GPB – Informative News — By Tommy Purser

A couple of years ago, I mentioned in this space about the sources I use for enlightening me on the world in general and Georgia in particular.

It was a wide range and while I get some of my information from network news and cable news (not Fox News propaganda), most of my information comes from print media — newspapers, magazines, etc. Sometimes I read about scientific research, not opinions mind you, but research based in fact.

Polls don’t really interest me much because I suspect that there are many, many, many people who, like me, don’t respond to polls. So polls don’t necessarily tabulate the opinions of all people but, rather, tabulate the opinions of people who like to answer polling questions. Quite frankly, most times I’m too busy or preoccupied to answer poll calls. I have better things to do.

Most polls include the number of attempts that were made to contact people for input and the number of times there was a response to those attempts. If you’ll take the time to look at that information, you’ll find that the number of people who respond is minuscule. I think those people, like me, represent a majority of people.

One year, during an election, a data gathering organization talked the good wife into helping them with exit polling here in Hazlehurst. Most people answered her questions but there were some who politely told her they didn’t participate in exit polling. I think if someone asked me, I’d give them the same response.

I’m an impatient person way too often. I don’t have time to waste with robo-dial calls or exit polling questions.

But, I digress. I started this column by mentioning that I had written before in this space about the sources I use for news.

When I wrote that column, a good friend from north Georgia who reads my column religiously each week, responded by telling me I had left out a source: Georgia Public Broadcasting, and/or National Public Radio.

In response, I started listening to GPB and NPR and I am hooked. Fair, balanced, informative, and entertaining, I keep the radio in my truck tuned to 90.1 and I am loathe to miss “Political Rewind” which airs several times a week at 2 p.m.

And I’ve become a “sustaining member” which means each month GPB drafts out of my banking account a fee to help support their programming. It is money well spent.