[nopardons]

Really ? All it's going to take is " good parenting "? The parents of the kids in wayoutnowhere, who don't have all that much money, are going to take their kids to N.Y.C. and drag them through the Met and the Frick ? Then, they'll go buy tickets to see La Boheme and hopefully there'll be some Shakespearian play ( there isn't now )on Broadway?

Okay, you can see some paintings on line and in books, you can buy records, but there is NOTHING comparable to seeing a live performance!

I'm against funding the NEA, but this, at least, was something worthwhile.

People here talk about not wanting to lose " our culture ". What exactly IS " OUR CULTURE " ...hip hop, Janet Jackson and whatever his name is, doing soft porn on T.V., MTV, rap music, or is it Grandma Moses paintings and Irving Berlin, and RHAPSODY IN BLUE ?

[kenth]

Below are listed a few of the grants given in 2003. Heck, just look at the grants on the NEA website and where they went and then tell me again how much rural Americans benefit. Mind you, these are the same rural Americans who have their funds forcibly taken to pay for such ventures.

The question of why to fund the NEA at all aside, why should the funding be upped? Why not cut back in other areas to fund Shakespeare?

New York Foundation for the Arts, Inc. (on behalf of Check Your Body at the Door)
New York, NY
$25,000
To support a fine-cut edit of Check Your Body at the Door, a video documentary about popular, social, and club dances and dancers in New York City. The documentary is filmed in the clubs and the studio, and features a group of dancers, ages 16 to 46, demonstrating a variety of styles including free-form house jazz, hip-hop, vogueing, fast footwork and other new free styles.

Cambodian American Heritage, Inc.
Fort Washington, MD
$10,000
To support instruction in Cambodian classical dance and music. The project will culminate with a concert in observance of the Cambodian New Year.

Center for Traditional Music and Dance, Inc.
New York, NY
$50,000
To support the New York World Festival. The festival will focus on the rich musical traditions of countries of the Western Caribbean and the coast of the Gulf of Mexico.

Texas Folklife Resources
Austin, TX
$50,000
To support the third International Accordion Festival. The event celebrates the accordion's central role in the traditional music of the United States and throughout the globe.

Orange Show Foundation
Houston, TX
$10,000
To support conservation and restoration of the Beer Can House, a work by self-taught artist John Milkovisch. The Houston landmark, consisting of a house and grounds decorated with methodically trimmed cans, will be used as an artist-in-residence project space.

Cinema/Chicago
Chicago, IL
$15,000
To support the 39th Chicago International Film Festival. Over 60,000 people will see 125 films from around the world.

Arts at St. Ann's (St. Ann Center for Restoration and the Arts, Inc.)
Brooklyn, NY
$35,000
To support the 2003 Puppet Lab and Labapalooza! Mini-Festival of New Puppet Theater from The Lab. The project is an ongoing professional workshop where emerging and mid-career puppet artists and collaborators meet weekly to create new, interdisciplinary puppet theater works.

[Wonder Warthog]

"The parents of the kids in wayoutnowhere, who don't have all that much money, are going to take their kids to N.Y.C. and drag them through the Met and the Frick ?"

Actually, yes, they can and do. I was one of those "wayoutnowhere" kids. Those visits to museums took place on our vacations. I preferred the Smithsonian to any of the others--FAR more interesting.

DEFUND/ABOLISH the NEA!!!!

[AppyPappy]

I'm against funding the NEA, but this, at least, was something worthwhile.

Then YOU pay for it. But don't pick some old widows pocket for it.

[McGavin999]

And people wonder why the Anglo-Saxon culture is disappearing. Maybe it's because none of the kids ever get to see it. They are bombarded daily with hip-hop, sex and drugs but are not exposed to the very things that make this a civilized nation.

Those who say parents are responsible for teaching their children seem unaware that a lot of those parents have never seen our culture either.

The Bushes are attempting to wrench away the "arts" from those who do nothing but degrade us and to remind people of what the arts are SUPPOSED to be. I'm amazed that so few here can see that. Unless......perhaps......they like seeing a cross in a jar of urine and like seeing the flag stuffed down a toilet. Perhaps this is what they really want to represent us on the world stage.