Drug Cartels Chuckle at Our Muppet-in-Chief's Priorities

There will be a lot more drugs for sale at the corner of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood and Sesame Street thanks to questionable budgetary priorities in the Obama Administration.  Of the few and clearly defined enumerated powers of the Federal government, noticeably absent from the list is funding television and radio stations.  Noticeably present in that list is protecting the United States from all enemies and maintaining public safety so citizens may pursue their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Grateful to the Obama Administration for the $451 million vote of confidence!

Yet, when faced with a budget priority decision between funding efforts to protect the United States from its "greatest organized crime threat" and funding NPR and PBS, the Obama Administration chose the priority with the greater potential political profit:  keeping Muppets on the air.  Capital Cloak has nothing against Muppets, mind you. Likewise Capital Cloak has nothing against cartoon character Arthur, except when he shows up at the Capitol building along with Bert and Ernie to pull on the heart strings of Members of Congress before they vote on "GOPink slips" for the beloved animated friends. However, Capital Cloak DOES have something against increasing funding for NPR and PBS to extraordinary levels - $451 million for the coming fiscal year- at the expense of cutting $38 million from an agency fighting what the Administration's own Homeland Security Secretary declared as our greatest crime threat in America today. 


It would seem a no-brainer for a Commander in Chief to try and secure his nation's borders and dedicate sufficient resources to fight international criminals bent on enslaving his countrymen.  Not so, with our current Muppet-in-Chief.  In the same budget which gives such a windfall to NPR and PBS, the Department of Justice agency tasked with combating organized drug cartels on American Soil, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), received a reduced budget - $38 million in cuts - from the previous fiscal year.  The Administration likes to chide Americans that everyone needs to tighten their fiscal belts and sacrifice, but apparently that sense of sacrificial duty only applies to agencies that actually safeguard Americans from crime and work to stem the tide of drugs pouring across our borders daily.  If you host news shows on PBS and speak glowingly of the Administration, or if you provide children's programming that could easily be provided, and is provided, in the private sector by companies such as Disney and Nickelodeon, you not only are not expected to sacrifice, you are handed $6 million more than last year, bringing your total to a staggering $451 million budget.  That is a belt-tightening that will only encourage further wallowing in the government trough.

Lest anyone think that NPR and PBS employees can maintain any degree of impartiality in their news coverage of current events involving President Obama, representatives of both entities expressed that they were "grateful to the Obama Administration" for the "vote of confidence".  How does one repay a debt of gratitude totaling $451 million?  With truthful but sometimes unflattering news stories and documentaries about the Administration?  Not likely. Where is intrepid Sesame Street Muppet Newsflash reporter Kermit the Frog to get to the truth of biased NPR and PBS news coverage of Democratic administrations? Somehow this video seemed all too applicable to any assurances we may hear from NPR or PBS officials about their political impartiality after being "rescued" budget after budget by Democratic administrations:

An Administration's priorities are best observed in what it desires to spend money to accomplish and what it is willing to cut from its budget.  Despite tough talk about drug cartels by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano in 2009, the Administration's latest budget proposal to cut DEA funding by $38 million while throwing money at PBS and NPR clearly demonstrates that controlling the messages broadcast over public television and radio is of far greater importance than controlling drug-related crime and the alarming spread of drug cartels in nearly every American city.  This is what Secretary Napolitano warned in 2009:

Mexican drug cartels maintain drug-distribution networks, or supply drugs to distributors, in at least 230 American cities, leading the Justice Department to call Mexican drug cartels the ‘greatest organized crime threat to the United States

 Americans of all political stripes and economic classes are being murdered by cartels and gangs over drugs.  Americans of all ideologies and incomes are becoming addicted to drugs supplied by cartels.  Families are literally being ripped apart by the ravages of illicit drug activity in homes and schools.  These cartels are operating brazenly in our streets, knowing that our government lacks the spine to commit adequate resources to the task of fighting them with any semblance of efficacy.  They operate in real cities, on real streets.  Except, of course, on Sesame Street, where everything is "A-okay" as long as the taxpayer spigot never slows by even one drop.  If funding public broadcasting is a high priority for the Obama Administration, then let it find those funds at the expense of agencies with no explicit duties to protect our national security and keep us safe to continue in our pursuit of happiness.  Keeping the men in the picture above off our streets is more important to most Americans than keeping Arthur in our living rooms.