[Mb-hair] "Why Would I Resign?"

[Lauren Coletta, Common Cause]

Dear Common Cause Activist,

On Tuesday, we received the long awaited report from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) Inspector General who investigated the activities of former CPB Chairman Kenneth Tomlinson (http://www.cpb.org/oig/).  As we expected, the report describes a rudderless agency in disarray under Tomlinson's leadership, and strongly criticizes his efforts to politicize public broadcasting programming and his partisan hiring practices, among other issues.

This is not news to Common Cause members.  More than 100,000 of you have taken action over the last several months to combat Tomlinson's reckless management of an important American institution, and we thank you.  The 67-page report raises a number of important issues that will need to be addressed in the weeks to come.

But right now, the evidence shows that a "partisan litmus test" was used in the hiring of the current CPB President Patricia Harrison, a former co-chair of the Republican National Committee.  Because of that evidence, we are calling for her immediate resignation.  Please sign our petition demanding her resignation:

http://www.commoncause.org/StepDownHarrison

Tomlinson did not work alone in his efforts to efforts to stack the CPB senior management with partisan operatives.  The report found that senior officials at the White House played a role:

"...[W]e identified e-mails between the former Chairman and staff in the Executive Office of the President that, while cryptic in nature, their timing and subject matter gives the appearance that the former Chairman was strongly motivated by political considerations in filling the President/CEO position."

According to news reports, Tomlinson also consulted Karl Rove, a long time associate, about hiring decisions, even though the former chairman told the Los Angeles Times in May that he had denied having any contact with White House officials (http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/11/16/former_public_broadcasting_chief_violated_ethics_investigators_allege/).

When Patricia Harrison heard that Common Cause was calling for her resignation, she asked, "Why would I resign?"(http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2005-11-15T202021Z_01_SCH557625_RTRUKOC_0_US-MEDIA-TOMLINSON.xml&archived=False)  If the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is to renew itself and regain public confidence, Harrison needs to step down, and the CPB board must address the many deficiencies identified by the Inspector General report.

Please join us in asking Patricia Harrison to step down, and forward this email to friends and family and ask them to do the same: http://www.commoncause.org/StepDownHarrison.  We will deliver the petition at the next CPB board meeting on January 31 and provide the CPB and media outlets with updates on our progress in collecting signatures.

Please download the petition page and bring it with you to local events in your community.  You can always mail them to us at Common Cause, 1250 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC, 20036.  Stay on the lookout for more information as we learn more about the implications of the Inspector General's report.

Thank you for all you do for Common Cause.

Sincerely,

Lauren Coletta, Senior Director of Media Programs, and the rest of the Common Cause Media and Democracy Team

P.S. You can learn more about our efforts in a recent Washington Post article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR2005111501740.html) and President Chellie Pingree's NPR interview (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5014688) on Morning Edition.


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