The Senate just passed its version of the $9 billion rescission bill, bringing the country one step closer to ending the most egregious and indefensible federal spending in the modern era. Public broadcasting. The $500 million that taxpayers are forced to fork over for government radio and TV yearly is such a small slice of the $7 trillion spending total, it’s more like a spending “scrape” than a cut. However, what these federal funds lack in volume, they make up for in stupidity.