Last week, Republicans passed what was called the recissions bill, which among other things, eliminates all federal funding for PBS and NPR, including the local affiliates. This is awful, but there is an opportunity here, if Democrats are willing to seize it.

No, I’m not referring to the de facto accelerationist strategy professional Democrats have adopted: if professional Democrats haven’t figured out the cunning strategy of “Trump take Big Bird”, then they’re much more stupid than even I thought. Here’s the thing: these stations, especially the local ones, are going to need a lot of free programming. There’s an opportunity for a smart Democratic operative with access to rich people to create loosely-aligned news, along with cultural/historical programming, and offer it to local PBS stations for free.

One thing to keep in mind is that a lot of conservatives watch PBS and listen to NPR too–they’re not just for liberals. This is a way to burst the FOX rightwingosphere bubble. Of course, this would mean less money for (most) consultants and less control over that money for professional Democrats–and they are far too often slavish devotees of the Iron Law of Institutions.

There is an opportunity here, if Democrats can seize it. And they need to do this because I’m absolutely certain the same idea has occurred to Republicans.