SCROOGE

PBS Fights Spending Cuts

Lawmakers want to trim federal funds.

Maybe lawmakers should watch a little more television. Despite PBS earning 58 Emmy nominations for fan favorites like Downton Abbey, bean-counting lawmakers still want to cut back on federal funding for the public television network. The proposed cuts would mean that some of PBS’s stations would have to “go dark,” said PBS president Paula Kerger, especially in some of the nation’s smaller markets. Republicans in the House of Representatives recently trotted out a law that would gouge federal money for PBS and National Public Radio—a move that Kerger said is “disappointing to me when you look at the value the American public places” on public television.