U.S. Congressional Arts Report Card

Americans for the Arts has published their 'Congressional Arts Report Card 2008' in advance of the November election. Statistics show that the budget for the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA) is just 48 cents per American. Funding for the NEA, the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), Arts in Education and the office of Museum Services totals approximately eight hundredths of one percent of the federal discretionary budget. The NEA budget had its highest budget back in 1992 at $176 million. In FY08 it is $144.7 million. Taking inflation into consideration, the FY08 budget has about half the purchasing power of its '92 budget. Without going through each member of Congress' grade , I'd just like to single out Doug Lamborn (Republican for the 5th district in Colorado). Not only does he receive a failing grade, he offered an amendment in June 2007 to eliminate funding for the NEA all together. Luckily the vote failed 97 to 335, but anyone in Lake, Park, El Paso, Fremont, Chaffee, or Teller counties should send this loser a message on election day that his antics won't be tolerated.