I understand what has driven Charles Johnson to abandon his former support of conservatives—I agree with most of his critiques. But he’s becoming increasingly prone to unobjective and unreflective commentary. Yesterday, he wrote about Juan Williams’ attack on federally subsidized National Public Radio, saying that Williams is
a shill for the most biased right wing media source in the country…but he has the gall to act outraged about a simple statement of fact [i.e., a Democratic Congressman’s statement that ‘NPR plays a vital role in providing quality news programming — from rural radio stations to in-depth coverage of foreign affairs. If the Republicans had their way, we’d only be left with the likes of Glenn Beck, Limbaugh and Sarah Palin to dominate the airwaves.’] If Republicans had their way, they would destroy any news sources that contradict the propaganda from the hundreds of right wing radio hosts and the non-stop disinformation of Fox News. And that’s exactly what they’re trying to do to NPR.
But neither Williams nor any conservative that I know of thinks NPR should be removed from the airwaves or censored. All they’re saying is that NPR should not be subsidized by taxpayer dollars—that is, propped up against its competitors with money taken by force from American taxpayers. When you make it so that NPR doesn’t have to compete fairly the way everyone from Fox to CNN to the Discovery Channel has to, then you’re “astroturfing”—that is, you’re making a certain segment of political opinion look more prominent than it really is. That’s not democratic—let alone the fact that it isn’t fair to force me to pay for the propagation of views I disagree with.
The same holds for union funding. Johnson recently condemned Republicans in Wisconsin for trying to “destroy” the public employee unions and whatnot. These unions obtain their funding by forcing people to give them money against their will. Say what you like about the Koch Brothers, at least Americans for Prosperity and other groups get their money from people who are willing to give it—they don’t just steal it the way unions do under the color of law.
When unions or NPR or other groups, left or right (but usually left) get their funding from people who haven’t consented, it doesn’t just violate the individual rights of those whose money is taken from them against their will—it also distorts the democratic process by allowing the subsidized side to lobby harder than its unsubsidized opponents and appear more popular than it actually is.
