MISTER ROGERS NEIGHBORHOOD

“I’m sorry, Jim. I’m going to the stop the subsidy to PBS. I’m going to stop other things. I like PBS. I love Big Bird. I actually like you, too. But I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for it.”

-- Mitt Romney, on PBS funding

What an idiot.

Funny, Mitt seems to think the right path to balancing the budget, if elected, would be to cut the $445 million the government spends on funding PBS. Yes, it does seem like a lot at first, but it works out to a little over $1 per taxpayer each year. In fact, the money received by PBS from the government works out to be 0.012% of the budget.

Seems pretty reasonable to me, considering the government in 2012 spent $1 Billion dollars on the war in Iraq, a war that is supposed to be over. It also sent Amtrak $1.4 Billion in capital grants and subsidies. Last, and certainly not least, another $864 million was spent by the government on office space acquisition.

This so-called war against PBS funding goes back almost to the day funding began. Here is a clip of Fred Rogers, host of the beloved Mister Rogers Neighborhood, speaking at a 1969 congressional hearing regarding the Nixon Administration's attempt to cut funding from $20 million to $10 million.

The clip is a little over six minutes, but it's worth every second you'll spend watching. Mr. Rogers impassioned plea for full funding is moving not only in its eloquence, but because it worked. PBS got the entire $20 million.

Mr. Rogers, you are my hero.