[Dixielandjazz] Effort to abolish NEA & NEH, PBS -NY Times.

[Norman Vickers]

To:  DJML & Musicians and jazzfans lists

From: Norman Vickers, Jazz Society of Pensacola

 

This from today's 1-25, New York Times:




  _____  


Republicans Try to Abolish Arts Groups


By ROBIN POGREBIN
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/p/robin_pogrebin
/index.html?inline=nyt-per> ; Compiled by DAVE ITZKOFF


A group of Republican lawmakers has called for the elimination of the
National Endowment for the Arts
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/n/nationa
l_endowment_for_the_arts/index.html?inline=nyt-org>  and the National
Endowment for the Humanities
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/n/nationa
l_endowment_for_the_humanities/index.html?inline=nyt-org> , each of which
received $167.5 million in the last federal budget
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/f/federal_budg
et_us/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier> . The group, called the Republican
Study Committee and comprising about 165 House Republicans, also called for
eliminating the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which got $430 million.
The proposal, made Thursday, is part of the Spending Reduction Act of 2011,
which aims to reduce federal spending by $2.5 trillion over 10 years.
Senator Jim DeMint
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/d/jim_demint/ind
ex.html?inline=nyt-per> , above, a South Carolina Republican who is chairman
of the Senate Steering Committee, said in a statement that the bill "begins
the difficult task of shrinking the federal bureaucracy that threatens our
future prosperity." Robert L. Lynch, president of Americans for the Arts, a
lobbying group, said in an interview on Monday that the arts provide 5.7
million jobs in the United States that generate about $30 billion in taxes,
nearly $13 billion of which goes to the federal government. "If they're
serious about jobs and they're serious about income, they would invest more
in the arts," Mr. Lynch said. 

FNV Comment:  This effort to shut down the NEA and the NEH has come up
intermittently since the George H. W. Bush administration.  Previously when
hearings were held just prior to a vote, outrageous charges were made on the
day before the vote--- e.g " an artist with AIDS passed bloody towels over
the heads of members of the audience."  The allegations were not true, of
course, but because of the time required to refute the charges, the vote was
over.  The agencies were not shut down but their budgets were severely cut.

I realize that there are two sides to the issue. There is  definite need to
balance our budget, but fairness and truthfulness should also prevail.
Watch and see if that is the case or whether one side resorts to "dirty
tricks."

 
--end--

 


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