Last night a friend and I were trying to grapple with-- if not exactly "understand"-- some conventional wisdom, namely that Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is "very educated," a "very intelligent" man and a "policy wonk," or at least what would pass for a Republican version of a policy wonk. His 100% Know Nothing attack on volcano monitoring made him sound like either an ignoramus or a two-bit craven hack pandering to the worst instincts of the purposefully ignorant anti-science crowd that had its day of quasi-respectability when George Bush sat in the White House. Soon after his snide comment about how the federal government (i.e., Barack Obama's new budget) "wastes" money by trying to understand volcano eruptions, Alaska's Mount Redoubt exploded for the first time in decades. It's still exploding nearly a week later. Senator Mark Begich of Alaska sent Jindal an e-mail: "I sleep better knowing the scientists are at work ... keeping track of this activity."
I suppose the Louisiana electorate is happy Jindal didn't denigrate hurricane monitoring. No amount of media hype will ever persuade me that a man who gratuitously addresses the nation by demeaning science and scientists-- a man, no less, claiming to be able to cure cancer by performing an exorcism-- is actually "intelligent," other than perhaps in a cunning and purely political, manipulative kind of way.
Yesterday Shaun Treat, who got his PhD at Louisiana State University in 2004 and is now an Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Communication Studies at the University of North Texas, teamed up with Holley Vaughn, a doctoral candidate in his old department at LSU to warn us about the real life effects of Jindal's politically motivated budget cuts, another manifestation of his exalted status in GOP circles as a "policy wonk," I suppose. Their report:
Bobby Jindal is about to enact a shameful budget cut that will devastate Louisiana's economy by slashing the state budget for the Arts and Arts education by 83%.Yes, you read that correctly... 83 percent!
This extremist Republican will virtually eliminate a $10 billion industry supporting 144,000 jobs. The Louisiana House Appropriations Committee will be meeting on April 2nd-- which is next week!-- and they are our last hope to stop Jindal from pressing this insane course of action!
We are working to persuade the media to cover this story and give desperately-needed assistance to those Louisianians fighting to keep the Arts and Arts Education alive in our communities and schools!
Investing in the arts is economically productive. It is paramount in revitalizing struggling urban centers and dilapidating historic districts. In terms of civics, these programs foster public discourse and debate and critically activate public memory. Moreover, these programs attract tourism, which is a vital part of Louisiana's struggling economy.
This shameful attack that shows Jindal's true NeoConservative colors!
In Northwest Louisiana (10-parish region around Shreveport), nonprofit arts groups and their audiences generate $89.77 million in economic activity, support 2,367 jobs, and provide nearly $13 million in state and local tax revenue.In addition to the arts contributing tremendously to Hurricane Katrina recovery efforts, the state launched the World Cultural Economic Forum this past fall to showcase the link between the arts, economy, and tourism. It will be expanded in 2009.
Louisiana's Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism launched the Louisiana Cultural Economy Initiative in 2004; in addition to promoting the arts, the program aims to attract businesses related to the arts to the state. Its 2004 report showed that for every state tax dollar spent, $5.86 is returned to the state treasury and citizens of Louisiana.
The National Endowment for the Arts will distribute $50 million of the stimulus funds to arts projects in all 50 states which specifically preserve jobs in the nonprofit arts sector that have been most hurt by the economic downturn.
In 2008, Louisiana received 27 grants totaling $1,343,700 from the National Endowment for the Arts.
I think it will surprise most of my friends to know that I'm an honorary officer of the Louisiana Highway Patrol. Even more shocking, the person who appointed me to my position was Governor David Treen, the first Republican governor of Louisiana since Reconstruction! And why would a conservative Republican governor appoint someone like me, who leans slightly to the left and ran a punk rock record label in San Francisco's Mission District, to such an exalted position? Bidness-- arts bidness. I signed a band from Metarie, the Red Rockers, to my label and their music and videos started getting airplay all over America, boosting Lousiana's image as a cultural center. I doubt Gov. Treen ever listened to their songs or grasped what it meant when critics termed them the "American Clash," but he sensed it was something that would bring Louisiana some business. Tony Award-winning actress Jane Alexander, who chaired the National Endowment for the Arts from 1993-1997, remembers when a Republican Congress gleefully slashed the organization's budget back then and disagrees with Jindal's claim that funding the arts are not in any way "Stimulus" for an ailing economy. Alexander:
What people forget is that there are over 2 million people in the United States of America who are professional artists. Those are jobs like any other jobs. The artists have families, they have people for whom they're responsible and they give to their communities.
We all have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The life part would be health and housing. The liberty part would be our civil rights. And the pursuit of happiness, the arts would come under that. And it's as vital a part of well-being in the United States as anything else... [W]hat he [Jindal] doesn't understand is that $50 million goes directly ... as a grant to organizations which employ people. It's quick and it's a system that works beautifully and it's done within a year.
Bobby Jindal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Who Is Bobby Jindal? The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly
10 Things You Didn't Know About Bobby Jindal - US News and World ...
http://www.marvel.com/universe/Red_Skull_(Johann_Shmidt)
You know what? I want the 20% of my income taxes that go to bloated, cost-plus, no-bid defense contracts to go to the arts instead.
“Billions of dollars are being squandered... that would be better spent in classrooms, emergency rooms and veterans hospitals.”
There's no real doubt about the need for reform. The Office of Management and Budget recently determined that, over the past four years, the Pentagon failed to recover close to $300 million in erroneous contract payments. And those are just the mistakes that are admitted.
What about the cost overruns of defense contractors? According to the Government Accountability Office, 95 major weapons programs that are currently in play exceeded their original budget allocations. Cost to taxpayers: $295 billion.
Then there is the matter of weapons systems that are dramatically flawed and dysfunction, yet continue to acquire funding. The groups that wrote Reid and Pelosi focused, according to The Hill, on the need to make "steep cuts to the Joint Strike Fighter Program and other futuristic weapons plagued by production delays and cost overruns, with the money saved going to schools, healthcare and other social services." It is now estimated that the Joint Strike Fighter Program could cost as much as $1 trillion.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/state_of_change/421634/shouldn_t_congress_hold_the_pentagon_to_account?rel=hpbox
Check it out, it's a vitally important part of American culture:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixieland
Gov. Blanco was demonized by the Bush administration, which blew the response to Katrina far more than Gov. Blanco did; her on-camera performance belied her actual response. Read three good books on the subject, by Brinkley, Von Heerden and Horne. All three laid the blame at Ray Nagin's and GW Bush's feet, not Gov. Blanco's feet.
I live here; I know what happened. The destruction of 80% of a major American city was more than any governor, even Jindal, could have handled. Only the federal government had the resources to help us get back on our feet and it failed miserably, and deliberately.
Who really isn't for something like Volcano Montoring that can save peoples lives. The UnSeen hand has used the kind of tactics in the past. Trying to belittle any issue that Liberals take up as outside the mainstream. When in fact most of the liberal issues are mainstream Populist issues. They just are consistent with there rhetoric. They will continue to beat something until it is burned into their followers conscience.
http://www.hallstyle.blogspot.com
State investment to underpin or boost a particular economic sector is entirely normal in many areas, from providing tax-breaks to inward-investing companies through to grants for activities which in turn will provide spin-off profits. So an entirely economic argument can be made for state investment in the arts.
Add to that the fact that EVERY report ever produced on education, innovation and inventiveness shows that students who have an arts/humanities education are more likely to think laterally, make intellectual connections and think creatively in all other areas of activity, including business and manufacturing. Arts and humanities provide a specific form of intellectual training which can then be applied in other areas. No successful society has ever existed, in any time or place, which did not have a thriving arts/humanities educational system.
Oh, wait........ If we do that we will find our economy suddenly collapsing!!!
The fact of the matter is that the arts are one area where we SHOULD be helping out!
and governing well is about .000001% of interest to Jindal.
Republicans reap what they sow.
They don't want to govern.
Republicans hold office only as a stepping stone, not to be a statesman on behalf of voters.
Republicans PROVED they are SUCCESSFUL AT FAILURE.
Should the Government pay for my rounds of Golf too?
BTW, I haven't played a city golf course in 20 years, they are all crappy.
Actually yes they are . . .
He hates medical care for people too.