In order to survive, yes, but almost all, if not absolutely all, the DeMedici's built was with private funding, including not just a few church buildings.

That which belonged to government and that which was private was much different in those days; almost as much different as between the years 1800 and 2000 in America.

Did I consent to have Bush take my tax dollars and murder innocent people?

You don't get a line item veto as a citizen.

No, not yet, but we should have that capability. It's certainly doable with today's communication technology.

As a supporter of the "Doctrine of Unanimous Consent", I'm opposed to both expenditures of involuntarily obtained loot.

I don't think the concept of, "the government has acquired the money, so the only argument is what we use it for" obtains.

Holy crap, I agree with HardDrive...

The end is near... cats and dog living together...

With all the junk this country pours billions of dollars into... oh wait, let's cut funding for the arts.

Steping over dollars to pick up pennies. :rolleyes:

I've heard that argument made time and again, but isn't it really how the money was acquired, rather than the amount?

David Boaz said it best:

http://www.cato.org/testimony/ct-db071105.html

(am I turning into FastPaste??!!)

If NPR and Public Television are a waste of resources for most Americans, let see a pole. I vote waste.

I personally have a problem when I hear "send me your money" and then I have to watch 3 commercials albeit between programs, and then "crybaby cry" the government won't give us free money." Ask these guys what there salaries are! You'd be surprised by how much you're being fleeced.

Watchdog Journalists? What a joke.

A lot more then 2% of PBS funding comes from the federal government. My local station, KCET, the main socal/L.A. station gets 7% of it's funding from federal grants. But this is in a large market with a lot of people watching and contributing. There are some stations in smaller markets that get over half of their funding from the feds. Do away with federal funding, and there will still be PBS stations in L.A., San Francisco, New York, Chicago, Boston, and other large cities, but some of the ones in smaller markets will not make it.

Now I like some of the programming on PBS, but most of it is cr@p. Of course I think most of the stuff on the for profit broadcasters is cr@p too so maybe I am not the right one to ask.

You aren't inferring that blue area liberals support the arts and conservatives in red states don't?

Is there a petition out there to encourage our Congressmen to cut the funding? :D

I used to listen to NPR a lot, but then I realized that in the past few years I hadn't heard one news story that held the USA in a favorable light. The America-bashing is getting old...it's ironic that NPR is funded by the very government it holds so much contempt for.

BRILLIANT!!!

We wouldn't want the federal government to publish a national newspaper. Neither should we have a government television network and a government radio network. If anything should be kept separate from government and politics, it's the news and public affairs programming that informs Americans about government and its policies. When government brings us the news -- with all the inevitable bias and spin -- the government is putting its thumb on the scales of democracy. Journalists should not work for the government. Taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize news and public-affairs programming.

Not at all. It's just a numbers game. In big cities you have more people to get money from.

Not to worry, it'll be gone in the morning.:cool:

Let's go further, let's forbid the federal government any access to public relations people. Do we really want the fedgov "selling" anything to us?