Recap: Radical funder George Soros’s $1 million gift to Media Matters, a left-wing character assassination machine, underwrites its campaign to stigmatize conservative ideas. For weeks Eric Boehlert of Media Matters attacked Glenn Beck because a disturbed viewer plotted to shoot up the offices of the left-wing Tides Foundation. The shooter, Byron Williams, failed, but in December when a fan of Media Matters, the late Florida school board shooter Clay Duke, wreaked havoc, Boehlert and Media Matters remained silent.

Soros is also bankrolling a documentary that celebrates left-wing terrorists who plotted to napalm Republicans at the 2008 GOP convention in Minnesota. Even worse, you too are bankrolling the film through your taxes.

A trailer for the left-wing film Better This World suggests that it depicts David Guy McKay and Bradley Neil Crowder as idealistic activists who, according to the official blurb, “set out to prove the strength of their political convictions to themselves and their mentor.” In fact McKay and Crowder are convicted domestic terrorists who manufactured instruments of death calculated to inflict maximum pain and bodily harm on people whose political views they disagreed with.

You can be sure that if it was right-wing terrorists who were plotting to attack the Democratic National Convention, whoever foiled the conspiracy would be immortalized in film, literature and song as a savior of democracy.

“If you flip the equation around and it had been a group of conservatives threatening to use force to prevent those on the Left from meeting, everyone would expect the government to infiltrate them and they would also expect the FBI to stop them and charge them with crimes,” said Brandon Darby, who helped the FBI thwart the planned attack. (Darby’s essay on political violence appeared on Big Government over the past weekend. Read it here.) (more…)

People have asked me my opinion of the Rev. Terry Jones’ threat to burn the Quran this past weekend. Personally I think the best thing to do with this story is to not give this insignificant media-hound with all of fifty parishioners a voice. But it’s way too late for that now. So, of course I find the action in poor taste – I would never burn any religion’s sacred parchment. That is just wrong and disrespectful to millions trying to practice their faith and go about their daily lives in peace.

But (there’s always a “but” in such testy cases), when I juxtapose this one twisted symbolic gesture against the disregard—and I would argue contempt—being shown by so-called “moderate” practitioners of Islam who insist on building their mosque almost on top of the ashes of 9/11 victims against the wishes of so many Americans, I can understand the frustration that creates a Jones and his ilk. And the fact is, as Mayor Bloomberg offered up, if there is freedom of speech for the fanatical Muslim goose, it must also be for the crackpot Christian gander.

Still, as a matter of common decency I hope this guy tables forever his plans—and there are no copycats. And as a practical matter, I agree with General Petraeus in that the last thing our men and women in the field need is another faux propaganda storm putting them in greater harm’s way… although I do believe that fear of retaliation should not be a reason to quell free speech but rather to fight harder for it. (Easy for me to say as I am not humping a pack in Kandahar I freely admit!)

However, something did occur to me this weekend. Jones is going about this all wrong. If he really wants to burn the Islamic holy book, I know a way that he could do it while at the same time have every left wing pundit and mainstream news outlet not decry his act but rather defend and even celebrate it. He should burn it on the steps of the Museum Of Modern Art up here in New York. And instead of calling it a protest, or a statement, he should just call his Quran torching “art.” In the interest of consistency, artistic integrity and fairness, maybe he can even do it in the building, right on the same spot where in 1989 the infamous “Piss Christ” photo was proudly exhibited. You remember that? The piece of “art” that showed a crucifix submerged in urine? As artist Andres Serrano explained his artistic vision in an open letter to the National Endowment for the Arts: (more…)

In his first interview since resigning from the National Endowment for the Arts, Yosi Sergant blames both the White House and right-wing media for the NEA Propaganda Scandal, as the controversial August 10th conference call has come to be known.

The article, riddled with factual errors and omissions characteristic of a student and/or mainstream media, lays out a revisionist’s version of what happened behind the scenes of the scandal. During the interview, conducted by a journalism graduate student and admitted “close friend” of the former White House appointee, Sergant states that he was called to a meeting in the West Wing at the end of his four-month stint in the White House’s Office of Public Engagement. The White House, fully aware of his role as an art activist during Obama’s election campaign, offered Sergant two jobs. One was to continue at the White House, and the other was as the Communications Director of the National Endowment for the Arts. Sergant selected the NEA.

President Obama and Yosi Sergant

“I think [the West Wing] made a bad decision to put me in a job without giving me any kind of guidance, not providing me with any kind of mentorship,” said Sergant in the interview. He continued, “That was a bad decision. I’d never worked in government before.”

However the White House knew where Sergant’s expertise resided, and how he would potentially put it to use in an arts position. He was the promoter behind the now famous Obama Hope poster. Sergant indicated in the interview that he was given some direction by the White House in his new position at the NEA. “The idea was that Yosi would help pave the way for the new director’s arrival,” wrote Hillel Aron, referring to Rocco Landesman, incoming Chairman of the NEA. On paving the way, Sergant said, “I started working on things that I knew were happening, that I thought would be safe… and I was wrong.”  (more…)

Back in December, Rock the Vote came out with a video featuring Eva Amurri and Zach Gilford – who the hell are they, anyway? Guess I’m not young enough to rock — and a bunch of  other unknown wannabe actors encouraging young people to “rock the vote” by withholding sexual favors from anyone who dares to believe that a government takeover of health insurance is a bad thing.

Traditionally used to sell items like beer and aftershave, sex is now being utilized to encourage citizens to give in to an unconstitutional take over of one sixth of the American economy. Has sex really become that commonplace and tacky?

For example, in the video, a geeky-looking guy holding a “no death panels” placard is described as a liar, and the hot chick wearing a partially-unbuttoned plaid shirt is told to “lie right back” to him by telling him, “I’m on my period and I don’t have a vagina.” Har-dee-har. (There’s more, but you can see the lameness for yourself, if you so choose.) (more…)

From Fox News:

A senior official at the National Endowment for the Arts encouraged artists to promote President Obama’s political agenda in a conference call he organized with the White House. The NEA’s communications director Yosi Sergant eventually resigned in August amid accusations that the grant-making organization was becoming politicized. The administration called it a “teaching moment,” but the media didn’t seem to catch the lesson. (more…)

“The former NEA Director of Communications acted unilaterally and without the approval or authorization of then-Acting Chairman Patrice Walker Powell.” – Rocco Landesman, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, on September 22, 2009

Chairman Landesman’s claim that Yosi Sergant, the former NEA Communications Director, acted “unilaterally” on the controversial August 10th conference call is not only beginning to erode, but new documents obtained by Judicial Watch under the Freedom of Information Act show that another federal employee thought the arts effort was entering murky legal waters.

–

In an email dated July 30, 2009, Nellie Abernathy, a representative of the federal program United We Serve, sent an email to Sergant to inquire of his interest in attending a meeting regarding 9/11 events – the culmination day of the United We Serve campaign. In the email Abernathy states (emphasis added):

“Just got off the phone with [redacted]. They’re interested in helping produce some 9/11 events and will be in DC next week. Any chance you could join us for a meeting Tuesday morning? Or does this fall into that sketchy grey we might get arrested area?”

Sergant responded, “I’d love to.” (more…)

I must admit that when I first heard about the National Endowment for the Arts conference call to enlist the arts community in propagandizing the White House’s agenda, I was a little mystified as to why it was so controversial.  After all, the NEA, through its funding choices, has been actively undermining American values for many years.  Way back in 1986 we were treated to the scandal of Andres Serrano getting $15,000 from the NEA for his mediocre photo of a plastic crucifix in his own urine – “Piss Christ.”  That is just one of a myriad of egregious examples of NEA funding going to support dubious “art” that functions solely to corrode the fabric of civilized society.

Sure, the NEA gives money to major established arts organizations – symphonies, ballet companies, repertory theater groups, and the like — but that is how they maintain their veneer of staid respectability, all the while promulgating their Leftist, nihilistic agenda through their smaller grants.  For example, I know a truly great American artist, Harry Carmean, who, among his other credits, was the Chairman of the Fine Arts Department at the Art Center College of Design  in Pasadena, California and taught there for 43 years.  He applied for NEA grants repeatedly to help fund his work but was rejected each time because his paintings were deemed “not edgy enough.”   Translation: he actually possesses artistic talent, skill, and discipline, which he uses to create beauty instead of pseudo-artistic, politicized claptrap.  We all know he would have had a far better chance of getting a grant out of the subjective and ideologically driven apparatchiks at the NEA had he used dog feces to paint images of female genitalia. (more…)

“The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it.” Joseph Goebbels

There is no shame in artists receiving monetary compensation to sell ideas, products or a presidential agenda. When everything is transparent and contracted aboveboard, this is called advertising. When this process is whispered into being, strategized and set into motion from the shadows of government and from behind closed doors, it is propaganda.

From Sun Tzu to Psy Ops, propaganda has won wars, toppled cultures and changed civilizations. As a self-identified enlightened and educated culture, we  thought ourselves beyond such base manipulation. We were wrong.

Where were the voices of dissent on the NEA conference call when so called “artists” were asked to further the President’s agenda?

I have danced ballets and I have done commercials; one side art, the other side business. What side were the NEA recipients on? (more…)

The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is always one of the hottest topics in the theatre community.  A huge amount of theatre in the US is created or presented at non-profit theatres that operate under the protection of or were first started with grants from the National Endowment for the Arts.

The latest NEA controversy broken here at Big Hollywood by Patrick Courrielche has become a fascinating Rorschach test within the theatre community.  The response has been disappointing yet predictable from the left-leaning proponents of the NEA and this administration.

Robert Mapplethorpe

To fully expose the inconsistencies and intellectually dishonest positions they have taken in their knee-jerk defense of everything Obama, we first need a little background for the Big Hollywood readers who might not remember all of the details in the recent history of controversies with regard to NEA funding in the theatre community.

NEA Primer: Now I don’t pretend to suggest that the following breakdown of the NEA struggles dating back to 1990 is a definitive or even thorough explanation of the recent history of left vs. right combat over the NEA.  I encourage all of my readers to research and read about this issue.  And, I especially want them to read the perspective of liberals/progressives/leftists who were in the middle of the struggle on the other side.  It is informative and enlightening to read how they really feel about the subject. (more…)

Other than the National Endowment for the Arts’ already tenuous reputation, the only casualty in the NEA conference call episode has been Yosi Sergant, the former Director of Communications for the public agency charged with funding arts organizations in America.

On September 10, the NEA announced that Sergant would be re-assigned with this curious statement accompanying the move:

“On August tenth, the National Endowment for the Arts participated in a call with arts organizations to inform them of the president’s call to national service. The White House office of public engagement also participated in the call, which provided information on how the Corporation for National and Community Service can assist groups interested in sponsoring service projects or having their members volunteer on other projects. This call was not a means to promote any legislative agenda and any suggestions to that end are simply false. The NEA regularly does outreach to various organizations to inform of the work we are doing and the resources available to them.”

This statement leads any objective and reasonable observer to wonder why Mr. Sergant would be “re-assigned” if there was nothing wrong with this purely “information/outreach” conference call. As has often been the case with this, the most open and transparent administration in history, it is very difficult to get a straight answer. We can’t even learn WHAT Sergant’s new position is, let alone why he was asked to step down from his role as Communications Director. (more…)

From El Rushbo:

Do you remember that NEA phone call? I think it was back in August, the 21st or the 25th, and it featured basically a coordination from the White House to the National Endowment for the Arts to promote Obama’s health care and parts of his domestic agenda. One of the artists on that call got hold of Breitbart and said they’re turning the National Endowment for the Arts and www.Serve.gov, the latest website out of the White House, into political instruments, and there are four pieces written on this at BigGovernment.com. But all it really exposes up ’til now is that the NEA was lying about their coordination with the Obama White House on spreading propaganda. This is the thing that George Will had a comment on This Week, said some laws were broken in this call. Then after some attention was focused on this they announced that the National Endowment for the Arts director of communications Yosi Sargent had been reassigned. They said he was fired but he was actually just reassigned. (more…)

Today, Big Hollywood released a full audio recording and transcript of the NEA conference call. A full review of the call reveals several new and more troubling aspects to what transpired on the August 10^th phone call. What is inescapable is that the origin of the call reaches into the highest offices of the White House. It is clear, from the transcript, that the call was orchestrated by the Office of Public Engagement, whose Director, Valerie Jarrett, is among the closest advisors to President and First Lady Obama. It is also apparent that Ms. Jarrett’s office directed the involvement of the National Endowment for the Arts and the Corporation for National and Community Service, two independent federal agencies. (This is important, as neither is officially part of the executive branch.)

At the very beginning of the call, the general ‘moderator’ of the call, Michael Skolnik, political director for Hip-Hop mogul Russell Simmons, explains the genesis of the call:

I have been asked by people in the White House and folks in the NEA about a month ago in a conversation that was had. We had the idea that I would help bring together the independent artists community around the country.

This is important, because in the immediate aftermath of the breaking story, the NEA has tried to state that a ‘third party’ organized the call. This clearly isn’t true. The e-mail invitation to the call was sent from Mr. Sargent’s government-provided NEA e-mail address. In addition, as the transcript reveals, Mr. Sloknik was “asked” by the White House and NEA to organize the call.

(more…)

[ed - Rush transcript! Leaked NEA conference call from my mom, proving the Bush Administration did it too]

TRANSCRIPT OF
CONFERENCE CALL OF THE
NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS
21-Jan-2007

MR. SMIRNOV:  Hello everybodies! Who we gots on the phones here?

MR. KIETH:  Toby Keith. Built Ford Tough.

MR. SMIRNOV:  Hokay, buddy!

MRS. BURGE:  Beverly Burge, Ocelot, Iowa. I do scrapbooking.

OAK RIDGE BOYS:  Howdy! We’re the Oak Ridge Boys!

MR. SMIRNOV:  Alrights, Branson in da house!

MR. HANEY:  Lester Haney, Sepulpa, Oklahoma.

MR. SMIRNOV:  Hey everybodies, I don’ts know if you see Lester Haney’s work, but he does some of the most beautiful chainsaw stump sculptures Yakov ever sees. (more…)

Big Hollywood today reveals the extensive proof that shows the White House used the National Endowment for the Arts to push a political agenda favorable to President Obama. But it gets worse: the Administration lied about it, and tried to cover it up.

You already know the background: an NEA spokesman participated in a conference call designed to encourage artists to further Obama’s legislative agenda. This was revealed back in August at Big Hollywood. What is new today is the full transcript of the call — and how clearly the NEA was involved in urging artists to propagandize for Obama.

Naturally, the NEA and the Obama administration denied this. According to the Los Angeles Times (in a blog post, of course, and not an actual newsprint story), the NEA denied any purpose to further a legislative agenda:

The NEA issued a statement saying that it took part in the conference to help inform arts organizations about opportunities to sponsor volunteer service projects themselves, or have their members take part in other volunteer efforts. “This call was not a means to promote any legislative agenda, and any suggestions to that end are simply false,” the statement said. (more…)

In the aftermath of the Andrew Breitbart/James O’Keefe/Hannah Giles-broken ACORN scandal, President Obama and his allies in Congress have distanced themselves from the community organizing goliath.  Congress has cut off funds, and Obama has refused to speak about the matter.  End of story, right?

Wrong.

There’s only one problem: the ACORN mentality – pinpointing and mobilizing particular groups in support of a radical-left agenda – is no longer restricted to government-funded private non-profits like ACORN.  The ACORN mentality now dominates the government itself.  Taxpayer dollars are being used by elected officials to encourage the deification of President Obama and his agenda.  And one of the chief organs of the government propaganda machine is the National Endowment for the Arts.

Let’s start from the beginning.  On August 25, artist Patrick Courrielche told the story of a conference call he attended on August 10.  That conference call was hosted by the NEA, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and United We Serve.  The goal of the conference call: “to help lay a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.”  The call would push “a group of artists, producers, promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a more civically engaged America and celebrate how the arts can be used for a positive change!” (more…)

At first glance, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) conference call of August 10th, 2009 sounds innocent enough because it’s supposedly been organized by Michael Skolnik, political director for Russell Simmons and someone not officially associated with any government agency. Skolnik appears to be acting independently as a concerned citizen and to have taken it upon himself to gather together a group of artists and art organizations hoping to move them towards “national service.” And how nice of the White House, the federal government and the NEA to make the time to participate in the call and aid this group of American artists motivated to help their country and community.

But this is only how things appear.

All evidence points to the fact that the conference call was a ruse, a front for a White House using Skolnik as a kind of beard in order to put an innocent spin on their abuse of the NEA and two non-partisan volunteer organizations (United We Serve – an initiative overseen by The Corporation for National and Community Service – a federal agency, and the White House’ Office of Public Engagement).

The goal: To motivate a group of hand-picked pro-Obama artists (grant recipients or those wanting grants) to push the President’s flagging agenda, especially health care — and to funnel this promotion through the ACORN related- Serve.gov website. 

***

Documentation gathered by Big Hollywood’s Patrick Courrielche and the Washington Times, coupled with a newly revealed audio recording of the full conference call, points to eight troubling facts that put the full context of the call in a very disturbing light. (more…)

**NEA conference call full audio and transcript here**

Should the National Endowment for the Arts encourage artists to create art on issues being vehemently debated nationally?

That is the question that I set out to discuss a little over three weeks ago when I wrote an article on Big Hollywood entitled The National Endowment for the Art of Persuasion?”

The question still requires debate but the facts do not.

The NEA and the White House did encourage a handpicked, pro-Obama arts group to address politically controversial issues under contentious national debate. That fact is irrefutable.

President Obama with the NEA’s Yosi Sergant

But some have claimed that the invite and passages, pulled from the conference call that inspired the article, were taken out of context. Context is what I intend to establish here.

On August 10th, the National Endowment for the Arts, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and the Corporation for National and Community Service hosted a conference call with a handpicked arts group. This arts group played a key role in Obama’s arts effort during his election campaign, as declared by the organizers of the call, and many on the call played a role in the now famous Obama Hope poster. (more…)

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Full Transcript:

Full NEA Conference Call Transcript and Audio –

On August 25th 2009, Big Hollywood’s Patrick Courrielche broke the story of a conference call he attended with other “rising artist and art community luminaries”:

On Thursday August 6th, I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts to attend a conference call scheduled for Monday August 10th hosted by the NEA, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and United We Serve. The call would include “a group of artists, producers, promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a more civically engaged America and celebrate how the arts can be used for a positive change!” 

The email invite came directly from Yosi Sergant, then-Director of Communications at the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), and it advised this hand-picked group that the call was about laying “a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.” 

Courrielche describes the call this way: (more…)

Everything you needed to know about the unorthodox roll out of the now-notorious ACORN sting videos was hidden in plain sight in my Sept. 7 column, “Katie Couric, Look in the Mirror.” ACORN was not the only target of those videos; so were Katie, Brian, Charlie and every other mainstream media pooh-bah.

They were not going to report this blockbuster unless they were forced to. And they were. What’s more, it ain’t over yet. Not every hint I dropped in that piece about what was to come has played itself out yet.Stay tuned.

When filmmaker and provocateur James O’Keefe came to my office to show me the video of him and his friend, Hannah Giles, going to the Baltimore offices of ACORN – the nation’s foremost “community organizers” – dressed as a pimp and a prostitute and asking for – and getting – help for various illegal activities, he sought my advice. In the past, Mr. O’Keefe created brilliant social satire that rocked his college campus and even made its way on to the talk-radio and cable-news shows, but the magnitude of his latest adventure had the potential to rock the political establishment.

I was awed by Mr. O’Keefe’s guts and amazed by the footage, but explained that the mainstream media would try to kill this important and illuminating expose about a corrupt and criminal political racket, and that the well-funded political left would go into “war room” mode, with 25-year-old Mr. O’Keefe and 20-year-old cohort Miss Giles in the cross hairs. I felt I had a moral obligation to protect these young muckrakers from the left and from the media, and to devise a strategy that would force the media’s hand.  (more…)