I have to respond to Margie Thibault’s Oct. 17 letter regarding “wants and needs” of taxpayer funded subsidies.

She used a metaphor of Mitt Romney’s about Big Bird/PBS funding as a “want” subsidy, not a “need.” Sesame Street is an excellent, non-violent learning program for children all over the country.

She states taxpayers no longer can distinguish between wants and needs, and this is a character flaw of President Barack Obama.

I must have this character flaw as well as I look at it in a very different perspective. PBS’s programs offer educational and decent entertainment for young and old when most of today’s programs center around reality shows and violence.

The price to taxpayers in millions to PBS is minuscule compared to subsidies of billions we give to just one corporation, Exxon Mobil, when it already has yearly profits of billions at our expense at the pump. Gov. Mitt Romney approves of corporate subsidies.

Thibault also states we have nothing to show for the trillions Obama spent. President George W. Bush’s trillions went mostly to corporations and wealthiest. President Obama’s went mostly to states, middle class and poor to keep them afloat during this recession mess Republicans got us into.

This is the difference between tea party Republicans and progressive Democrats, the two options we have today. Are we going to be fooled again by these extremists or are we going forward with President Obama?

William Fleming

Augusta