I'm beginning to think that PBS has outlived most of its usefulness.
Here in the DC area, we have two major PBS stations, 22 and 26. They're both on their second major fundraising push in, I believe, the past 6 months.
Not only are the fundraising pushes getting more frequent, they're also getting longer and longer and longer. If I'm not mistaken, they're now up to at least 3, and possibly 4, major fund raisers a year.
At the same time, they show the same shows time and time again while in fundraising mode.
The two here in DC have been trading off the same John Denver special (one of their "gifts" for sponsorship) for the past couple of years. It's running again tonight for at least the 5th time in the past 2 weeks.
I recognize that PBS brings a lot of very interesting programming that I'm likely never going to see anywhere else (especially BBC commedy), but for the love of God, this is getting excessive, and is one of the reasons I've quit supporting PBS.
I'm thinking that DC simply doesn't NEED two major, and at least one minor channel 31 or 32 on my cable system, PBS stations, running roughly the same programs on staggered schedules and doing their fundraising at the same time.
This area is bleeding heart liberal frigging central, especially Maryland. If these stations can't make enough to support operations with 1 or 2 fundraisers a year, plus their regular mailings, how in the hell are the PBS stations in other areas of the country, areas that are a lot more conservative, doing it?