territory.

David Sanders writes twice weekly for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock. His e-mail address is DavidJSanders@aol.com.