Yeah, Cut'em Loose.

With the brouhaha over NPR's sacking of Juan Williams, we thought it might be worth calling the question: Is National Public Radio really public radio? Our thoughts on this consideration, from an earlier post, can be found here.

The Big Rolls in the Game.

The Center for Responsive Politics has tabulated the spending by independent organizations (i.e., not the political parties). Here are the totals:

Pro-GOP: $140.0M

• US Chamber of Commerce - $75.0M
• "American Crossroads" (Rovian Cabal) - $65.0M

Pro-Dem: $171.5M

• AFSCME - $87.5M
• SEIU - $44.0M
• NEA - $40.0M

In our local Congressional race, Democrat Mark Schauer has received about $1M from PACs, while Republican Tim Walberg has received about $270K, as reported by the CRP.