The New York Times' Stephen Labaton has the story:

Investigators at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting concluded today that its former chairman repeatedly broke federal law and its own regulations in a campaign to combat what he saw as liberal bias.

The scathing report by the corporation's inspector general described a dysfunctional organization that violated the Public Broadcasting Act, which created the corporation and was written to insulate programming decisions from politics.

The corporation received $400 million this year from Congress to finance an array of programs on public television and radio, although its future financing has come under heavy criticism, particularly from conservative lawmakers. Its board is selected by the president and confirmed by the Senate.

The corporation's former chairman, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, who was ousted from the board two weeks ago when it was presented in a closed session with the details of the report, has said he sought to enforce a provision of the Public Broadcasting Act meant to ensure objectivity and balance in programming. But the report said that in the process, Mr. Tomlinson repeatedly crossed statutory boundaries that set up the corporation as a "heat shield" to protect public radio and television from political interference.

As with many of the difficult stories the White House has had to handle in recent weeks, news of Tomlinson's allegedly illicit activities is not necessarily a problem in and of itself. But given the fact that two Bush administration officials have been indicted recently, as have former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and GOP superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, this story further corroborates claims by administration critics that there is a dearth of ethics in the White House.