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The carnage from the midterms leaves us with wingnuts high and low — and drunk with power. Look at this shite:
Conservative Republicans Propose Eliminating Arts And Culture Funding.A group of conservative Republicans, called the Republican Study Committee, revealed a new plan on Thursday to cut federal funding for arts down to zero. This means the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities would be left in the cold. Not to mention the potential hit at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Run by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the over 150-person group’s plan, the Spending Reduction Act of 2011, would “save” $167.5 million pulled from the NEA and the Humanities endowment and $445 from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. They are forecasting that this erasure of cultural funding would reduce federal spending by $2.5 trillion over the next decade.
And at ths state level, the obsession over controlling the reproductive systems of women is reaching fever pitch in a number of states. (NYT):
Lawmakers in Many States Pushing for Abortion Curbs
The lawmakers are drafting, and some have already introduced, bills that would ban most abortions at 20 weeks after conception, push women considering abortions to view a live ultrasound of the fetus, or curb insurance coverage, among other proposals.In Florida and Kansas, legislators plan to reintroduce measures that were vetoed by previous governors but have the support of the new chief executives, like ultrasound requirements and more stringent regulation of late-term abortions.
“I call on the Legislature to bring to my desk legislation that protects the unborn, establishing a culture of life in Kansas,” Gov. Sam Brownback said last week in his first State of the State message.
“This is the best climate for passing pro-life laws in years,” said Michael Gonidakis, executive director of Ohio Right to Life, expressing the mood in many states. “We’ve got a pro-life governor and a brand new pro-life speaker. Our government now is pro-life from top to bottom.”
12 Comments
Gotta Love the GOPHundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars to drive brave, hard-working, honorable gay servicemembers out of the military? Well spent!
A few thousand for the arts? Outrageous!
Very interestingThe real reason they want to kill CPB is because it’s the only media outlet that still reports on the misdeeds of government.
Is this really a surprise to anyone?This is exactly the same crap they pulled last time they were in charge of the House. In their view, art, in any form, is a waste of time and money. Art, they believe, serves no useful purpose in society. Besides, even if it did, anything that serves to exalt the human condition and is NOT based on Jesus and the Bible, is bad and needs to be destroyed.
Hundreds of billions for corporate welfare and wasteful, unnecessary military spending is fine. Helping children to discover the creative within themselves and learning to appreciate it in the wider world…a complete waste.
Who’s killing the soul of America now? Elvis on velvet is good enough.
Wildly unlikely they’ll do much harm to the arts,if only out of self-interest. The boards of the scores of museums, symphony societies and suchlike that would be affected are sloshing over with corporate executives and the wives of corporate executives, all of whom are riding the Arts(TM) gravy train and benefiting both financially and socially from the ride. The new crop of teabaggers in congress may not care about alienating them, but the party leaders have more than enough survival instinct to ensure that it doesn’t happen. At worst we’ll see a few individual artists and “Piss Christ”-type projects singled out (which is bad but not catastrophic). The arts establishment overall is quite safe.
Into our own handsI’m disturbed by both the erosion of women’s reproductive rights and the gutting of art funding. Time to take things into our own hands; I can’t be bothered with “leaders” who provide no leadership and “lawmakers” who write laws that serve theocratic and corporate interests at the expense of human rights and welfare. Too bad the government extorts thousands of dollars from me every year – I could certainly find more constructive things to do with those funds than pour them into endless war and politicking.
Maybe I’m short-sighted or have too little inherent paranoia, but after Roe v. Wade passed it didn’t occur to me how the right to reproductive choice could and would be undermined.
Speaking of taking things into our own hands, that’s just what Jane – an underground group of women – did to make abortion available before 1973. An interesting piece of history – I wonder if it will need to be repeated.
It is significant to note that every fascist and totalitarian government worked to destroy the artsWhen Christians took control of the Roman Empire, a great deal of public art was destroyed. Same with when Protestants took control in Europe. The Bolsheviks, followed by Lenin and Stalin. The Nazis. Mussolini. Mao. Castro.
And, right along with them, the Republican Party of the United States of America.
ArtI am a starving artist. We are called that because we would rather buy supplies than eat. I could not imagine life without creating. All the funding cuts and censorship in the world will not stop us from telling our stories thru music, theatre, dance, sculpture, painting, or print. We are the historians. It is thru art we know about our past and can see the future. Creative problem solving is what drives us to move forward. For me, creating is like breathing.
We don’t do it for the money. We don’t do it for the accolades. We are driven to express ourselves and when our corner gets full, we try to find a like mind that will take it home and understand.
I feel sorry for the people who have no appreciation for the arts. They live a blind life of staying inside the lines. Their comfort zone is limited so they get frightened by our unabashed expressions.
The true artists of the world will never let anything get in the way of their expressions. We have no choice. It is what we are.
http://bjlincoln.wetpaint.com/
Save the military-industral complexLord knows we need to keep charging 10,000% inflation on ANYTHING that goes on a war machine.
Let’s not do a cost-effective audit on what we can do or change to save our money from bleeding away on no bid hyper inflated contracts with the military.
The military is GOP gold and can not be touched!
Actual conversation
Me:
“Cant you fit a 22″ LCD flat screen in there for $200 instead of that 1970′s monochrome CRT that costs the taxpayers $20,000, needs constant replacement, weighs more, and uses far more energy?”
Military leadership:
“No! The instruction mandates that we put this in and we will get hit on inspections if it is different.”
Me:
“Aren’t you in a position to change this? I mean all it needs is a simple modification for the modern display connection. Wouldn’t that $18,000 saved help a closing school somewhere?”
Military leadership:
“I can’t do that. This is proven technology. They will issue a revision if they felt that was better.”
Me:
Realizes that the real answer is he doesn’t want to question the Admiral. facepalms
Let’s save moneyby ending the Faith Based Initiative programmes instead.
If we sold a Nimitz class carrier, that would probably fund the entire social services budget of the US for a year or so.
How about a base closing here and there?
I recommend all of the still manned FOBs in Iraq and those in Afghanistan, as well as that deep water port that we cling to in defiance of international law, Guantanamo Bay?
Lets stop subsidizing nearly everything in Alaska
Lets go all states rights on border protection and let texas, new mexico and arizona pick up the tab,
I think that this would make a far bigger dent than cutting AMTRAK and the arts.
Any takers?
The sad thing about the Republican anti-abortion campaign is that they know it won’t affect them.The Republicans are content to let abortion return to the pre-Roe v Wade days when only wealthy Republican women could get safe abortions and everybody else took their chances.
It’s part of the entire trend. The Republicans want to eliminate any aspect of a public society and replace it with privately funded playgrounds where it is legal for them to exclude anybody but themselves.
By the time a lot of middle and lower income white people in the U.S. wake up to this ploy it will be too late, and lots of those middle and lower income white people will have cast the votes that handed all the wealth and power to the very rich.
Too true!Look at the illegal “clinc” which was recently raided and reported on here at PHB. Already, the Mandatory Motherhood Mob have been spewing the lie, equating that this “clinic” is just like all the other “baby killing” clinics, and thus is an example as to why Roe should be overturned.
I truth of course, is that this “clinic” is in fact an example of what it was like BEFORE Roe was handed down! But don’t tell the fanatics of the American Taliban this… it’ll conflict with their fantasies, and thus cause them to think.
Ashamed and ironicFirst, I’m ashamed this twit Jordan’s from Ohio. In fact, his district’s home base is just to the south of me, in Findlay. The district is rabidly and vehemently conservative: anti-union, anti-LGBT, anti-choice.
Ironic in that Findlay supports the arts. Both the high school and university music programs are supported, with the local musicals well attended and even extended from time to time.
I play in a summer community band which has hundreds to a thousand people attend, and the concert series itself has been going for well over 50 years, thanks to the support of businesses in town.
As to truthspew’s comment, I remember the criticism PBS and NPR faced because they dared to be neutral during the invasions of both Afghanistan and especially Iraq. I believe the GOP thought those two outlets should’ve marched in goosestep with the rest of the MSM, and act like Radio Moscow did during the Cold War.
I also remember back in I believe the Reagan Regency when the PBS logo was changed to look right instead of left.
We’ll see if these Neanderthals of the right get what they want when the budget faces the Senate.