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To: FJB who wrote (326029)	9/25/2009 7:07:25 AM
From: Tom Clarke	Respond to of 793955

The person who was the Former NEA Director of Communications has resigned (after being reassigned) in the wake of the conference call scandal. But this person, if in fact he ever existed, wasn't the worst offender on the call. That was Buffy Wicks, who works for Valerie Jarrett in the White House. Wicks was the one who gave her squishily grandiose idea of "change" and "service" an ideological cast by urging arts types to "connect" with "labor unions, progressive groups." Bet she stays. ... 3:49 P.M. slate.com

To: FJB who wrote (326029)	9/25/2009 2:03:25 PM
From: KLP	Respond to of 793955

New White House ‘Guidelines’ Are Pathetic Revisionist History by Ben Shapiro bighollywood.breitbart.com In the aftermath of the revelations that the NEA sponsored a conference call with artists across the country in order to promote President Obama’s political agenda, the NEA and White House are running scared. Yesterday, Yosi Sargent, the NEA Director of Communications who headed the call, resigned. Also yesterday, the White House Counsel’s Office released what it called a “memorandum” designed to create “guidelines regarding our vitally important outreach efforts.” Ready? Here we go. WH_COUNSEL_MEMO_GUIDELINES_FOR_PUBLIC_OUTREACH_MEETINGS First, the White House suggests that all NEA employees “avoid even the appearance of impropriety.” According to the White House, “President Obama has pledged to restore Americans’ trust in their government. Strict adherence to the rules is not enough – we need to avoid even the appearance of politicization in order to ensure people’s faith in the actions of the Administration. This means always asking whether an action under consideration could be construed as inappropriate.” Good advice, to be sure. But this would be too little too late – and it also conflicts with the facts. The clear implication here is that no laws were violated. As I have posted before, I believe several laws were violated. And there is no question that the call was blatant partisan outreach for President Obama. Michael Skolnik, who was a co-host of the call, mentioned that he was “asked by folks in the White House and folks in the NEA about a month ago” to host the call. He then proceeded to lionize Obama supporters: “I think Shepard [Fairey] and the Hope poster obviously is a great example, but it’s clear as an independent art community as artists and thinkers and tastemakers and marketers and visionaries on this call, the role that we played during the campaign for the president and also during his first 200 some odd days of his presidency and the president has a clear arts agenda and has been very supportive of using art and supporting art in creative ways to talk about some of the issues that we face here in our country and also to engage people.” He went even further: “And so I’m hoping that through this group and the goal of all this and the goal of this phone call, is through this group we can … get involved in those things, to support some of the president’s initiatives, but also do to things that we are passionate about and to push the president and push his administration.” That does more than create appearances of impropriety. That is impropriety. Next, the White House suggests that the NEA “continue to ensure that decisions are merit-based.” The memo explicitly states that “it is the policy of this Administration that those funding decisions be free of political interference or even the appearance thereof.” Appearances like 21 organizations coming out two days after the call in favor of Obama’s health care plan – and the shady coincidence that 16 of the groups and affiliated organizations received $2 million in grants in the 150 days before the call. Nonetheless, let’s give the White House the benefit of the doubt. They state that they want to ensure that agencies “serve the needs of the American public without regard to party.” Immediately thereafter, the White House then states, “This does not mean that government officials are not permitted to meet with individuals or select groups as agency needs and the public interest demand.” Of course, what the White House thinks the “public interest” demands is silence from those damn “teabaggers.” So any artist who forwards that agenda is properly targeted for help under this standard. Here’s the thing about art: nobody needs it, in the strictest sense. With that said, the White House’s definition of “public interest” needs is malleable in the extreme. But the White House is not done. Next, the White House suggests that the NEA “engage only in authorized activities.” They state, “Each federal agency is limited in its power to act by its authorizing statute” – surely a shocking statement from an Administration that insists it has the power to create czars willy-nilly without authorizing statutes. The White House explicitly mentions avoiding Hatch Act violations (as discussed in my last piece) and violations of the Ethics in Government Act (an act dedicated largely to revealing the financial associations of federal employees). What precisely is the NEA’s purpose? The NEA was chartered in 1965 under 20 US Code §954. It is supposed to provide aid or loans to groups or individuals to enable them to create “projects and productions which have substantial national or international artistic and cultural significance … meeting professional standards or standards of authenticity or tradition, irrespective of origin, which are of significant merit and which, without such assistance, would otherwise be unavailable to our citizens for geographic or economic reasons …projects and productions that will encourage and assist artists and enable them to achieve wider distribution … projects and productions which have substantial artistic and cultural significance …” In other words, blah, blah, blah. Significantly, however, nowhere in the authorizing act does Congress suggest that the purpose of the NEA is to provide funding, conference call rah-rah boosting, or emotional support for artists seeking to promote a particular president’s agenda. Even community service is not mentioned, despite the fact that hosts of the call repeatedly stated that the NEA was to be involved in the president’s new “service” initiative. The White House’s concluding paragraph is truly a doozy: “We should consider this call to be a reminder and a teaching moment.” (If I had a penny for each “teaching moment” this Administration had provided, I could pay off the entire national debt personally. It’s time for the Obama Administration to stop providing “teaching moments” and start behaving in competent fashion.) But the White House continues: “It was organized with the best of intentions to promote community service and volunteerism, something the Administration does with many constituencies and something we will continue to do. The misunderstandings that flowed from the call should serve as a less going forward of the need to take extra care to ensure it complies with these general principles.” There was no misunderstanding here. The problem for the Obama Administration is that the American people understood precisely what was going on. Finally, the White House concludes with these stirring words: “At all times Administration employees should be focused on the twin goals of furthering their agency’s mission and serving the public trust.” Wrong again. The purpose of federal employees is solely to fulfill the law by doing their jobs. The public trust doesn’t come into it – especially not the Obama Administration’s definition of public trust, under which the public trust is best protected by shilling for President Obama himself. Here’s the bottom line: the proof is in the pudding. We must now carefully watch each and every distribution of NEA cash to each and every artist. We must analyze where our tax dollars are going. If the White House really wants transparency, they must immediately start a website that posts online the basis for each and every NEA grant and loan. Anything less is a boondoggle.