The Fix’s Sean Sullivan reported early on the unexpected mention of Big Bird in the first presidential debate:
Sesame Street character Big Bird’s name came up at Wednesday night’s first presidential debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney.
During the first presidential debate Wednesday night, GOP challenger Mitt Romney said he would cut funding for PBS, even though he is a fan of Big Bird.
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As Romney noted what entities he would stop funding, he mentioned the president’s health care law, then added that he would also stop a subsidy to PBS.
He said to moderator Jim Lehrer, who works for PBS: “I’m sorry, Jim. I’m going to the stop the subsidy to PBS. I’m going to stop other things. I like PBS. I love Big Bird. I actually like you, too. But I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for it.”
The AP delved into the social media reaction:
As Republican Mitt Romney pledged to cut funding to PBS — adding, “I like PBS, I love Big Bird” — commenters on Twitter leaped to the defense of their favorite “Sesame Street” characters. Big Bird was a major Twitter trend throughout the night, while Oscar the Grouch and Bert and Ernie also featured. Twitter said that shortly after Romney’s remarks, users were posting 17,000 tweets per minute mentioning Big Bird. A spoof Twitter account, @firedbigbird, quickly won thousands of followers, while others shared a jokey, doctored photo showing the character posing with a cardboard sign pleading for work.
Why the proposed cuts to public television? Romney’s comment came during a segment concerning what to do about the federal deficit. The remarks below came immediately before he said PBS and Big Bird would not pass his test as critical enough to “[borrow] money from China to pay for it:”
ROMNEY: Good. I’m glad you raised that, and it’s a -- it’s a critical issue. I think it’s not just an economic issue, I think it’s a moral issue. I think it’s, frankly, not moral for my generation to keep spending massively more than we take in, knowing those burdens are going to be passed on to the next generation and they’re going to be paying the interest and the principal all their lives.
And the amount of debt we’re adding, at a trillion a year, is simply not moral.
So how do we deal with it? Well, mathematically, there are three ways that you can cut a deficit. One, of course, is to raise taxes. Number two is to cut spending. And number is to grow the economy, because if more people work in a growing economy, they’re paying taxes, and you can get the job done that way.
The presidents would … prefer raising taxes. I understand. The problem with raising taxes is that it slows down the rate of growth. And you could never quite get the job done. I want to lower spending and encourage economic growth at the same time.
What things would I cut from spending? Well, first of all, I will eliminate all programs by this test, if they don’t pass it: Is the program so critical it’s worth borrowing money from China to pay for it? And if not, I’ll get rid of it.
For The Washington Post’s Dan Zak, the moment was a blip of relatability in a stream of wonkish banter:
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