When Gov. Bob McDonnell made a point of cutting state funding for public broadcasting, reasoning that it was not a core government service, Virginia Democrats were beside themselves. Senator Henry Marsh took to the pages of Style Weekly to thunder that the educational programming offered on PBS stations deserved state support because of the “educational support it provides our schoolchildren.”
So that means student test scores have skyrocketed in the age of “Sesame Street,” right? Well, no. If anything, scores are getting worse.
But if putting money into public broadcasting really is as critical as some contend, for reasons educational, cultural and otherwise, then a recent court decision could be the answer to their prayers:
Reversing a decades-old rule, a federal appeals court said on Thursday that public television and radio stations could not be prohibited from broadcasting paid political advertisements.
The ruling could prompt some noncommercial stations to start including ads from candidates and political action committees on their broadcasts, just as commercial stations do. Hundreds of millions of dollars are expected to be spent on advertising in the prelude to the elections this fall.
The ruling startled the television industry when it was issued on Thursday, in part because the case before a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit initially involved ads bought by corporations, not candidates.
This will probably rankle some public broadcasting purists, who believe that this could make public stations no different from their commercial counterparts (though it’s doubtful that “The News Hour” will be sponsored by ShamWow any time soon. Life Alert, though, is a real possibility).
But this ruling does serve the valuable function of providing a market solution to public broadcasting funding. It also provides politicians, like Mr. Marsh, the option of putting their campaign dollars where their mouths are and actually sponsoring an episode or three of the syrupy “Caillou,” or even “This Old House.”
It’s a win-win.
And by the way, if you’re devoted to old-fashioned capitalism, and the defenders thereof, you can always advertise with Bearing Drift: [email protected]
