Wilson Blames Cable TV Choices for Public Anger Over Budget

The ever-wider array of entertainment programming available to cable television viewers threatens to produce a class of “intellectual shut-ins” who don’t understand the complex choices faced by state government, Gov. Pete Wilson said Thursday.

Wilson blamed the public’s ignorance of the state’s fiscal situation for the anger that has resulted from his decisions to raise taxes and fees and cut spending over the past two years.

“The public really does not have the basic information it needs to render intelligent decisions,” Wilson told the convention of the California Newspaper Publishers Assn.

The governor didn’t blame either the newspaper publishers or the television industry for not trying to keep voters informed on important issues. Instead, he cited the proliferation of cable television choices available to most viewers as an example of how voters no longer have “a common body of information” for deciding public policy.

Wilson said he didn’t know what public officials or the media should do “to keep the public informed despite the public’s wishes” but that the fragmentation of information is “a disturbing phenomenon.”