Raiders of the lost PBS funding

On Tuesday, Gov. Bob McDonnell vetoed $424,001 that had been earmarked in the state budget for educational programs produced by public radio and TV stations.

"Such grants are not core services of government," he said in a statement, "and especially given the scarcity of resources during these difficult economic times, such grants ought to be eliminated."

If instructional programming for public school children doesn't quality as a core service of government, Virginians might wonder what the governor would include in that category. They did not have to wait long for an answer.

On Wednesday, McDonnell announced he had awarded $4.6 million in grants, tax breaks and in-kind donations of office space to billionaire movie director Steven Spielberg, who is planning a film about Abraham Lincoln in Richmond and Petersburg.

McDonnell frequently repeats the lines of prominent cable TV conservatives who argue that all radio and television shows should be underwritten by private interests.

But the TV and radio money the governor targeted this week could not have been spent to bring commercial-weary viewers a "NOVA" episode on why the Incas abandoned Machu Picchu.

Instead, the funds he cut - down to that last lonely $1 - were designated solely for classroom videos and curriculum plans on topics ranging from American authors to geometry to ancient civilizations, all of it carefully designed to help students pass the Standards of Learning tests.

The incentives being handed over to Spielberg are valued at 10 times the amount yanked from academic programming, and they represent the bulk of the funds McDonnell has added to the state's movie incentives over the past two years.

McDonnell justifies his rich incentive package by arguing that it will generate thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in revenue. But those jobs and dollars are ephemeral, and the next well-heeled director fishing for a venue will be insulted if he or she doesn't receive an equally generous offer. The money cut from PBS could ultimately result in the permanent loss of real jobs held by Virginians.

It's also unclear how much taxpayers will be spending to hire Daniel Day-Lewis an extra hairdresser so he can more closely resemble Lincoln, who showed no sign that he employed even one. Or perhaps the cash will upgrade Sally Field's trailer to reassure the actress signed to play Mary Todd Lincoln that she is really liked in the Old Dominion. (In a sign of how different the movie world is from the one most of us inhabit, state rules limit tax credits claimed on wages at less than $1 million per cast member.)

It's possible that without Virginia's $4.6 million come-on, Spielberg would have filmed Lincoln's visit to the war-torn capital of the Confederacy in some deserted corner of Kazakhstan.

Instead, the commonwealth taxpayers will help subsidize a more authentic backdrop and hope the man who gave us "Jurassic Park" has more respect for history than he does science. Even if he takes liberties with the script, it's doubtful that the state's schoolchildren will know the difference.