Distasteful was probably not the right word. Pandering means that you are giving something to someone, that they want but it is something that is immoral or improper to give and the judge of that morality or properness is the society the pandering is happening in. In this case the USA.
Choosing to compress your audio, or to play classical music instead of jazz is not immoral, at least not as judged by reasonable Americans, so it isn't pandering.
If what you are really getting at, is the idea of the US federal government providing tax revenue to NPR is distasteful to many, that may be true, but it doesn't mean that NPR is pandering to anyone. Similarly, FOX News may or may not be pandering to someone, but their acceptance of federal tax breaks isn't evidence of it.
The person I was responding to supplied their own definition of pander:
>By this I mean, consider the leaders of the organization have demographic data on who is most likely to pledge support during their quarterly pledge drives.
By this definition, NPR has admitted to pandering (would only need to establish that NPR consumer === pledge supporter) in this article alone.
Choosing to compress your audio, or to play classical music instead of jazz is not immoral, at least not as judged by reasonable Americans, so it isn't pandering.
If what you are really getting at, is the idea of the US federal government providing tax revenue to NPR is distasteful to many, that may be true, but it doesn't mean that NPR is pandering to anyone. Similarly, FOX News may or may not be pandering to someone, but their acceptance of federal tax breaks isn't evidence of it.