Save NPR and PBS
February 13, 2007
President Bush just proposed drastic cuts to NPR and PBS. We’ve stopped similar cuts in the past, but enough is enough: With the new Congress, we can make sure this never happens again.
We need Congress to save NPR and PBS once and for all.
Can you help out by signing this petition to Congress? It’s really easy—just click the link below:
Thanks!
5 Responses to “Save NPR and PBS”
Done and done.
By mim on Feb 13, 2007
It may amuse you to know how much of the PBS budget is from the Government…not much. When I interviewed with them years ago, I asked those questions. Most of their money comes from patents they hold for Hi-Def and Closed Captioning systems right now. They also hold multiple patents for video compression.
While I agree they shouldn’t lose money, what they ask from the govt is peanuts, I don’t like when they complain about losing those funds.
Not sure about NPR though.
And our local PBS megastation MPT makes most of it’s operating budget from selling production services in their state of the art studios.
By daffyd on Feb 14, 2007
So the government doesn’t give them very much money now but you think they shouldn’t complain if they get even less?
By mim on Feb 15, 2007
Is it really a 25% cut or is this an instance of baseline budgeting deception?
It’ll be interesting to see if the number is legitimate or not.
For example, in the past if an organization had a reduction in the rate of growth it gets reported as cuts.
As an example, if an organization has $75m budget one year and a projected budget of $100 which gets reduced to an $80m budget the media will report it as a 20% cut even though the actual budget grew.
By John Gibson on Feb 15, 2007
No, complain away, but also look for a way to detach yourself from government funding. Where I work, we receive no government money, and therefore aren’t at the whim of someone who doesn’t like how we cover an event.
Same goes for PBS. They show culture and art, and do a very good job. But from time to time, when a member of government doesn’t like what they see they cry out that PBS is polluting the airwaves with filth, and should lose all government funding. Eliminate the problem, find a way to operate using no government money whatsoever.
Perhaps PBS funding is better left at a state level, where actual public service commitments can be guaged and the amount of funding dependent on it?
With our current level of technology, ratings can be done on huge numbers of the population (using Tivo, Satellite receivers and Cable boxes) if I were PBS, I’d take the numbers watching to the government and ask for an amount based on the viewership. A dollar a viewer?
I’m actually for PBS, but after donating what I could a few times, they sent me more in mass mailings than I gave them. Their promotions are costing them more than they take in.
Did you know that Sprout (the PBS kids station) repeats Sesame streets. I’ve seen the same on 3 times in the last couple of weeks. And they only show them twice a day.
By daffyd on Feb 16, 2007