David Obey: “I think that we should require of every other program administrator in government the same pristine perfection that we…”

“I think that we should require of every other program administrator in government the same pristine perfection that we demonstrate in the Congress every day. I am being sarcastic. I assume people understand that. I mean, the gentleman is suggesting that because a tiny handful of stations allowed somebody to exchange fund-raising lists, that somehow they ought to pay a penalty for that by cutting back on funds which will assist them to deliver programming to every American. Now, if Members are satisfied with what they get on the private TV networks, then, fine, be my guest and vote for this amendment. But all I would say is that I think, in general, the quality provided on public television is considerably less violent, considerably less ridden with sexuality than the programs that we see on any of the major networks. I would simply say that if Members of Congress had 1 percent deducted from their office budgets every time we did something stupid, we would be operating on budgets of zero. So I think that public broadcasting has already paid a very large penalty for what happened.”