Americans for Limited Government, the parent organization of this website, has created an advertisement for the purpose of running on the networks operated by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting that calls on the organization and its subsidiaries to be defunded.
Check out the ad:
As the Daily Caller reported:
Referencing conservative James O’Keefe’s sting on NPR executives Ron Schiller and Betsy Liley, the ad’s announcer asks, “Why would an NPR executive say they would be better off without taxpayer funds?” then says, “the fact is less than 15 percent of public broadcasting dollars come from taxpayers” and that the nation faces $1.65 trillion deficit in “this year alone.” It wraps up by asking viewers and listeners to “call you congressman today and tell them that you are a public broadcasting viewer and you support defunding.”
In a document accompanying the video’s release, ALG’s General Counsel Nathan Paul Mehrens references several public broadcasting efforts to influence viewers and listeners on the taxpayer funding issue. “Currently, WETA a public station which broadcasts in the Washington, D.C. area, has a video clip posted on their website called ‘Let Congress Know How You Feel,’ encouraging viewers to contact their congressmen to express their opinion about eliminating federal funding for public broadcasting,” Mehrens wrote. WETA also has a pro-taxpayer funding for public broadcasting campaign on its website.
And from a statement released by ALG:
Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today demanded that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) give equal time for an advertisement urging that Congress defund public broadcasting.
“The debate over taxpayer funding of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting has clearly reached a level where disparate opposing points of view should be allowed on stations that receive taxpayer dollars to fund programming,” Wilson wrote in his letter to the CPB.
The letter cites ads that have been run by the CPB: “Currently, television stations that receive taxpayer funds through the CPB, including WETA which broadcasts in the Washington, DC area, are posting a video clip on their website called ‘Let Congress Know How You Feel’ extolling the virtues of public broadcasting and encouraging viewers to contact their Congressmen.”
ALG has in turn requested equal air time, free of any cost, with a 30-second video, “ALG Wants You To Help Defund Public Broadcasting”.
Wilson noted that the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 requires that the CPB operate with a “strict adherence to objectivity and balance in all programs or series of programs of a controversial nature.”
The letter concluded, “Public broadcasting advocates have loudly proclaimed that you provide a balanced voice for those who otherwise would not have their message heard, now it is time to prove it by running this 30-second piece that balances the position that you are already articulating.”
Also read:
Letter to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, March 23rd, 2011.
Script of ALG ad for airing on public broadcasting, March 24th, 2011.
ALG Memo: “Why Public Broadcasting Stations Should Run Our Ad Free of Cost,” March 16th, 2011.
