Honorary Chairman First Lady Michelle Obama- NEA
Posted on 02/05/2010 6:36:04 AM PST by opentalk
Thanks to a stimulus windfall, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) has new funds to support an eclectic array of projects and organizations, from the American Samoa Council on Arts, Culture and Humanities to puppeteers across the country.
Last year Congress allocated $50 million of the $787 billion stimulus bill — designed to stave off a second Great Depression — to the National Endowment for the Arts. Congressional Republicans opposed, charging that the funds would essentially increase the NEA’s budget of $145 million by 34 percent.
The NEA divided its stimulus money in two: $19.8 million was given to regional and state arts agencies and $29.9 million was given directly to 636 nonprofit arts organizations. Unlike thousands of stimulus projects, The NEA assigned and dispensed of the funds within months of the stimulus bill’s passage.
So where did the money go?
(Excerpt) Read more at dailycaller.com ...
While some Americans are just short of starving, our elected officials give millions to the NEA. What an embarrasment our current politicians are.
Puppeeters didn’t do badly, either: The Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta received $50,000, while the Sandglass Center for Puppetry and Theater Research in Vermont and the Spiral Q Puppet Theater in Philadelphia both received $25,000, all to preserve administrators and puppeteers.
The NEA also covered the ethnicity requirement: The Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance received $50,000 to preserve its director’s position, as did Chicago’s Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, which used the money to retain a collections manager and an exhibition coordinator. Radio Bilingue, Inc. received $25,000 to hold onto the host of the La Hora Mixteca Radio Program.
The Mixtecs are native to Oaxaca, Mexico.
My kids are doing without but I’m expected to support adults playing with dolls???
Honorary Chairman First Lady Michelle Obama- NEA
The NEA was created in 1965. Can anyone name a genre of art that has been better post-1965 than pre-1965?
I am a playwright myself on the side. For my last produced play, I put in at least a thousand hours of work between the writing and the production details. In the end, I ended up making about $100 profit. But it’s a labor of love, and I was delighted to earn it honestly and without any NEA money. Why should anyone be forced to support my hobby? The very idea is un-American.
If you like my plays, come see them and tell your friends and I’ll be glad to take your money. If you don’t, don’t see them and I’ll have to write better plays or accept that I will be working for free. But nobody is forcing me to write, and nobody should force anyone to work and pay taxes on my behalf.
The most crooked administration we have EVER had!!
An earlier scandal with the NEA, The Administration was using the funds to promote the Obama agenda through art. My guess this is the reason for an increase in funding.
http://www.todaysthv.com/news/natInt/story.aspx?storyid=98431&catid=288
I have nothing against puppets. I just don’t this is an appropriate use of taxpayers’ hard-earned money when the country is running obscene deficits and debt.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.