Archive for the ‘Teya Ryan’ Category

It is peculiar how certain red-meat issues among Republicans travel poorly between Washington and Georgia.

Last year’s health care overhaul obviously incited GOP angst in both D.C. and the state Capitol. Abortion continues to prompt near-universal condemnation from Republicans. Gay marriage, too — though that may be slowly changing.

But it is the Republican attack on public broadcasting that has landed with something of a dull thud in Georgia.

Two weeks ago, the GOP-controlled U.S. House voted 228-192 to block federal funding of National Public Radio. Among many tea partyers, public broadcasting — including Big Bird — has become one of the most glaring symbols of government excess.

“In an age when there are almost limitless outlets from which Americans can get the news, even bordering on information overload, there is no reason for taxpayers to be subsidizing NPR,” declared U.S. Rep. Tom Price, R-Roswell.

U.S. Rep. Tom Graves, the Republican from Ranger, made the defunding of …

Continue reading The split GOP take on public broadcasting: What happens in D.C., stays there »

Early this spring, Gov. Sonny Perdue made a quiet stir in the state Capitol with his selection of former CNN executive Teya Ryan as the head of Georgia Public Broadcasting.

The governor broke two unspoken rules along the way. First, the five previous people in charge of bringing Ken Burns or Clifford the Big Red Dog into your home had been state bureaucrats.

Teya Ryan, president and executive director of Georgia Public Broadcasting

The idea of putting an experienced broadcaster in charge of a state-owned network of nine public TV stations, 18 radio stations, an educational video arm and a web site actually qualifies, by Georgia standards, as revolutionary.

But it was the second violation that left Republican lawmakers, in particular, irate. Perdue passed over several GOP-credentialed nominees pushed by GPB’s board of directors — which has the formal authority to make the appointment — to get to Ryan.

Resentment was exacerbated by the fact that, in a world bisected by Fox News …

Continue reading Sonny Perdue puts a CNN veteran in charge of Georgia Public Broadcasting »