IN FAIRNESS TO THE UR...:

Obama Stiffs the Arts: The arts world is fuming over Obama's underqualified "arts czar," and a humanities appointee who fudged his college degree on a résumé. (Judith H. Dobrzynski, 3/25/09, Daily Beast)

Memo to President Obama, from the arts world: This is not what we had in mind. [...]

[F]or the most part, it’s been politics as usual. With the nation’s economic woes front-and-center, no one expected Obama to focus on the arts right away. Appointments to the NEA and NEH chairs could be weeks or even months away; in the meantime, they have acting chairpeople appointed by Obama, both seen as adequate for the short-term.

But the three lesser appointments Obama has so far made in the cultural arena—a Chicago lawyer named Kareem Dale, a Hollywood fund-raiser named Jeremy Bernard, and an Obama Senate staffer named Anita Decker—have been strange at best and, at worst, deflating. None has much arts expertise; what they do have are political connections. Bernard, appointed to a key post at the academically minded NEH, never graduated from college, though he claims a bachelor’s degree on his résumé.

...the arts is another area where W had raised the bar impossibly high...unless Mr. Obama can coax Dana Gioia into coming back....

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 25, 2009 8:48 PM