Ripped from the headlines
My Escort had a cassette player in it. I used the daylights out of it. My Taurus-X and Jetta wagon have CD players. I use the daylights out of them. Next step, apparently, is to put my tunes on a flash drive.
Steve
Yes, I have. And, I lived under the threat of “the cut” for 10 years.
When it happened … It was eye opening.
I grew mentally, emotionally, psychologically …
BIGLY as a result.
That “trauma” and resulting “growth” is largely responsible for me being FI.
Trauma/adversity can be the mother of growth.
Our SOCIAL insistence on being “taken care of” often seems to subvert/stop the personal growth that leads to success and contentment.
Too much of a good thing is still “too much”.
Too much safety net stymies.
ralph
As noted, programs like “Masterpiece Theater” did not have the long rollup of patrons who financially support the program, forty years ago. Patrons started coming out of the woodwork when Exxon, which had taken over long time sponsor Mobil, cut off the grant. Some of you may have noticed the clip of Darlene Shiley inviting others to help support the program. Her late husband, Donald, was co-inventor of an artificial heart valve.
Many of the works in the Detroit Institute of Art were owned by the city of Detroit. When Detroit went b/k, the creditors were pushing for the collection to be broken up and the works auctioned off. Suddenly, patrons came out of the woodwork to put up money to keep the collection together at the DIA.
Detroit’s $7 billion reorganization plan represents a hard-fought agreement among the city’s employees, retirees, bondholders and other creditors. It’s also a big win for art lovers, thanks to an unusual, and possibly unique, deal under which outside contributors agreed to put $800 million into Detroit’s underfunded pension plans in exchange for taking the Detroit Institute of Art’s priceless collection of Van Goghs, Matisses and Picassos off the bargaining table.
There used to be such a thing as “patrons of the arts” who funded cultural endeavors out of their own very deep pockets. How many libraries did Carnegie start? Then someone figured out if they could get the government to pay the bills, they could keep their loot, and still have their “cultural” hobbies.
Maybe it’s time for being a “patron of the arts” to be a thing again, instead of leeching off middle class taxpayers?
The gift that keeps giving.
Steve
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I don’t know about NPR but the PBS, in particular rural PBS, gets a much higher percentage of their funding from the CPB (rural stations can’t fundraise as easily as metro stations).
Just another example of the current admin sticking it to their own voters.
Rural stations depend more on CPB funding than urban stations. CPB grants – represented 17 percent of an average rural station’s revenue, versus 9 percent for non-rural stations. Almost half of all rural grantees – 120 stations – relied on CPB for at least 25 percent of their revenue while 33 rural stations – many on Native American reservations – relied on CPB funding for at least 50 percent of their revenue.
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With so many hungry people out there, why let them expire? This has to be a blunder. At minimum poor management of resources.
Do they have acceptable excuses? Let’s hear them!!
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There is no excuse. Their ideas and instruments are very blunt weapons.
The food easily could have gone elsewhere not in a war zone, but this admin believes in inheriting wealth.
Does their “base” watch PBS? Do they support the “National Endowment for the Arts”? Years ago, Sean Hannity was up on his hind legs howling about an art piece, funded by the NEA (2025 budget $210M) that, he felt did not depict Christ with the required reverence. There is a large mural in the Detroit Institute of Art that was created under a depression era arts program. The mural, depicting the inside of an auto plant, was nearly painted over in the 50s, because the artist, Diego Rivera, was a “Commie”.
I’m surprised the NEA budget was not zeroed out too.
“himself” is taking a victory lap today.
“HOUSE APPROVES NINE BILLION DOLLAR CUTS PACKAGE, INCLUDING ATROCIOUS NPR AND PUBLIC BROADCASTING, WHERE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS A YEAR WERE WASTED,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform late Thursday night.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/trump-celebrates-congress-pulling-1-114454994.html
Steve
“I remember when RV traveling years ago, before we had a Sirious satellite radio in the vehicle, or cell phones, the only radio stations one could find out in the boondocks were the crazy RW/NJ stations, Limbaugh and worse, so there was always a search for either public radio or maybe an FM station”
I had the same experiences on a couple of different trips out West. All Things Considered would air everyday at 4pm ( I think), and then there would be a couple of hours of interesting program that would help the miles melt away.
But the other offerings on over the air radio were pathetic.
Only listened to Limbaugh for a few minutes, he just seemed like an angry charlatan to me. Still remember the DittoHeads calling in and kissing his feet on the air, that was enough to turn me off for good. Best program that I seen Limbaugh in was on the Golf Channel, when Hank Haney would try to fix a celebrity golfer who stunk at golf. Limbaugh was a whining crybaby, always had a million excuses for why he was not getting better. Nothing was ever his fault. Him and Trump are mirror images in that regard.
I subscribe to Sirius/XM, have no problem getting an annual subscription. Really do not want to listen to over the air am/fm stations. Would listen to NPR over the air if I didn’t have XM, that’s about it.
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Isn’t much of the rural dependency on public radio and television due to the fact that there are no local news alternatives in many places anymore? Sure they can get Fox and “Bro” radio, but actual news and alerts that are applicable to their location are few.
Pete
Aye, that he was, began in Sacramento, but as I was on the road a lot for work, I listened to a lot of it until one day, met aTelco guy, black fellow and as we talked, he told me to listen between the lines a bit, anti woman, racial stuff was imbedded in his garbage… I hadn’t [aid attention, really, just background noise while driving, but then, yes, indeed, and it became as sickening as he was, shut his carp off, glad he’s gone… Rather listen to road noise or decent country music if I could find it, I did gain a collection of tapes, audio books, but the final solution was a Sirius/XM subscription, could have it in both cars, but now I let the F150 lapse, have it in our RAV4, so also on my iPhone, that+Carplay dongle gets it in the F150, once I’d replaced the OEM head unit with an Alpine screen unit… iPhones also changed the options, news, podcasts, whatever is of interest, covered. Just ignore the costs of subscriptions, stay in touch with the world…
Sadly so many don’t have the options, can’t afford, etc… Being led astray… Sad…
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I figure I paid for the music I want to listen to in the 70s and 80s. No need to pay for subscriptions to listen to what I already paid for. Just keep moving the tunes from one format to another.
Steve
“Base” and “voters” are not synonymous.
Life in the Heartland is one of the more popular PBS shows in rural communities.
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In my area, Limbaugh was not on public radio. He was on our largest am commercial station at 11 am.
For music on internet Spotify is hard to beat. I have 30,000 favorite songs that play continually. Free with ads. Paved dirt roads too. We do know how!!!
Declining population has to be a problem for rural radio. Fewer people to listen and donate. Less business for sponsors. Internet or cell towers must be the future if you can get them paid for. Worked for electrification. Why not for internet?
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That’s pretty awesome, dude!
DB2
Its amazing how many artists recorded albums with lots of tracks over the years. Spotify has back to 1920. You can find almost any artist in their list and all their albums and often recordings from concerts. Also bands, groups. Every military organization you can name seems to have a band often with dozens of recordings. And don’t forget pokas, waltzes, classics. On and on. They seem to have it all. And for free.
And yes, I own the stock.
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