I guess we shouldn't be surprised.

With Republicans back in charge of the House of Representatives, funding for NPR and PBS is in grave danger. Again.

The Republicans just released their budget proposal, and it zeroes out funding for both NPR and PBS—the worst proposal in more than a decade.1

They probably think that no one will notice these cuts in the midst of so many others. But the millions of listeners and viewers who rely on public broadcasting for "Sesame Street," "All Things Considered," and independent journalism will notice.

We need to tell Republicans that cutting off funding was unacceptable last time they were in charge, and it's unacceptable now.

Add your name to the petition to save NPR and PBS:

Petition

The petition says: "Congress must protect NPR and PBS and guarantee them permanent funding, free from political meddling."

The Ohio GOP may soon push "breakthrough" legislation requiring the official execution of Medicare recipients, according to a fictional source within the party.  Secret computer-based lotteries will decide who will be eliminated from the state's Medicare rolls, he said in confidence, but family notification would be withheld until after the shootings have taken place. 

The GOP now has total control of the Ohio legislature and governor's office.  The unnamed "source" explained that soaring budget deficits threaten the party's efforts to eliminate the Ohio estate tax, a tariff that could lower the income of some of the state's multi-millionaires by as much as several thousand dollars. 

"There are simply too many Ohioans turning 65 to allow this to continue," the source said.  "Clearly those who have not accumulated at least $2 million by the time they become seniors have no right to continue to live, let alone to impinge on those who, by the force of their efforts and the grace of God, have become acceptably rich."

George W. Bush has his back to the wall. He just cancelled a speech in Switzerland due to fear of mass protests and his arrest for authorizing the torture of detainees at Guantánamo Bay.

Bush is afraid of another Pinochet incident. In 1998, late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London on a warrant from Spain for multiple crimes committed during his brutal, bloody reign.

Human rights activists all over the world have pledged to seek arrest warrants wherever Bush travels outside the United States. Already, legal proceedings in Spain and Germany target Bush and his henchmen for their crimes. Bush cannot hide, just like Pinochet couldn’t.

We owe the people of Switzerland, Spain and Germany a debt of gratitude for their steadfastness and continued activity to bring Bush to justice. We can do no less.

This is truly a global movement for accountability and justice. The American people have a special responsibility to continue to expose Bush and keep the pressure on.

Bush and Cheney were hoping that the outrage against them would die, but it never will.

In the United States, a country with the greatest spying apparatus in world history, 80% of it used against its own people without "probable cause," Reagan's legacy as a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) snitch known as "T-10" must be honored. Having our very own "first snitch" is something to be proud of in a nation dedicated to surveillance and a security-industrial complex unmatched by any Constitutional government.

We should also pay homage to Reagan for all he did to advance the rights of unnatural corporate persons. His days as a corporate shill for General Electric when the company was engaged in massive price-fixing in violation of the free market and fundamental principles of capitalism have to be acknowledged.

Reagan and his former CIA director George Herbert Walker Bush both were elected in 1966 for the first time. They both sided against natural born black citizens by adopting the racist rhetoric of "state's rights." So while the Kennedys and King fought for natural people, Reagan's record demonstrates a shining commitment to Jim Crow in the U.S. and in support of the racist apartheid regime in South Africa.

In his nationally syndicated column in December 2010, George Will defended the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bush v. Gore. The infamous case halted the counting of votes in Florida 10 years earlier and handed George W. Bush the presidency.

In claiming that the Supreme Court got the decision right, the nonattorney Will made several incorrect statements. That’s probably the only way to defend what dissenting Justice Stephen Breyer has called “the most outrageous, indefensible thing” the court has ever done.

Will said problems with the vote count in Florida could have been mitigated “by adhering to a principle of personal responsibility: Voters who cast ballots incompetently are not entitled to have election officials toil to divine their intentions.” Will ignored the fact that tens of thousands of perfectly valid votes weren’t counted in Florida because of problems with voting machines, not voters.