The
Senate Foreign Relations Committee's ranking Republican, Indiana
Sen. Richard
Lugar,
released a hard-hitting report Thursday that criticizes the U.S.
government's international broadcasting efforts, which have long
been dogged by accusations of ineffectiveness, cronyism, and
post-Cold War irrelevance, as well as partisan bickering over
editorial direction.
The
report,
entitled "U.S. International Broadcasting: Is Anybody Listening?"
is unsparing in its criticism of the Broadcasting Board of Governors,
an independent federal agency established in 1994. Its nearly $700
million in annual funding supports Voice of America, Radio Free
Europe/Radio Liberty, and a host of other media efforts across some
60 languages.
Lugar's
report reserves the bulk of its criticism for unspecified members of
Congress, in both parties, whom it accuses of holding the agency
hostage to partisan agendas.
But
the timing of report clearly suggests it's a shot across the bow at
Oklahoma Sen. Tom
Coburn,
who has been holding up President Obama's eight nominees for the BBG board
for months.
Congress
originally intended the board, which was established in the 1990s, as
a way of shielding U.S. broadcasting efforts from political meddling.
It hasn't worked out that way.
As
the report notes, there's been no BBG chairman since 2008, and the
four out of eight board members who are still around are on expired
terms. The
board has been at full strength for just six of the past 15 years,
leading the authors to characterize the confirmation process as one
of "chronic
dysfunction."
"It
has become clear that the BBG, rather than functioning as a political
‘firewall,' has become a political ‘football' as Board
membership nominations have become enmeshed and blocked due to
partisan politics," Lugar said in a letter accompanying the
report. "It is
time to end that and confirm the Board, or it is perhaps time to
create a new mechanism that will have greater Congressional support."
Coburn
Tom
Coburn,
who has been severely
critical
of the BBG, especially with regard to its programs in the Middle East
and South Asia. "The BBG is the most worthless organization in the
federal government," he told The
Cable
in an April interview. "It's full of people who know nothing about
media or foreign policy. All they are doing is spending money and
somebody's got to look into it."
Lugar's
report finds plenty to criticize, especially at Al-Hurra, the U.S.
government-funded Arabic-language satellite news channel. The network
has suffered since its inception from abysmal ratings, widely panned
programming, and a deep credibility problem among Middle Eastern
viewers skeptical of American designs in the region.
The
one bright spot for Al-Hurra, the report notes, is Iraq, where it
routinely ranks as one of the most popular news channels. Otherwise,
however, the network's viewership is "marginal."
The
report also highlights a number of setbacks for BBG efforts in
repressive media environments such as China, Iran, and Russia, and
argues that a fully operational board could help chart a more
effective way forward.
Coburn
told The
Cable
this week that after meeting with all the nominees and making them
answer a bunch of written questions, he'll "probably let them go
soon."
Coburn is still waiting to hear from Senate Foreign Relations
Committee chairman John
Kerry,
D-MA, however, about his request for a hearing on BBG oversight.
In
the meantime, it looks like Lugar has missed his deadline. "[I]t is
my hope that, by the time this report is printed, the new Chairman
and the other seven members of the Board, nominated some 7 months ago
in November 2009, will have been confirmed by the Senate," he wrote
in his accompanying letter.
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