GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney just made a few enemies over on Sesame Street after announcing plans to balance the budget by cutting public funding to certain arts programs.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Romney told supporters in Iowa that he'll "stop certain programs. Close them. Turn 'em off. Even some you like." However, this does not necessarily mean killing off Sesame Street, but rather adding commercials and advertisements. Essentially, he's whoring out Big Bird.
"You might say, 'I like the National Endowment for the Arts.' I do," Romney said. "I like PBS. We subsidize PBS. Look, I'm going to stop that. I'm going to say that PBS is going to have to have advertisement. We're not going to kill Big Bird," Romney said. "But Big Bird is going to have advertisements. Alright? I happen to think it's immoral for us to keep spending money we don't have, and passing on to our kids our obligations."
His argument rests in the idea that programs like Sesame Street are popular enough to stand on their own and don't need to be protected in the current media market. The proposal to cut funding for arts programs isn't entirely new either. Earlier this year, Republican Senators Tom Coburn and Jim DeMint introduced a bill to cut subsidies for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. (PBS gets 15% of its funding from the government).
However opponents argue that doing so would defeat the whole purpose of public broadcasting. Almost all programming in the private sector are pressured by advertisers to get high ratings, which means that we would lose valuable programming if it's not profitable.
So would that be worth it? Obviously, Big Bird would argue no. Regardless, if Romney gets his way, the big yellow birds getting one hell of a plucking.
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