Boise News

Opinion|Politics

What Does Wayne Hoffman Have Against Big Bird?

By Sharon Fisher, 12-21-09

I haven’t written much about Republican operative Wayne Hoffman’s road-to-Damascus conversion to nonpartisan gadfly with his Idaho Freedom Foundation columns. Actually, I thought he often had an interesting kernel of an idea in them, even if I didn’t always agree with how he got there or what he proposed to do about it.

Last week, however, was different.

If you aren’t already aware of Wayne Hoffman, he’s a former reporter for the Idaho Press-Tribune and Idaho Statesman who went on to take several positions in state government, as well as chairing the Idaho Young Republicans. He went on to become Congressman Bill Sali’s spokesman, where we grew accustomed to hearing him say, “What Congressman Sali meant to say was...” Soon after Sali’s defeat by Democrat Walt Minnick, Hoffman announced the ”Idaho Freedom Foundation,” a supposedly nonpartisan nonprofit organization dedicated to developing and advocating “the principles of individual liberty, personal responsibility, private property rights, economic freedom, and limited government.” As such, he publishes an occasional column in the local news media.

I don’t know what Wayne’s problem with Sesame Street is, but twice now in the past six months he’s written columns denouncing state funding of Idaho Public Television—the first time, specifically assuring us he didn’t have a childhood grudge against Big Bird, and, the second time, specifically suggesting cutting Big Bird.

(Hoffman’s wife has run a day care in the past, and the Hoffmans have young children of their own. Do the Hoffman’s clients, and their children, know he’s trying to kill Big Bird?)

I didn’t need to respond to Hoffman’s first kill-public-television column, because Idaho Public Television General Manager Peter Morrill did such a great job of it himself. “Great Caesar’s ghost!” he thundered, going on to point out not only that Idaho Public Television received more than 62 percent of its operational funding from “viewers like us,” but that conservative darling President Ronald Reagan had championed a 31 percent increase in federal funding to public television during his administration.

So what was different about last week’s column?

Drawing a link between funding of cystic fibrosis and funding of the arts and public television in Idaho, Hoffman conjured up an image of sick children choking their life away so that we could watch Masterpiece Theatre. “The dichotomy here is obvious, and the conclusion should be also,” he said.

Well, maybe to him.

Let’s start out with some facts.

The cystic fibrosis program in question is for adults, not for children.

It was not “put on the chopping block.” Cutting it was discussed. It was not eliminated, and the Legislative Health Care Task Force Committee has been discussing what to do with it.

It is true that cutting it is under consideration. However, it is not simply a budgetary matter, but also one of equity and fairness. Other chronic adult diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, are not covered, and few other states provide the sort of cystic fibrosis coverage that Idaho does—to the extent that one legislator expressed concern that Idaho would become a “Mecca for cystic fibrosis patients.”

At the same time, there is no desire on the part of the Legislature to have such patients die when they reach adulthood—an achievement which, thanks to improved medical treatments, more and more of them are now able to do, which is part of the reason for the increasing cost of the program. The committee is working on a way to keep from cutting off such people while at the same time being fair to other adults with chronic diseases, and I have faith that they will find a way to do it—as well as the $205,000 that the cystic fibrosis program costs.

Which brings us back to Big Bird.

While it is true that the state provides $1.6 million in funding for Idaho Public Television, as Hoffman states, it is not for programming. Programming is paid for by grants, foundations, and donations from “viewers like us.” What the state funds for Idaho Public Television is the infrastructure—the stations, the repeaters, and so on. This equipment brings television into the homes of rural Idahoans, as well as quality programming—including live broadcast of the Legislature itself—to all Idahoans.

In short, it doesn’t pay for Big Bird in the first place

Hoffman also lambasted the state for providing $787,600 for the Idaho Commission on the Arts. But arts provide a great deal back to the community—by some estimations, $7 for every $1 invested. One study found a total of more than $166 billion in economic development generated by the arts, and that was in 2005.

But it’s more than just money. As First Lady Michelle Obama said earlier this year at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, “The arts are not just a nice thing to have or to do if there is free time or if one can afford it.  Rather, paintings and poetry, music and fashion, design and dialogue, they all define who we are as a people and provide an account of our history for the next generation.” The Obama administration also added $50 million in stimulus funding to the National Endowment of the Arts (Idaho got its share) to preserve jobs in state arts agencies and regional arts organizations to keep them up and running during the economic downturn.

But lest Idaho’s conservative community recoil in horror from a quote from the Obama administration, let us remember that our founding fathers also understood the value of the arts in producing a well-rounded citizenry. To quote President and patriot John Adams, “I am a revolutionary, so my son can be a farmer, so his son can be a poet.”

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