The fact is, Big Bird isn't going anywhere. If PBS disappeared tomorrow a dozen networks would fight over Children's Television Workshop and a fat slice of that 'Sesame Street' merchandise money cake.
'All Things Considered'and the rest of PBS radio would move to satellite radio to compete on their own merits with other opinion shows.
While government sponsored alternative programming might have made sense in the days of three networks, today we are literally spoiled for choice from hundreds of alternative media and the Internet.
Time for the ideological anachronism that is PBS to go the way of the dinosaur.