Budget constraints, My Ass!

I must begin to sound like a shill for MoveOn. I'm not. I use them and they use me...both in just the ways we want to be used I suspect.

Not that any of Bush's rationale's are likely to take in anyone reading this blog but don't you get sick, tired and angry at this kind of crap?

MoveOn provides a link whereby you can weigh in quite easily on the matter. Please do so. You may be apprehensive of giving out your e-mail to MO. Don't be. Their privacy and email policy is right on the form and I know they stick by it. You can be in for this one fight and then bail. Or, maybe you will like this form of involvement. The way I think of it is "the parties have candidates and will muddy the issue to focus the candidate, the dot-orgs have issues and will bloody the candidate to focus the issue."...I am a multi-issue political animal, not a party political animal. And quick response plus connection to events is the pulse of netroots. Try it! There will be a box into which you can type your particular emphasis on the demand to save NPR and PBS. This was mine:

To Senators John Kerry and Ted Kennedy and to Representative Ed Markey:

Gentlemen:
Given the stands you have taken on key issues of our day such as the Iraq war and breakdown of health care I am sure that you appreciate how shows like Frontline have done your causes more good than harm. Beyond seeing a gross affront to civic mindedness and fiscal responsibility in the president's war-friendly,tax-stupid, service-cutting budget, it is hard not to suppose he wants to eliminate NPR and PBS because of their inconvenient habit of telling the truth. Trust me on this sirs, I would miss that news with its fidelity to facts and freedom from the attached strings of sponsorship and partisan meddling even more than I would miss your particular services. And if we lose the one, what stands in the way of losing both? Let us NOT keep having to save something of such obvious public benefit as neutral news and preschool educational shows that can reach the very poorest households!

We gave our congressional delegates their jobs. Its high time to ask them to do those jobs now that the preznit is so damned eager to undo them. The sonofabush already lost this fight once. This time we should put it out of reach. Its rather like making a house childproof: if you have a president so insulated from the world of his citizens by his coterie of yes-men that he keeps sticking his political tongue into proverbial electrical outlets, just take away his options. That is a possibility in the PBS funding fight.

Note: US citizens reading this blog probably know just who their congress critters are and may even have them on speed dial. But if not, go to the extremely valuable and informative Congresspedia page of SourceWatch.org and enter your zip code in the yellow box on the left sidebar. Don't know your zip? Ask your mom. You know, that woman who has been writing you letters and sending you things? She has your address. And if Frontline goes off the air, she will have to listen to Fox News to know what's up with medicare. Get the picture?