We Must Save the N.E.A.

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"Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Sesame Street?" If some people in this country have their way, and funding for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is cut, then the answer to that question will be no. Many people in this country want the federal government to remove the NEA from the national budget or at least cut back on its funding. Some of these people do not think that the Endowment is necessary, other people argue that the agency funds too many artists who create works that are off ensive to a majority of people. Though it may be true that some of the work recently produced has been offensive to a large number of people, it is not a reason to remove a very useful government program. The NEA provides jobs, funds programs for museum s and libraries, helps to educate the public, and helps generate economic activity. Instead of entirely cutting off the funding for such a useful program perhaps the federal government could look into reevaluating the budget and changing the spending policies of the agency. That way they could try to eliminate the artwork that is offensive to the public, and promote the good programs that the Endowment supports. There is a couple of ways in which the government could do this. They could do it by changing the grant giving policy, or by privatizing the NEA.

Before discussing how we can go about saving the National Endowment for the Arts we have to understand why it is so important to our country. First of all, the NEA employs about one million, three hundred thousand people ("Alliance" 1). We often hear i n the news about the rise in unemployment due to company layoffs and cutbacks. Imagine what would happen if a work force of over one million people were laid off...

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