Our Threatened Freedom

Are You A Patron Of The Arts? (03:16)

R.J. Rushdoony

Transcript:

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:00 Are you a patron of the arts? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom. Very few of us have the money to finance artworks, and if we did have it, we would prefer to pay for what we believe is good art. All of us, however, through our tax dollars, are very definitely patrons of the arts. The annual appropriation for the national endowment of the arts budget is being pushed closer and closer to the $150 million mark.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:34 These millions go to many things most of us would consider bad art, and to much we would not at all call art. In recent years, such funds have been used to produce a film on making a blue cornmeal bread or producing a gay Sunshine journal, to publish a feminist publication, to acquaint ex-criminals and ex-drug users with art, and much more.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:03 Some of the funds go to strange causes. The National Conference of State Legislatures is a lobbying group, but it has received arts funding. The same is true of The National Council on Aging, also a lobbying group. In Washington, D.C., one sponsor of an erotic art show received funding, and so on and on.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:26 Of course, some in Congress will argue that $150 million is not much. It may not be much to Congress, but it is a great deal to the rest of us. Moreover, we have our growing deficit because grants of $150 million to many thousands of like causes add up to billions of wasted dollars and an economic crisis.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:57 We are regularly told by State and Federal officials that their budgets cannot be cut. What we are not told is of the thousands of foolish grants which are regularly made, and need to be eliminated totally. Our national deficit is becoming the national disaster. Taxes are increasing, and so, too, is the tax revolt, a dangerous fact, in that it represents a growing vote of dissent and no confidence in our form of civil government.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:33 If Congress continues to spend money as usual, it will not only bankrupt the country, but also destroy all confidence in our Constitutional order. The end result of fiscal irresponsibility and inflation has all too often been a totalitarian regime.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:55 Those who want subsidies to the arts should remember that such subsidies, which are always followed by controls, are the hallmark of every totalitarian state.

R.J. Rushdoony: 03:11 This has been R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our threatened freedom.