THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Monday, January 30, 1995               TAG: 9501260019
SECTION: FRONT                    PAGE: A8   EDITION: FINAL 
TYPE: Letter 
                                             LENGTH: Short :   36 lines

PBS CAN STAND ON ITS OWN

``If Congress defunded public television. . . .'' (Another View, Jan. 12) is shear hate and fear-mongering. I was appalled that you would give credence to such obvious propaganda, even on your editorial page.

Columnist Mark Harmon claims that if the Republican Congress were to take over public television, there would be shows where all the muppets would be bleached white, Reading Rainbow would feature such works as Mein Kampf, Charlton Heston would use machine guns to bag endangered species, etc.

In essence, Mr. Harmon is saying that all Republicans are racist, self-interested Nazis. How extremely insulting to so many of your readers!

As I understand it, the Republican Congress has no interest in taking over public television. It seems to me that it feels it's time that Big Bird supported himself. For more than 20 years ``Sesame Street's'' producers and creators have been using public money to make themselves very, very rich. Why, the merchandising profits of ``Sesame Street'' and Barney paraphernalia alone could support many television stations.

I've also noticed that private corporations have been supporting public television in return for being mentioned on PBS and I, myself (a hated Republican), have at times over the years sent PBS a check or two.

There are many positive things about PBS. I'm sure it can stand on it's own without taxpayer support.

PAULA LEARY

Chesapeake, Jan. 12. 1995 by CNB