Sometimes I feel that we get so caught up in the daily news cycle and the resulting media criticism that we lose touch with something that we all know-- though we may need to be reminded of it. This fact is that mass-market investigative journalism is alive and well, using the old-fashioned medium of the radio.
I've listened to a number of great reports on the radio in the past couple of days that have surprised me with their breadth, brought me to tears, made me laugh out loud, and above all, made me think. While it may seem so to some readers here, the primaries are not consuming all the media's oxygen, and access to broadband internet means that many of us have access to an incredible range of reports that can make us think about the war, about poverty (both at home and abroad) and about domestic and foreign policy.
This stuff is everywhere-- below the fold, just a few of the radio programs and reports that I would recommend for a wide view of the worlds events. Most are available via podcast as when I get tired of one issue dominating (or seemingly dominating) the airwaves, I find podcasts a great way to have on-demand broadcasting of what I'm (and I'd hazard, all of us are) interested in.
First, let's start with the BBC. Their documentaries are the best in the world, bar none, in terms of quality and quantity. The World Service has a four-part series that just wrapped up called A Dollar A Day. The reporter traveled to Kenya, Peru, India and Ghana to report on those living on less than a dollar per day, and the status of the Millennium Development Goal to lift people out of this desperate level of poverty. He talked to Kenyan subsistence farmers who just barely were able to feed their families with what they grew, and had no money left over to buy the required uniforms to send their children to school. Many of these farmers had great ideas for the better allocation of the aid money that they have seen spent for years, but never seen the benefit of.
He talked to a woman in Peru with 10 children who is part of a demographic that is slowly getting covered by the government's aid programs, but it's not enough, and it's often not arriving in time. Finally, he talked to old people in India, left behind by the rapidly moving economy-- their families no longer feel responsible for them as they move away from home more than any previous generation, and there is no government safety net "like you have in Europe and America" in the words of one woman. Hearing these people and their stories helps remind us both of what we have, and how aware the rest of the world is that they don't have the same things.
Secondly, I'd like to give a shout-out to my local public radio station, North Country Public Radio in Canton, NY. Over the past few years, they have invested a great deal in their local news operations (their listening area is very large-- about 6 hours by car East-West, and the same North-South with a number of small and relatively isolated mountain communities for whom NCPR is the only local news source). This investment has paid off in a big way as they are now producing top-notch local investigative stories on local, regional, national and international issues (their listening area includes a good portion of southern Ontario and south-western Quebec). I think that this investment partly resulted from peoples' disaffection with Morning Edition and All Things Considered, which seem increasingly to follow the story-line set for them by the rest of the media, rather than setting their own narrative.
NCPR produced an really good four-part series on PTSD sufferers at Fort Drum, the massive base for the 10th Mountain Division in Watertown, NY. This is actually from December, and told the human background for the story that Morning Edition told last week about base administrators being ordered to lower the number of PTSD diagnoses, diaried here.
Thirdly and finally, citizen media. I honestly don't listen to much self-produced radio because between the BBC, APM, NPR, the CBC and other public broadcasters there aren't that many hours left in the day. However, blogger NTodd at Dohiyi Mir and the rest of his blogging empire produces an excellent occasional podcast-- Paxcast-- that is inspirational because his devotion to nonviolence and peace. He also has great taste in music.
I realize I don't have much to say here, besides this: Look for it, and issues that we all care about are being covered the way we would want them covered. We can learn about the growing movement for local food (Splendid Table); about old style investigative journalists and real dirty campaigning (Daniel Schorr on the Bob Edwards Show) and about other events and news throughout the world and our country-- then we can come back to Daily Kos and it'll be as worthwhile as ever-- or better.
What do you listen to? Can you recommend ways for us to stay informed about the world while avoiding the media circus that so often follows politics? Thank you!