>> >          Cuomo was NYS' most unsympathetic governor for arts funding.
 ...
>> Am I the only one who sees it that way?
>
>NO, Mario.  You are certainy *not* the only one who sees it that way!
>
>Why would you think that?  He was, after all, only quoting Cuomo's
>analogy, I think.  Do you see something else in his words?
 
And it was to Cuomo's words I was reacting -- I included the "Cuomo was
NYS' most unsympathetic governor" line from the original to keep that
connection in the readers' minds.  I apologize to the poster of that
message if he, like you, inferred that my irritation was directed at him.
 
I'm afraid the bottom-line mentality I see in Cuomo's words is so alien to
my way of thinking that it frightens me -- all the more so because it seems
so common, and, worse, seems so common among those who have some measure of
power.
 
Of course, you make certain you've got food and shelter first ... that's
common sense.  The moment you have the basic physical necessities taken
care of, however, culture (by which I DID mean the arts, specifically, to
answer another poster's objection -- there are two general meanings for the
word, after all, other than cultivation as in tillage: the first being that
pertaining to the intellectual and aesthetic development and senses of
human beings; and the second being the pattern of thought, beliefs, forms,
and other traits, including material, that marks and characterizes a
grouping of human beings) assumes as important a role.  THAT was my point.
 
Too many people seem to think that, if something is not directly necessary
to physical survival, it is ipso facto a luxury.  Too many people also
value things -- programmes, academic courses and departments, whatever --
only in proportion to how much money they can bring in, immediately or
potentially ... the bottom line mentality.  Children will not grow up to
make a living off of music or drama or art, so cut those programmes out of
the schools and emphasize especially the sciences, because THOSE will be
important to the nation's business and economy.  Which, first, leaves us
poor humanists pretty well nowhere, and, second, leaves -- to go back to my
original analogy -- those children without a soul, without the sort of
thing that can give inner meaning to life.
 
(Yes, I know that's a rather simplistic picture, but that's the easiest way
to try to bring my point across.  I'll leave the if, and, but, and maybe
complexities to others, and get off my soap box now.  To the sound, no
doubt, of thunderous applause and sighs of relief <grin>.)
 
>Being from Texas, I can't begin to assess NY politicians, so I'll
>not try.  (Heck, even Texas pols are beyond me!)
 
And I've given up on pols altogether, thank you all the same.  <rolls eyes
heavenward>
 
>David LaRo
 
Mario Rups
[log in to unmask]