I suppose people want to say the presidential candidates have a debate between each other, as it's always been

An issue is that the harddrive is full of a lot of these things.  There is a strong need to have discussion on priorities at this point, and decing what is worth it or not.  And the biggest items on the harddrive will get people thrown out of office if they decide to tweak.  Heck, look at the GOP trying to go after Obama regarding Medicare.  That is to score political points.  If you were to also bring in military spending, another large item, that ends up being another.

It's for the undecideds who wait until the election gets closer to actually start studying the candidates and issues. A debate allows a relatively easy way to see what each nominee's views are and how they compare to the other's.

So yeah, it's still very important.

this thread seems like a damage control thread to me. Debates can matter, I refer you to the republican primary this year as proof.

Wasn't particularly clever when Neil DeGrasse Tyson originally said it, and it's even less clever when you regurgitate it for lack of anything better to say. There's nothing you can point to in the federal budget that's worth cutting if that's the standard, including the oil company "subsidies" that Obama loves to bang on about. Ending those would only account for about two or three days worth of deficit spending at the current rate. That doesn't mean that they're not worth ending.

It's perfectly valid, because PBS is a fine institution, if only for what it provides to children, and costs America little. Not like Oil Subsidies which, small as they may be, do nothing but line the pockets of big oil.

So killing PBS would be like getting rid of a good .txt file.

That's why I said it indicates a lack of fluency. If I ask you a question about something and you just stutter and stammer and hem and haw, it doesn't necessarily mean that you don't know the answer. But odds are, you don't.

Apropos of nothing, I'm finding a huge number of my lib friends are asking this very same question today--I wonder if there's some over-riding reason for this? Like, say, their favored candidate got crushed like an eggshell in a debate happening just last night. Something like that. I'm sure it's just coincidence.

This may be a silly question, but why does the government need to fund PBS?  Can't the programs on the channel be funded like any other channel, through advertisement revenue?