By Katie Kieffer
If you want to make more money than your private sector peers, get a job in PR or broadcasting for the government.
Warning: You will make more money, but you will lose all creativity, input, control and ownership over your work.
PR and broadcast professionals generally fall into three important camps – news managers, news relaters, and news interpreters. They help preserve the rights and freedom of all Americans when they work independently of government pressure.
This month, USA Today released a report showing that federal employees make significantly more than private sector employees in comparable occupations. The biggest public-private pay variances exist in the average annual salaries of public relations managers and broadcast technicians.
NO MORE BULLDOGS
Let’s take a look at the monetary “treats” that the federal government is offering private media “watchdogs” (broadcast professionals) and news managers (PR professionals) to turn them into federal lapdogs:
The government seems bent on eliminating investigative journalism, specifically watchdog journalism. At the end of the day, many decisions come down to money. Particularly during a recession, people will choose careers and employers based on the size and stability of their paycheck.
So, by creating such a large pay variance between private sector and public sector PR and journalism professionals, the government will remove “unsavory” viewpoints from the public arena. And, even if a few stubborn private media moguls, such as Rush Limbaugh, Jason Lewis, Michael Savage or Laura Ingraham persist in their watchdog roles, the government will eventually be able to squelch their voice with its army of highly paid federal PR and media employees – unless this trend is stopped.
We can already see this happening with The Associated Press (AP), which has become an agent for The Man. Remember how the AP assigned 11 reporters to Sarah Palin? Remember how AP reporter, Calvin Woodard, wrote a “Fact Check” article claiming that small businesses do not create jobs?
Remember how the AP conducted its own poll to show that supposedly, “More Americans believe steps taken to reduce global warming pollution will help the U.S. economy than say such measures will hurt it?” Here’s the shocking truth: The AP conducted this study in Nov., 2009 but withheld release of the “results” until Dec., 2009 during the same week as the Copenhagen Climate Conference.
Additionally, the AP study was conducted by allegedly independent firm, GfK Roper Public Affairs & Media, which boasts a cozy polling partnership with the AP since 2008. Rush Limbaugh reported that, “In contrast, the New York Times/CBS News poll was conducted between December 4th and 8th, and it doesn’t show the same results and details.”
President Obama presents at Copenhagen. Image: AFP/Attila Kisbenedek.
GfK also recently conducted a study indicating that PBS (which operates through federal funds from the innocent-sounding Corporation for Public Broadcasting) is “the most trusted and unbiased source for news ahead of Fox News Channel, CNN and other commercial networks.”
Let’s connect the dots: The AP has a reputation for construing the facts in favor of liberalism and the current administration’s agenda to expand government. The AP also partners with a not-so-independent research firm that conducts polls favoring man-made global warming myths and federally-funded broadcasting.
USA Today’s report reveals that it “pays” to work for the government. So, unless the public becomes aware of these facts and demands media watchdogs, not treat-plumped lapdogs, expect to see more PR and media giants follow the AP and GfK’s trend of construed news.
We need to monitor the FCC to make sure they don’t slip the “Fairness” Doctrine in “under the radar” by way of new gov’t. regulations! We have
to support the Broadcaster Freedom Act.