House GOP Votes to Move Ahead on Defunding NPR
As expected, House Republicans voted en masse today to defund NPR.
They had to rush it through with an “emergency meeting,” before any more people got wise that James O’Keefe’s sting video was a dishonest scam. Can’t let a good smear go to waste.
The proposal, sponsored by Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.), would ban any federal money from going to NPR, including funding through competitive grants from federal agencies and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. NPR receives about $5 million annually in such funds. The bill would also prohibit NPR’s roughly 600 member stations from using federal funds to purchase programming from NPR and to pay station dues.
Voting in favor were 235 Republicans and one Democrat, Rep. Heath Shuler (N.C.), while all 181 Democrats present voted “no.”
The bill has no chance of passing through the Senate, of course. Rep. Louise Slaughter nails the GOP’s real motives:
Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.), the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, called the bill a “purely ideological bill so members can go home and brag about what they have done to NPR” when they return to their districts later Thursday for a week-long recess.
Exactly right. It’s an empty gesture to the ignorant base: “Look! We really stuck it to those pointy headed commie intelleckshuls!”