Elmo's Life Threatened by Real Housewife of St. Louis

I never really get the urge to sucker punch someone in the face (mostly because I am a lazy pacifist) but Dana Loesch has just moved herself to the top of my bitch-slap bucket list.  I was fortunate enough to be in France during the initial onslaught of the Teabag-partiers; it made it much easier to ignore them, however this representative from crazytown (to quote Joan Walsh) finally hit a personal nerve with me, by stating that government should NEVER be responsible for funding the arts.  She may be the most preposterous nincompoop I have ever had the displeasure of watching on television - and I say that even in a time where we are blessed every week with morsels of spray-tanned-wisdom from the whiny mouth of Snooki of Jersey Shore. Dana tried to qualify that she "likes the arts" and how she had studied dance (mostly ballet) for 15 years, six days a week...now I wonder who paid for those lessons?  How nice for her to have a family that was able to budget such a thing (too bad her parents couldn't put a price on her education) but Dana, there and millions of children in the world with natural talents, who are unable to nurture them, and the thought of even having a parent is not part of their reality.

Those who believe arts education is something that should be privately funded, are those who would carelessly widen the divisive gap between the wealthy and poor in our country.  How would one expect a child of no means be exposed to ballet, opera, the symphony or ground-breaking visual art, without an introduction through their public education?  To cut budgets in this area tells us that the education of our children in general is not a priority in this country, and that we are satisfied with producing a mass population of mediocre minds.

To justify budget cuts for mediums such as PBS and NPR under the argument that they promote Liberalism, seems an extreme point of view, to me, but perhaps it is just a simple demonization of the word "liberal" when one hears the term Liberal Arts.  It wouldn't be the first time there was confusion over vocabulary, it happens in 1st grade classrooms everyday....but, let me not digress to utter bitchiness, instead I will clarify that the term Liberal Arts refers to the education of a person who enjoys the freedom of existence, instead of slavery.  It means we are afforded the right to read great literature, study the sciences and find new solutions in mathematics. If these are things that members of our government do not feel are important enough to fund for the children who will one day be the leaders of the world, then I say the future looks bleak and colorless indeed.  While I am a promoter of Fine Art in my own field, I believe that well rounded exposure of all subject matter through education, creates the highest level of human being; a person who can think for themselves by using rational thought.  If Maya Angelou, Itzhak Perlman and Barbara Walters had not been able to get to Sesame Street, most children might never bother to find out who they are, or how they each overcame great adversity to become pioneers in their respective fields.  Perhaps this group of people who feel Sesame Street promotes Liberalism would prefer someone like Newt Gingrich to appear in a segment with Elmo; then we could all learn the reasons why hypocrisy is better than forgiveness...