Big Bird : Soon Brought To You By Viacom Ltd.

There is one place where advertising dollars and media consolidation can not impede the progress of good ideas, and can not drag programming quality into the craphole. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting uses federal dollars to fund public broadcasters, who in turn give us Civil War documentaries and Nova. Seriously, however, the public broadcasters (including NPR) are widely seen as one of the few unbiased sources of news information.

This one place exists because the government decided that instead of selling all the broadcast real estate out there, that they would hold onto a tiny little bit and fill it with programming without a money trail. So what's the problem?

The Republican chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee on labor, health, and human services says that there is a liberal bias in CPB's programming choices. Because of this, he wants to dramatically slash the CPB funding over the next two years.

While we at H.O.P.E. are non-partisan, we will simply say that to axe the CPB for any reason is a terrible idea. Further cuts place our news-watching options in the hands of a smaller group, and eliminates a trusted source of news (especially foriegn news.)

Here is a nice way to influence the upcoming votes.

Here is an excellent history/writeup of the debate so far.

Here is an easy way to call your senator and influence this upcoming vote