The video: Democrats recruited PBS character Arthur the Aardvark — or a person dressed up as him — to appear at a press conference on Wednesday opposing budget cuts to public television and radio. House Republicans want to reduce this year's funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting from $340 million... to zero. "We can't leave Arthur and all of his pals in the lurch," said Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), as quoted in The Wall Street Journal. "Public broadcasting is an electronic oasis for learning in what has been called the vast wasteland of commercial television."
The reaction: PBS's budget eats up less than ".0001% of all taxpayer money, and the majority of PBS funding comes from pledge drives" anyway, says Rick Jacobs at The Huffington Post. Republicans should dump their "slash and burn budgets" and keep their "hands off Big Bird." Oh please, says Allahpundit at Hot Air. "A more honest use of puppets and cartoons would be to have them rifling through the pockets of 5-year-olds since, after all, they're the ones who’ll end up paying for this down the road." Watch a video of Arthur the Aardvark (silently) pleading for NPR funding:
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