Thursday, March 5, 2009

Who's Fooling Who?

Do you remember Barack Obama and Joe Biden's Campaign Platform in Support of the Arts (pdf)? It seems like only yesterday that the candidates promised "to use the bully pulpit...to promote the importance of arts and arts education in America."

Then came the great stimulus package battles and President Barack Obama gave a big speech explaining his plan to save everything but he didn't mention arts at all, which hurt.

Then Education Secretary Arne Duncan visited a school in Brooklyn and he too said nothing about arts education at all.

More recently, a Chicago Tribune article says the Obamas attendance at art events like a recent performance of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater may be enough to boost the profile of the arts in general:
If outings to arts venues become a habit with the first family, "it would be a huge boon to the arts community in Washington and for the United States and the world," said David Andrew Snider, president of the League of Washington Theatres. "There's a widespread feeling that he ... gets the importance of the arts."


Hyperballad: Billie Holiday "Foolin' Myself"

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