(German Constitutional) Court: Politicians have too much power over TV

TheLocal.de ^ | 25 Mar 2014 10:46 GMT+01:00 | (DPA/The Local)

[Olog-hai]

Germany’s top court ruled on Tuesday morning that politicians have too much influence over the country’s state broadcaster.

The Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe decided that several aspects of broadcaster ZDF’s state contract were against the constitution. […]

Politicians can also have “no decisive influence” over the selection of members for the television board, the court added. …

[Pontiac]

I am just amazed that it should even be considered that should be a state owned media organ. After the lessons of the Soviet Union no people should tolerate a state owned media. No news paper, no radio and no television.

Why should the government need a state owned media?

I know that they all do even the US has PBS and NPR, but why? In the early days of broadcast there was no NPR and to my knowledge there has never been a national press.

[tcrlaf]

NPR used to be called “The National Educational Radio Network”, and was privately-funded by the Ford Foundation, Kellogg, and a few others, that broadcast educational radio on a very few stations.

Many local stations broadcast educational stuff at the beginning, but that slid due to the need to make EVIL PROFIT.

Then, Lyndon Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act, that created the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, basically nationalizing NPR, and providing for subsidized “government-sponsored” programming.