The Artist in Chief

The swirling uncontrolled greed that George W. Bush and his cronies unleashed on our nation has depleted the resources necessary for the Arts to thrive in our schools. Barack Obama understands that "The Art Spirit" needs to have a home in education and in our culture as a whole. He clarified his position a bit more within an issues page on change.gov, and he actually admitted that he considers himself an artist!

Barack Obama's Plan

Arts

Our nation's creativity has filled the world's libraries, museums, recital halls, movie houses, and marketplaces with works of genius. The arts embody the American spirit of self-definition. As the author of two best-selling books - Dreams from My Father and The Audacity of Hope - Barack Obama uniquely appreciates the role and value of creative expression.

At first I was conflicted. Whoever wrote "as the author of two best-selling books" should have known how crass and common that pitch would sound. When I calmed down enough to understand what it was trying to say (taking out the "best-selling" would help for me) I realized that basically...

Our new President Elect considers himself an artist. As should we all.

It's extremely exciting to see this shift in priorities already appearing.  I have always been an advocate for arts education, and I think, along with civics education, it's one of the most important things for young people to learn.  We get so stuck on math and science, and -- the author is correct -- the resources to expand the education we offer to students get eaten up by wars we shouldn't be fighting and tax cuts we shouldn't be giving.

Nicholas Kristof's column is up on the Times website, and he addresses intellectualism and how interesting it will be to have a president who finds delight in nuance, who embraces philosophy and poetry.  Along similar lines, it will be nice to have a president who advocates for arts programs, resisting the effort to cut them in order to suit a failed policy (NCLB).

It will be nice to have an "artist-in-chief" as well as a commander-in-chief.