A snowy week in Hampton Roads

Crashes pile up amid snow in Hampton Roads

Services, events canceled due to snow

If you read the paper, a lot of it will be about the snow, which made the roads slippery yesterday and looked pretty and that’s all I’ll say about it because I’m not AMS-certified. Four days from now, on the winter solstice, AltDaily will introduce our new full-time meteorologist, who will be online 24/7 with up-to-the-minute Doppler radar, tidal charts, and surf reports. For now I’m only covering my bases so as not to get accused of ignoring the day’s biggest news, given that I’m about to home in instead on a short article from yesterday. To wit:

Public broadcasting on the chopping block in Virginia

The Pilot reports that Governor McDonnell is “proposing a $2 million reduction in the next fiscal year” in state funding for public broadcasting, and “a full phase-out by the close of the following year to save $4 million.” This will eviscerate WHRO and other Virginia PBS and NPR stations in return for a few million dollars—but hey, we’ve got a shortfall, and $4 million is big money, right?

I couldn’t help but notice another statement yesterday from McDonnell’s office that he’ll propose spending $4 billion on roads. If you dilate your eyes, “$4 million” might look on the page like “$4 billion.” Off the page, four million is one one-thousandth of four billion. Since it’s hard to compare numbers that are so hugely disparate, let’s look instead at a single project.

Virginia Beach is rebuilding the intersection at Kempsville Road and Princess Anne Road for $89 million. (A budget rundown is here.) It’s part and parcel of the larger Witchduck Road construction project, which has another phase costing $27 million and yet another one that’s $29 million. “But roads have nothing to do with PBS!” “Those figures combine state and federal funding!”

Why public broadcasting?

Fine, but the numbers above still represent the true cost of widening one single road in the Hampton Roads region. While Witchduck Road has an evocative name, I’ve driven on it just twice, and $145 million is a lot of money. McDonnell agrees: “It’s a wonderful resource, cherished by many,” he said yesterday, but his ultimate lack of support “is driven by the fundamental need to re-establish the proper role of government, and budget accordingly.”

Except he was talking about public broadcasting, which costs one thirty-sixth the amount of that single road’s widening.

For me to have driven on Witchduck Road twice has nothing to do with whether or not to widen it. I believe the $145 million is an extravagant waste (and they call me a liberal!), but plenty of people live along the road and use it daily. Likewise, scores of PBS- and NPR-bashers are arguing an irrelevant point when they shout that they don’t watch PBS. It may be true, but it doesn’t matter a whit, because millions of us do watch it and listen to NPR and derive invaluable things from the existence of these organizations.

According to Free Press, “some 80 million [Americans] watch public television. Most American households (67%) and more than 133 million people tune into public television each month.” Right-wingers like to toss around the cynical canard that public broadcasting is liberal, which I’ll address below, but “Americans consider PBS news and public affairs programming the most trustworthy and objective. More than 40 percent … ranked PBS as the most-trusted source for news and public affairs programs.”

In another poll, “90 percent found that PBS provides “high quality programming.” That’s not 90 percent of PBS viewers but rather 90 percent of all Americans. Can you name any other media organization that 90 percent of Americans find to be of “high quality,” let alone one beholden to advertising?

Since these statistics are so noteworthy and so contrary to the notions Bob McDonnell holds, I’ll quote further. “The [federal] cost of public broadcasting (TV and radio) for the entire year is $1.70 per person. By comparison, the average cable bill is over $481 per year, with premium channels and digital packages costing even more. According to a recent Roper poll, the majority of the public (51%) believe the amount of federal funding PBS receives is ‘too little.’ Most Americans (82%) believe [PBS funding] is ‘money well spent.’”

Perhaps most illustrative: “The American public considers PBS the second-best use of tax dollars, ranking below only military defense.” Considering that PBS receives one one-millionth of the military’s dollars (I haven’t run the numbers but I doubt I’m exaggerating), I’d say “money well spent” is an understatement. You might even think, given such widely held opinions, that PBS funding would be a sacrosanct item in the budget, safe from cuts.

It’s not, though, because certain figures on the far right have been chipping away at public trust in PBS and NPR in a truly cynical fashion by spreading the pernicious rumor that PBS is liberal or left-wing. That notion has achieved such a foothold that several Pilot commenters base their absurd arguments on the proposition that liberals would be angry if the government funded Fox News.

Well, yes, if Glenn Beck had to file federal purchase requests every time he needed new chalk, that would upset me. But comparing Fox News to PBS is like comparing nuclear apocalypse to panda bears. They’re not in categories that merit comparison. For proof, let’s look at a representative sample from today’s WHRO schedule.

Let’s see… there’s Sesame Street, Sid the Science Kid, The Electric Company, Nova, Charlie Rose, This Old House, Paint Paper and Crafts, Austin City Limits, Teen Kids News, Dinosaur Train, Curious George, Great Performances, Sewing With Nancy. I guess I’m having trouble finding the liberal shows. I don’t watch much TV; maybe the host of Sewing With Nancy is Nancy Pelosi? That would figure, since sewing is what liberal elitists do.

PBS is blatantly nonpartisan. The news hour on PBS is trusted by ninety percent of Americans because it reports the news without bias, as practically no other TV news show does. And news constitutes a tiny fraction of the channel’s programming. According to 170 Million Americans for Public Broadcasting, “public television stations air a minimum of 7 hours of non-commercial children’s programming each day”—which is why the words of Del. John Cosgrove (R-Chesapeake) are so troubling.

“Personally, I’m going to support policemen and teachers before I support Bert and Ernie,” said Cosgrove earlier this year. But to cut PBS to pay for education is nonsensical, because PBS educates in so many ways. 170 Million Americans reports that “Local public broadcasting stations are … expanding digital educational resources [in part by] creating online libraries where educators can access digital, standards-aligned audio and video clips of public television content for use in their classrooms,” and that’s just one of dozens of examples they give.

If children improve their reading skills by watching Sesame Street and other PBS programming, that offsets education costs. It’s probably hopeless to tell PBS-haters that a thriving arts culture and thoughtful populace behooves our civic health, but surely they’ll listen to arguments about saving money. If McDonnell’s road budget were $4.004 billion instead of $4 billion, would they demand that it be cut by exactly $.004 billion? PBS costs one one-thousandth of what we’ll pay for roads next year, and I’m not conflating federal and state funds here. One one-thousandth.

Cutting PBS to fix the budget is like going on a diet by vowing no longer to sprinkle black pepper on your food. It makes so little sense, in fact, and it’s so culturally bankrupt, that I wouldn’t be surprised to learn it’s really a belated swipe at NPR for firing Juan Williams after he violated his contract by appearing as a paid commentator on Fox News. Williams’s name has been front and center in partisan attacks on NPR, but that contract violation is why he was fired—not for the substance of what he said. It’s certainly not because Williams failed to be “centrist.”

The Democratic Party these days is a rather centrist organization. Organizations that strive to be unbiased, like NPR, can get mistaken for occupying that same “center.” But there are key differences between centrism and lack of bias.

This op-ed has been brought to you by the letters W, T, and F and by the number four million.

‘Don’t ask’ repeal gains support; vote Saturday

I won’t believe it until it happens, but the Senate may be about to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell tomorrow. A similar repeal passed the House earlier this week. There’s no other piece of federal legislation being considered that would have a more profoundly positive effect on Hampton Roads.

Heartbreaker

This song by Girls from their new EP Broken Dreams Club was on repeat while I wrote the above.