Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) made embarrassing news again this week when he suggested that colleges could just "pop in 14 hours of Ken Burns' Civil War tape" instead of hiring history professors, or as he calls them "the higher education cartel." That suggestion didn't go over so well with Ken Burns himself. Mr. Burns is going to be even less enthusiastic about that proposition when he finds out that his number one Senate fan, Ron Johnson, tried to defund PBS, the network where many of his documentaries have run exclusively.

Johnson joined an unsuccessful push to eliminate federal funding for public broadcasting in 2012, two years into his first term. He signed a letter authored by then-Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.), calling on appropriations leaders to push legislation that would defund public broadcasting, including PBS.

"We face many hard choices ahead, but defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting should be one of the easier decisions to make," the letter stated. "We simply cannot afford to continue funding all of the programs that we have in the past."

Besides, it's all there on Ron Johnson's VHS tapes. Why do we need more than that?

Can you spare $3 to raise the Senate’s IQ and get Russ Feingold back where he belongs?