Opposing viewpoints: What did Big Bird do to you?

Like most people who watched the presidential debate last week, I’m of the opinion that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney mopped the floor with President Barack Obama.

It’s pretty easy to see how Romney did it. Obama exuded the personality of a wet carrot.

But regardless of whether he came out on top, Romney had some low points.

Specifically, his plan to cut funding to the Public Broadcasting Service was perhaps one of the most asinine and uninformed attacks I heard the entire night. 

To begin, the funding for programs like PBS is laughably small.

Count von Count wouldn’t even bother trying to add it.

Investment in public broadcasting in general equates to about one-hundredth of a percent of the total annual federal budget. 

Specifically, PBS funding requires about $445 million of that, less than one-thousandth of a percent of the budget.

This is clearly over-the-top budgeting on Romney’s part. I understand that the nation is in a deficit and that we need to save as much money as possible, but cutting a program that doesn’t even register as a percentage point is too much, especially when that funding is so vital.

Stations in the more rural areas of the country depend heavily on federal funding, with upward of 60 percent of their budget being traced back to the government.

Without governmental funding, these stations will surely shut down.

But perhaps the most aggravating bit of this whole situation is that Romney doesn’t seem to know or care what he’s cutting.

PBS is a learning channel that broadcasts countless programs to better our nation’s youth.

History Channel may have sold its academic soul to the gods of reality TV, but PBS stands resolute in its goal to educate in a fun and engaging way.

Its rate of success with children is remarkable. PBS is watched by 81 percent of all children between the ages of 2 and 8.

When Romney looks at programs like PBS, he seems to see only dollar signs.
PBS is so much more than that.

It’s been such a huge part of our culture for so long that you’d be hard-pressed to find an adult who didn’t learn the alphabet along with Big Bird.

We need programs like PBS now more than ever, and cutting them, as Romney plans to, is nothing more than shortsighted.  

­— kevsjack@indiana.edu