{"id":6076,"date":"2011-12-28T15:13:13","date_gmt":"2011-12-28T23:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6076"},"modified":"2011-12-28T15:13:13","modified_gmt":"2011-12-28T23:13:13","slug":"mitt-romney-takes-pot-shots-at-big-bird-and-pbs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6076","title":{"rendered":"Mitt Romney Takes Pot Shots At Big Bird And PBS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/Pix\/Humor\/bigbird-che.jpg\" alt=\"Big Bird\" class=\"alignright\" \/>One of the right&#8217;s perennial targets has been public television and programs that benefit the arts. They have relentlessly criticized these institutions and sought to deny them federal funding. They have even accused them of being socialist vehicles intent on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=4560\" target=\"_blank\">indoctrinating America&#8217;s young<\/a>. Now Mitt Romney joins the battle with a pledge to stop funding PBS and the National Endowment for the Arts (video below).<\/p>\n<p>When Romney says that he wants to <em>&#8220;stop certain programs&#8230;even some you like,&#8221;<\/em> he is referring to programs that are of significant value to average Americans, but that he can live without because his quarter of a billion dollar net worth enables him to acquire whatever he wants. Romney demonstrates how pitifully out of touch he is by proposing to eliminate funding for PBS, a network that provides educational programming that is not available anywhere else, certainly not in commercial television. He is explicit in what he plans to do:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;We subsidize PBS. Look, I&#8217;m gonna stop that. I&#8217;m gonna say that PBS is gonna have to have advertisements. We&#8217;re not gonna kill Big Bird, but Big Bird&#8217;s gonna have advertisements.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Despite his denials, killing off Big Bird is precisely what his plan would accomplish. There is a reason that commercial TV does not produce the sort of programming seen on PBS. For-profit networks have to cater to advertisers in order to stay in business. By necessity they are more concerned with generating profit than with quality programming. Take a look at tonight&#8217;s primetime schedules of the cable nets that were supposed to compete with public television:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Bravo:<\/strong> 8:00pm Top Chef: Texas; 9:00pm Top Chef: Texas; 10:00pm Top Chef: Texas<\/li>\n<li><strong>Discovery:<\/strong> 8:00pm Sons of Guns; 9:00pm Sons of Guns; 10:00pm Moonshiners<\/li>\n<li><strong>Learning Channel:<\/strong> 8:00pm Toddlers &#038; Tiaras; 9:00pm Cheapskates; 10:00pm Toddlers &#038; Tiaras<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That&#8217;s not exactly entertainment designed to enrich America&#8217;s children. It&#8217;s a jumble of insipid reality programs that repeat ad nauseum. It&#8217;s Real Housewives, Swamp Loggers, Hoarders, and info-mercials. If Big Bird were required to rely on advertisers for funding it would not be long before Sesame Street was just another avenue on the Jersey Shore.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s the free market model for public broadcasting that Romney and the right advocate. It&#8217;s a model that would replace Bert and Ernie with Kim and Chloe. Is that really the example we want to set for our kids?<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"480\" height=\"360\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/dR7iA_cQvWk\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the right&#8217;s perennial targets has been public television and programs that benefit the arts. They have relentlessly criticized these institutions and sought to deny them federal funding. They have even accused them of being socialist vehicles intent on indoctrinating America&#8217;s young. Now Mitt Romney joins the battle with a pledge to stop funding [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9,152,1],"tags":[260,405,957],"class_list":["post-6076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-culture","category-election","category-general","tag-mitt-romney","tag-pbs","tag-sesame-street"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-1A0","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7155,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7155","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":0},"title":"Mitt Romney Still Trying To Kill Big Bird And PBS","author":"Mark NC","date":"5\/24\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"In Mitt Romney's recent interview with Time's Mark Halperin, he reprised his attack on one of his favorite targets: PBS. Romney listed public television as one of the first cuts that would come during a Romney administration. In his remarks he even managed to insinuate a commie angle to continued\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Election&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8145,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=8145","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":1},"title":"Debate Wrap-Up: Obama Limps, Romney Lies","author":"Mark NC","date":"10\/4\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"The first debate of the 2012 election is history and the way the press covers it will tell us a lot about whether they are more interested in style or substance. In a couple of snap polls last night, Romney came out on top with a big 2-to-1 advantage. It's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7859,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7859","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":2},"title":"Mexican Anchor Baby Mitt Romney: No One&#8217;s Ever Asked To See My Birth Certificate","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/24\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"In keeping with his promise to change the tone of the campaign, Mitt Romney just dove head first into birtherism in a speech to supporters in Michigan: \"Now I love being home in this place where Ann and I were raised, where both of us were born. Ann was born\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Election&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7889,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7889","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":3},"title":"Ann Romney Salutes Women But Still Doesn&#8217;t Trust Them To Make Decisions About Their Own Bodies","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/29\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"The Republican National Convention Kvetch-a-Sketch continues. Last night Mitt Romney's wife gave a speech that included the shocking revelation that she loves her husband and that she thinks he'd be a pretty good president. Fox News broke into their Karl Rove convention analysis with a \"News Alert\" to announce this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Election&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7330,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7330","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":4},"title":"John McCain Throws Mitt Romney Under The Corporate People&#8217;s Bus","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/16\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Remember when Cory Booker, the mayor of Newark, NJ, disagreed with President Obama's attacks on Wall Street? Remember when Bill Clinton defended Mitt Romney's record as a businessman at Bain Capital? Have you noticed that anytime an Obama surrogate says anything remotely contrary to a position taken by the President\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7293,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7293","url_meta":{"origin":6076,"position":5},"title":"Mitt Romney Wants To Eliminate Government Bloat &#8211; Like Teachers","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/11\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"A couple of days ago I posted an article detailing how Mitt Romney is Protecting America From The Scourge Of Firefighters, Police, And Teachers. I wrote in part that... \"Mitt Romney has boldly come out against big government and its coddling of superfluous bureaucrats that drain our nation of scarce\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Election&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6076"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6076\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6079,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6076\/revisions\/6079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}