You know I’m a (former) lifelong liberal. Grew up in a blue neighborhood in a blue state in a blue region, I’m a first generation middle class American who’s lucky to have my parents: two educated go-getters from very different ethnic and social backgrounds. They left an outer borough coop and rural cottage to build a more affluent life in the suburbs, in a house with a lawn out front, yard in the back and a car in the garage. It was the American dream circa 1970s, when a young couple could afford a house near a major city, highways and public transit, in a safe, walkable town with great schools. That’s now a bygone era after decades of Republican and Democratic policies. Some call it Reaganomics, others say Neoliberal, whatever the term, our country is now more unequal and less well off. Class mobility is frozen. To live in the exact same house in the exact same town of my childhood which hasn’t changed all that much, you now need to be in an much, much higher income bracket than my folks, who had few financial advantages.
Neither party seems interested or capable of expanding prosperity for the working and middle classes, so we’re stuck. Biden talked about expanding the middle class but didn’t or couldn’t do it. Trump plays to these concerns much better but is currently making it worse. That may be temporary, time will tell.
Where can you turn to learn about the sorry state of public affairs, and the infrequent wins, that hundreds of millions of Americans need as information to manage their lives?
Growing up in a halcyon, late 20th Century Massachusetts milieu meant the Boston Globe and the New York Times were read each morning at the kitchen table. NPR’s local affiliate, WBUR, played on the radio throughout the day and on every drive. At night, my parents watched the WGBH PBS News Hour in rotation with NBC, CBS and ABC.
When I left home I continued listening to my local NPR affiliate in Santa Cruz, then in Palo Alto, Washington DC and finally, WNYC in the vast and incredible city of my adulthood, where I’ve lived since I was 25.
Fast-forwarding from the 1980s to the 2020s, NPR is unrecognizable from the friendly, insightful voices of my youth and early adulthood. (The New York Times is as well, but that’s a story for another day. I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal for less biased reporting.) I now listen to WNYC less and less. I need to understand reality more than hearing dictates from a narrowly-cast ideology.
What changed: NPR or me?
Did I become a flaming pro-Trump malcontent who only consumes Breitbart, Fox News and manosphere podcasts in a deep red news bubble? Or did I remain consistent with my values as a more or less menschy guy fascinated by current affairs, who now wonders why more and more capital “P” Public programming focuses on precisely curated victimhood narratives, that funnily enough, are paired with misinformation about the Middle East? One wonders what other misinformation is being broadcast regularly, be it the origins of Covid, an evaluation of the government’s Covid response in 2020-2022, public safety in New York and more.
For me, the great shift was in early 2024 when Brian Lehrer, a popular and beloved host of an eponymous general affairs call-in show on WNYC, hosted one propagandizing interviewer after another in the wake of the Hamas invasion of Israel, which, to this day, involves American captives. The guests spouted so much misinformation it was like listening to Trump attest to his mental stability, daily, in my ears, except it was about a subject I happen to know well. It was infuriating. It felt like betrayal. It wasn't news or dispassionate inquiry.
A calm review of diplomacy over the past 100 years leading to the attacks wasn’t available in NPR or WNYC programming. Tackling the evolving nature of Jewish identity after the establishment of Israel, and how that dovetails with the evolving nature of antisemitism, wasn’t available. Investigating the reasons for Hamas’s popularity among all Palestinians and understanding why American Leftists made common cause with them wasn’t available. Even asking about Hamas’ goals for starting the war, or what civilian Palestinians genuinely hoped for, wasn’t available.
Something else was on the air.
For those who don’t live in NYC or subject yourselves to intensely ideological propaganda on a regular basis (but hey, no ads!), Brian Lehrer had been one of the most trusted, even keeled, sweetest guys on radio. I liked him. In a way I needed him.
Even if you don’t know whom I’m talking about, you have this media personality in your life. You've been listening to a man or woman yourself for years. Maybe he or she’s podcasting instead of broadcasting, but it’s the person you go to, throughout the week, month after month, to inform, inspire and entertain you. He’s your companion. She’s your trusted source.
The experience of enjoying the same authority figure on the radio is like a child listening to a storybook over and over again. What’s more comforting, the individual story or the warm voice of the trusted reader? Yes.
Then it ended. The tide of broadcast antisemitism and straight-up disinformation about the conflict, the history, the players involved engulfed me. After hearing about local college students calling for the murder of Jews, with no pushback by Brian Lehrer, I canceled my automated monthly donation. I had a frank and polite email exchange and phone call with the WNYC director of membership. It went nowhere.
I was alone. I was adrift. Then I saw her.
Turns out, I had known her all along. While looking for someone new, someone fresh, I found someone known. Someone steady and tenacious. She has victory in her name. She’s my Nike of Samothrace. I can never see or touch her, I can only listen—that's cool, we all have our kink. I fell back in love with 1010 WINS. At the time it was an AM-only station that’s now on 92.3 FM. I was happy to discover it’s the oldest news broadcaster in America. I like to think my grandparents tuned in from the Bronx.
Their tagline is, “You give us 22 minutes, we’ll give you THE WORLD!”
What the exchange really means is, ‘you also give us 8 minutes of ads about timeshare cancelation services, injury lawyers and IRS tax repayment scams, and we’ll give you everything the earth contains in your ears.’ It’s an annoyingly good deal.
They never interview bigots on any side of any issue. They don’t lecture me about niche identities that ebb and flow with time, like crabs washing ashore with different colors, persecution rankings and pronouns. On 1010 WINS, they’re just called crabs.
Instead, the station tells me the weather and the headlines, traffic updates and sports news. The morning anchor, Larry Mullins, uses a soft touch of humor when needed, and all the anchors have a non-partisan, non-ideological, “just the facts, ma’am” perspective. The journalists sound like they grew up nearby or have lived here forever, think lots of Italians, Latinos, black New Yorkers, a few “regular” white people and I bet a Jew or two.
They cover crime when it happens, city affairs that hold meaning to me, they report on local Republicans and Democrats if they’re relevant to a story, and they heavily cover the outer boroughs, meaning they employ journalists who report on all of New York.
Does that make 1010 WINS more public than the Public WNYC? If that’s the case, why does NPR receive tax support instead of 1010 WINS’ corporate parent? Does the “E” in DEI spell equity but mean favoritism?
Sometimes my eyes, I mean, other sensitive body parts, wander back to NPR. Especially in the morning. It’s like looking up an old lover on Facebook or LinkedIn. (I’m Gen X, those are my social platforms, don’t judge.) I step into the bathroom and while I shouldn’t do it, I can’t resist. I tune into WNYC while washing my face. Then I hear my-ex, Brian Lehrer, speaking just to me.
How I missed his friendly, easygoing voice. That unmistakeable accent of the everyman Jewish New Yorker I grew up with, which, to me, means someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of delis and comes from an outer borough.
Was I wrong to leave him? Or did he leave me? Everyone has their narrative of a breakup—who can say what the truth was? Who even cares? He's still there. It’s not too late for us. He did all the talking in our relationship anyway, it’s not like he’ll stop yakking if come back.
As I get excited about what could be, Brian keeps going. He's now talking to an Ivy League student sired by millionaires who demands her right to coordinate with Hamas as she insists she’s not coordinating with Hamas, it’s more of a cooperative partnership. Besides those technicalities, what she’s really doing is waging an epic, er, jihad against white supremacists. It doesn’t matter the white supremacists in question aren't white and are numerically inferior. Trivial details like that go unmentioned.
Next, Brian turn his attention to a progressive mayoral candidate who will, this is true, I swear, create city-owned grocery stores. This means the DMV will now have a frozen food aisle. What could go wrong?
Last up, Brian chats with an emotionally disadvantaged nonbinary (unitary?) advocate who performed an award-winning poem about climate change.
OK, I made that last one up, but twenty bucks says their interview is tomorrow.
Now I’m cranky and running late. Brian’s voice isn’t aging well, he seems tired. I bet he looks tired. And, you know, his friends were never really my friends. The New Yorker Radio Hour feels like a late night dorm room chat at an private liberal arts college I can't afford. Since I don’t have a daughter of any color and I believe in science, four hundred references to black girl magic aren’t feeling super relevant to my day.
I look in the mirror and tune in 1010 WINS. I learn about traffic on the BQE despite working from home. I tell myself that I’m not doing so bad. I’ve been killing it at the gym. I’m doing fine without Brian or any of them. NPR was just a chapter in my life, right? I hear about a fire in Canarsie and the Bloomberg money report. It never had to be forever. And I mean, when was the last time someone offered me the entire world if listen to the Cars for Kids jingle? Again. And Again. And again.
I'm sad. I'm fortified. I’m strong. My best days are ahead of me.
I finish brushing my teeth. Now that I know the weather, I pick my clothing for the day.
National [BLANK] Radio and the [BLANK] Broadcasting System have long abandoned the public despite their self-described mandate. Let's rebrand them to be honest about their diminishing base. Wonder why that’s happening?
Progressive, Propaganda, Politicized, Plutocrat or Palestinian seem more apt. Lefties love letters and inclusivity, maybe it should be NPPPPPR.
Either way, I’m sure those listeners will more than make up the difference when Congress cuts off the spigot. You should get what you pay for. It's working for Columbia University.
Or, crazy thought, the leaders of NPR and PBS venture outside their immediate neighborhoods and social circles, talk to people they wouldn’t normally interact with, say their gardener or nanny, and ask what they’d like to hear.