About half way into the very first debate of the democratic candidates, I turned to my husband and said "Biden isn't really running for president, he's running for secretary of state under the next democratic president."

I watched Biden the next Sunday on one of the morning political shows, and his perspectives confirmed my earlier thoughts. He surely believes he is running for president, but mostly he is running for secretary of state, and he will make a fine one.

...BUT who among the NPR News staff is a conservative? NONE of the Senior News Analysts, for sure. Those are the staff opinionators.

NONE of the viewpoint-type programs feature conservative hosts. Not Democracy NOW!, or News & Notes. Not Tavis Smiley or Kurt Anderson or "On the Media". (Brooke Gladstone's husband is the virulent Bush-hater at Slate, Fred Kaplan.) Not Terry Gross, who was excoriated by the NPR's ombudsman for her hostile interview of Bill O'Reilly. Gentle soul Garrison Keillor is the "old liberal" from the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party. Ira Glas represents the Gen-X generation of new urban liberals. There are probably 50 political viewpoint shows produced by NPR, PRI, APR, Pacifica, etc. I don't think there is a single conservative viewpoint show. They are all gradations of liberal, to left, to far-left, to radical-left.

NPR is not as "fair" as it pretends to be, and it isn't even close to being "balanced."

I think the word I'm looking for is PROTOCOL.

The appropriate way to behave in a foriegn land when invited as a visitor. How you deal with your in-laws during the holidays is not lthe appropriate way to deal with foreign leaders and their families. Hillary is experienced to know the difference.

NPR has virtually zero (or just "zero"?) credentials as a home to any conservative analysis or news programming.

I listen to NPR everyday and they always have on someone from the Heritage Insitute, or Grover Nosquite is there or they have some climate change skeptic on Science Friday and on and on. Conservatives are well represented.

A lot of conservatives are confused by this because they think a "fair" radio show would be something like Fox News -- where a Progressive opinion is expressed for 5 mins followed by 4 hrs of commentary by "fair and balanced" anchors like Bill O'Reily.

It's understandable that a modern conservative breast fed on Faux News 24hrs a day would be utterly unable to recongnize an actual "fair and balanced" radio program.

IMHO.

I don't come anywhere close to "fighting every battle." Who would have the time?

Here's the thing with NPR. I hope we can agree on all of it.

NPR is a great medium, with a huge advantage over any other news network. There are no commercial interruptions. There is a massive national network of stations. If you are in Paris, Texas or Parris Island, SC, or Parisville, Michigan, you will almost assuredly have NPR News. And NPR has the luxury of a highly educated audience that will tolerate thoughtful, lengthy, debate.

And, NPR is relentlessly, religiously, liberal-biased. Their Senior News Analysts are Dan Schorr, Juan Williams and Cokie Roberts. There you have the full range of viewpoints from radical-left Democrat to left-wing Democrat to mainstream Democrat. Those are the people who NPR assigns to interpret your news for you. There are no conservative voices in NPR News; none. NPR's sister publication is Slate, where the polling of its staff for the last Presidential election was something like 85 or 90% for Kerry. The Slate and NPR commentators are often interchangeable; I presume, and think I have every good reason to presume, that the political leanings of the NPR News staff is about the same as it is at Slate.

And yes, Michelle Norris' husband is a former staffer to noted California nutjob Pete Stark, a former Clinton White House Aide, a former Senior Advisor to the Kerry-Edwards campaign, and he's now a lobbyist specializing in Democrat connections, right?

NPR has virtually zero (or just "zero"?) credentials as a home to any conservative analysis or news programming. Which doesn't make conswervatives feel very good about their national government-supported radio news network.

Has any of this been quantified, you ask? Well, yes, it has. Look here:

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=278808786575124

I was eager to see a substantive case that sizes up the "veteran Senators" positions on foreign policy and brings some much-needed balance to the coverage. Instead, we get more of the same--as far as actual quotations from the debate, it's Obama, Clinton, Edwards, Obama, Biden, Clinton, Clinton, Edwards.

By this count, it's: Putative Frontrunners 7, Veteran Senators 1.

I lurk here and read letters a lot. And it used to be, oh, a year or two ago, I would read your letters and think, well, I am on the opposite side of this, but what he is saying makes a little bit of sense, I can see how someone would look at it that way. There is some merit in that argument. And that is just gone now. I think it's because you have lost the ability to see that sometimes, the democrats are on the right side of an issue, and that once in a while, the repubs have a contradictory or nonsensical approach. Instead, you fight every battle, even when it's obvious that it makes no sense, to the death.

It's too bad.

One example is your ridiculous note saying you're glad that the repubs will not go on NPR. I have heard NPR interview many of the republican candidates. Since they are a responsible news outlet, they are are doing introduce yourself interviews with ALL of the candidates. The candidates are allowed to express themselves, are treated with respect, even get away with their spin lines. If they could have a reasoned discussion on NPR, NPR moderators would not be the issue for them. It would be the requirement for reasoned discussion. I actually think Romney, whom I can't stand to think of as president, would do best in such a forum. He is very smart. I'd just love to hear what he actually thinks about something for once.

Anyway, I miss that spark of reason. It was a tiny little light shining in the dark of knee-jerk responses.