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Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Arts / Visual Art / Theater / Dance Sen. Mark Schoesler's Thoughtful Response to Arts Advocates

Posted by Jen Graves on Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 12:40 PM

When people who care about the arts sent Sen. Mark Schoesler (R-Ritzville) an email asking him to consider supporting a bill to continue their meager funding (from a lodging tax that isn't going anywhere), this is what he sent in return.

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Comments (14) RSS

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And just look what a cultural wonderland Ritzville is!

Posted by aiff on April 13, 2011 at 12:49 PM

Geez, he's a republic-CON so what would any thinking person expect!

There's only one solution, and that's the FINAL SOLUTION for all republiCONS.

Posted by sgt_doom on April 13, 2011 at 1:02 PM

He doesn't want King County to support arts & cultural activities funded in part from revenues received by people spending money IN King County, but I'll bet he'd scream bloody murder if someone suggested King County residents shouldn't support funding in HIS district for roads, schools, and the like that his constituents CAN'T fund on their own.

Posted by COMTE

on April 13, 2011 at 1:03 PM

WHY all the concern for Arts funding. Art won't die. Give it a rest.

Posted by Sargon Bighorn on April 13, 2011 at 1:08 PM

Didn't even have the decorum to send the standard form letter. What a prick!

Posted by AreYouHighOrWhat on April 13, 2011 at 1:12 PM

honest and direct. art does nothing for his constituents. they don't care.

unless the art is also a windbreak or a shading device or a meth lab.

Posted by Max Solomon on April 13, 2011 at 1:16 PM

No one will address the real issue here. WHY all the hell bent concern? Art in Seattle will not stop. Art won't go away. Art won't wither and die. Does ANYONE know why there is such a flap over this? If they do they ARE NOT telling. I just want to know.

Posted by Sargon Bighorn on April 13, 2011 at 1:26 PM

@7: Why should anybody bother explaining anything to you? You are a fucking moron.

Posted by Sargon Smallbrain on April 13, 2011 at 1:43 PM

@aiff, you are so right. Ritzville is home to the friendliest drunken quilters in the state!

Posted by sheschemes on April 13, 2011 at 2:09 PM

Hey, Ritzville just got a Taco del Mar. It's moving up in the world.

Posted by TVDinner

on April 13, 2011 at 3:37 PM

@7: Sure, "art" won't go away. But this lodging tax funds an amazing diversity of arts organizations and projects around King County, and without, a significant chunk of them will go away. This includes community chorales, small theaters, collectively-run art galleries, dance ensembles, local reading series, and many other arts events that are on a small scale and so have a very hard time making ends meet. Government funding for the arts helps ensure that art that isn't commercially viable. And while you could take a rabid social-Darwinian attitude about it and say "fuck anyone who can't survive by their own bootstraps", the government funds a whole fuck of a lot that I have no interest in supporting, starting with the military and continuing well into corporate welfare and all sorts of regional pork. While we're funding all that, with considerably larger sums than we give to education and social services and, yes, the arts, we might as well make some tiny gesture towards one of the only things that makes life immediately more enjoyable and survives over the centuries to demonstrate what kind of a culture we live in.

Posted by bottsford on April 13, 2011 at 3:54 PM

Also, we're talking about a wee sliver of a tax that isn't going to go away and has to be used to pay for tourism-related activity. Why the fuck shouldn't it be used to pay for the arts?

Posted by bottsford on April 13, 2011 at 3:56 PM

Schoesler is a farmer. Farmers don't pay taxes on anything in this state. Close the tax loopholes for farmers and all of a sudden, there's lots of funding for the arts. But majority Democrats would rather fuck their own constituents in Seattle, Tacoma and urban Puget Sound so that red county welfare abusers like Schoesler get to keep their welfare.

Posted by Oly insider on April 13, 2011 at 4:51 PM

HEY! been to Ritzville lately? Don't you mean Shitzville? No offense but at least the guys honest. Look around at the dying rural areas and towns in our state and country and get real!

Posted by sucka69 on April 13, 2011 at 8:37 PM