NEA Chair Rocco Landesman Mocks Critics
by John Nolte
About ten days ago, in a widely ridiculed address to the 2009 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference – so widely ridiculed he had to walk his Obama-Caesar gushing back some – embattled NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman took a moment to launch a shot at his critics:
Am I starting to sound like an advocate? Well, that seems to be a touchy subject. Some quote-unquote “journalists” have recently accused this agency of losing its independence and becoming a propaganda machine.
Ooh, ouch, that stings: “quote-unquote journalists.” I would have responded sooner but the insult went over my head. You see, in the world where I reside — the land of Where Decent People Try To Do The Right Thing – accusing someone of “not being a real journalist” is like accusing them of “not being a dishonest left-wing poseur with more affectations than a washed-up Shakespearean stage actor.”
But what a punk thing for Landesman to do; acting like the big mouth kid who after a well-deserved playground thumping runs home to talk big in front his fat, fawning Aunts. Gee, Rocco, if you and yours hold so much contempt for your critics, why respond to their criticisms in such dramatic ways:
- NEA admits to inappropriate language during NEA call.
- NEA Communications Director Yosi Sergant resigns.
- White House issues new guidelines.
- NEA scrubs leftist call for health-care reform from website.
Too busy scrubbing a website and accepting Yosi’s resignation, Rocco might have missed that someone who probably meets his definition of a “journalist” (i.e., an Obama supporter) had this to say about an NEA conference call that occurred a little more than two weeks after the now-infamous August 10th call:
I’m “creeped out” too…even though, like many on the call, I supported and (with reservations) still support the agenda of the new President.
By any standard, Lee Rosenbaum is a respected and prominent writer in the art community who contributes to, among others, the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and New York Public Radio. On August 27th she participated in a conference call hosted by Kalpen Modi (Kal Penn of “Kumar” fame) of the White House Office of Public Engagement (the same office as Buffy Wicks) and Robert Lynch, president and CEO of Americans for the Arts — a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that, just two days after the August 10th conference call, joined a host of other national non-profit art organizations in calling for health-care reform, including the “public health insurance option.”
The invitation for the August 27th call was posted on the Americans for the Arts website (it has since been scrubbed, but screen shots are available below), and came directly from Modi. The invitation reads in part: [emphasis added]
“Please join us for a United We Serve / Arts conference call … I’ll be facilitating the call. We’ll also have representatives from” The Corporation for National and Community Service, National Endowment for the Arts, and Americans for the Arts.
“The purpose of United We Serve – a project of the White House and Corporation for National and Community Service – is to engage all Americans in the nation’s economic recovery at a time of great challenge and great opportunity. … The president and First Lady are challenging people young and old, in communities large and small, to roll up their sleeves and work together to tackle some of the nation’s toughest issues: education; health; energy and environment; community renewal; and safety and security. …
Though Modi’s invitation went out prior to Courrielche’s August 25th Big Hollywood expose’ of the August 10th call, Modi’s actual conference call (which Courrielche did not participate in) took place 2 days after the Big Hollywood piece published – and Ms. Rosenbaum wonders if that might have caused “second thoughts about commandeering their constituents for this political adventure[.]” For starters, though the invite said they would, the NEA and the NEH did not participate:
This was the second such conference call: In a post on the Big Hollywood blog (excerpted yesterday by the Wall Street Journal), Patrick Courrielche, who reported that he was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts to participate in the first telephone discussion on Aug. 10, came away fearing that the arts were at risk of “becoming a tool of the state.” …
At the beginning of the second conference call, last Thursday, Modi informed us that “unfortunately our colleagues from NEA and NEH [the National Endowment for the Humanites]” were tied up in meetings and couldn’t participate, as had been planned.
Could it be they were having second thoughts about commandeering their constituents for this political adventure? We can only hope so.
The mind reels at how much more “creepy” Ms. Rosenbaum’s conference call might have been had Courrielche’s article not posted just two days earlier.
Maybe as creepy as those “quote-unquote journalists” at the right-wing extremist Boston Globe found the whole sordid affair.
If Landesman wants to help our side further the Obama-worship narrative with swaggering, grandiose comparisons of the president to Julius Caesar, I’m all in favor of that. What is troubling, though, is when a man in charge of millions of federal dollars saves all his contempt for those who point out wrongdoing and none for the actual wrongdoing.
Stage Right contributed to this article.
*****
–
Email this to a friend | Print |
Share on Facebook
| Tweet this
| 
Follow Us on Twitter
Subscribe via RSS
Tips & Feedback
35 Comments
[...] this article: NEA Chair Rocco Landesman Mocks Critics This entry is filed under America – Blogs, Big Hollywood. You can follow any responses to this [...]
Let the "arts" stand on merit, not taxpayers wallet.
"A government supported artist is an incompetent prostitute" (Heinlein)
Unfortunate that the incompetent prostitutes are illiterate, intolerant, narrow-minded, and desperately need a dictator to tell them what to do and say and believe.
If I still considered myself an Artist I would be humiliated by all these incompetent prostitutes; they cannot even screw without their pimp telling how, where and when to screw.
Real art doesn't need funding. The NEA is a disease.
>"Gee, Rocco, if you and yours hold so much contempt for your critics, why respond to their criticisms in such dramatic ways"<
As Powerline's John Hinderaker adds (at your link): "At risk of piling on, this [Landesman] guy really is a dope."
Q.E.D.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Michael Chavez, WV Watchdog. WV Watchdog said: #NEA Chair Rocco Landesman Mocks Critics #tlot #tcot NEA http://ping.fm/8WEgc [...]
I so dislike that picture of Landesman. Taxpayer paid suit, looks just wonderful on him, taxpayer paid office
and Taxpayer paid furnishings of dubious taste. He looks like he belongs in the rail car scene of Music Man,
His taste equals his judgement capability, poor. He is a leech on the taxpayer and extremely happy to not have to actually produce anything for his pay. He will sell himself to the next administration, tho it be Conservative,
to prolong his stay at the trough. Other than that a despicable humen being.
Mr. Nolte, this is hard-hitting journalism at its best. Your piece is loaded with facts.
Thank you ever so much for the excellent write-up. Great content, well executed, and presented in a way that even a relative neophyte (to NEA-related stuff) like me can follow along and make sense of it all.
It is not possible to effectively mock while wearing that godawful suit and tie. Any attempt to do so would be viewed by the fashion conscious as laughable. No getup short of a clown costume could possibly scream wishy-washy, leftard, pencilneck any louder.
Time has passed and the head pops out from beneath the rock while muttering the sun is too bright illuminating all the feces strewn about his rock which he regaled as art, but now with age the aroma must be anothers doing.
Why should the average American donate their hard earned money to an institution that they will never have the chance to enjoy anyway. Let the rich pay for all of this artsy fartsy crap, the rest of us don't care enough about it anyway.
Oh and if obama had been properly vetted we wouldn't be in this posititon now.
Check out the sworn affidavit by a Bishop
http://devvy.net/pdf/nov08/exhibit1.pdf
If you guys want a little more insight into what's probably going on here, then here is my suggestion:
Watch Kal Penn's movie " Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle " They made the movie themselves. If you look at all of these strategies and policies of the current administration from an aerial view, you may find there is a reoccuring theme in common.
This movie is filled with racial intolerance against the stars, " Harold and Kumar " At first glance, one might think they are simply poking fun at themselves to an extent. But, of course, the racial offenders are white, in every instance. And, in the end, they get their just due by being setup to go to jail.
Maybe I'm reaching a little here, but does " Hate Crimes Legislation" ring a bell to anyone?
This from the Chair of the quote-unquote "independent" NEA?
Too funny!
Do some people just not realize that most people get picked on when they're in school? The only difference being that it's supposed to be some kind of big atrocity if it happens to a person who's part of a smaller group. Guarantee there won't be so much outrage once white kids are the minority….The sad part is most of us white kids just want good friends no matter what they look like….
Hmm…I thought that great "art" was produced by artists undergoing pain, anguish and suffering.
I say we move the NEA and all the "artists" is supports to GITMO, and we waterboard those f**kers until they produce some kick a** art.
Just for laughs read Rocco's vanity bio at wikipedia. It smacks of being crafted by himelf or a paid stylist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocco_Landesman
What a preening narcissist.
his response is no different from what you get trying to argue with any lefty troll on any conservative site. the facts don't matter. logic doesn't matter. you're just a hater/racist/non-journalist, blah, blah, blah. and he works for the Troll-in-Chief.
This guy is an embarrassment. When money is tight in my house, art is the first thing to go (except for the kid's drawings on the fridge).
Too bad money is no object with our Congress. The NEA needs to be defunded.
I think old Rocco should go around with that big “R” monogram around his neck, just in case someone in the general public would not mistake him for a complete tool. It will save everyone a lot of time.
DUMP THE NEA! DUMP NPR!
FIGHT THE OBOMINATION!
http://noliberalspin.blogtownhall.com/2009/11/02/...
http://noliberalspin.blogtownhall.com/2009/11/02/...
The Anti Liberal Zone
#134 on Obama's Enemies List and LOVING IT!
Ah come one people, just try to understand things from Rocco's perspective.
"Hey, I put in my time, I paid for this job fair and square, now I'll do whatever I want with it!"
Barry and him have so much in common…
To be fair… That is an old photo of him in his offices on Broadway, paid for by the ticket buying public. (Though I still can not excuse the suit.)
Don't mean to echo the same response but some "quote-unquote artist" is questioning the integrity of "quote-unquote journalists.”
"What is troubling, though, is when a man in charge of millions of federal dollars saves all his contempt for those who point out wrongdoing and none for the actual wrongdoing."
Give em enough rope and they'll hang themselves. (I think I learned that quote from a divorce attorney) So what has quote-unquote artist known as Rocco actually done? Or is he the typical entertainment industry nephew or grandchild milking someone else's fame?
I stand corrected, but he is no less a despicable man in an ugly suit.
That's exactly why the founding father's strictly prohibited this type of governmental control. They knew any time power is invested in a person, that person will use that power for their own purposes.
How do we de-fund the NEA? Really. How?
Concur.
"A government-subsidized artist is an incompetent whore."
Wasn't that in the contract on America in 94 along with elimination of the Dept of energy,
funding NPR, etc. Republicans in charge and it didn't happen. The Rino effect?
I will admit they did have a positive effect but then decided that Gee, Governing is tough.
The efforts diminished.
DEFUND THIS ILLEGAL PROPAGANDA UNIT NOW! THIS CRAP IS STRAIT OUT OF DR. GOEBBLES PLAYBOOK!
Take the Congress back from the fools running it. Less career politicians, more citizens not drunk with power.
NPR is a sh*t hole. I was listening to it this morning (no Rush till noon on the east coast) and they had an author on why free markets don't work.
This is what passes for news. Laughing and making jokes at economic theories that have been proven time and time again since Adam Smith's time.
They were scratching their heads as to why the banks would make loans to people obviously incapable of paying them back. Duh! The banks feared something much more powerful than their own bankruptcy. Death by lawsuits from ACORN and strangulation by government regulation if they failed to tow ACORN's line.
The high minded are so high minded that to them it is obvious the lower cast is incapable of understating their high mindedness solutions thus those of us doing the real doing are even more subjugated to the high minded thoughtfulness for not appreciating the good doingnesses of the limousine liberal. It is all about their doingness and thus when we interfere with such goodness doingness we become even more of an ignoramus. Oh Goodness! http://ezinearticles.com/?Spirituality-Informatio...
Understanding the desire to distinguish oneself as essentially political because the goods of this world, even the intellectual joys of understanding never give total satisfaction or repose. He said “Theory itself is a sort of activity fraught with restiveness, and as such not surely superior to action. Alexis De Tocqueville
A better idea, let's waterboard Congress first.
Ooh, ouch, that stings: “quote-unquote journalists.”
See the Sesame Street whining, Mr. Editor.
You must be logged in to post a comment.