Tom Buhrow, WDR director and ARD chairman, advises the Hamburg Übersee-Club on a 15-year plan for public broadcasting. About a posse.
Of
Willie Winkler
The public-law system, which must be stated very clearly at this point, has failed miserably. The educational mandate, with which the fee-financed broadcasters are entrusted according to Article 11, Paragraphs 2 and 3 of the Interstate Broadcasting Agreement, is neglected right up to the highest institutional circles. The latest example: WDR director Tom Buhrow. On Wednesday evening, Buhrow gave a speech in front of the Hamburg Überesseclub, in which he jumped from one rhetorical platitude to the next like a speaker opening the marquee. No ban on thinking was left unthought, no taboo that shouldn’t fall, no forehead that wasn’t offered. Of course you should be “strong together”, but “not careless”, “discuss openly”, act “responsibly” and absolutely “help shape”. Or as Buhrow, the master of truly glaring ramblings, brilliantly puts it: “and, and, and”.