MediaWatch: August 1995
Table of Contents:
Time: Conservatives Are Stupid
If Republicans succeed in reducing federal funding for cultural agencies, the move "will depress the quality of life for everyone, and it will undermine the kind of democracy America has always aspired to." So read the table of contents page describing Time's August 7 cover story by Senior Writer Robert Hughes, just below the moniker reading "the weekly newsmagazine."
The subhead for the eight pages of slurs and innuendoes, declared: "The conservatives' all-out assault on federal funding is unenlightened, uneconomic and undemocratic." About the GOP "ideologues... squeaking with Newtish zeal," Hughes charged, "These boys and girls aren't even cultural Neanderthals. They're Jurassic. On culture, the limbic forebrain can hold one sound bite at a time, courtesy of Rush Limbaugh or George Will."
Assuming culture equals what the government funds, Hughes contrasted these conservative cretins to the "dedicated" artists on the dole: "By what meanness, through what smug Philistinism...do our Jacks-in-office decree that the arts and humanities are beneath the interest of the American people and unworthy of their collective support?" He added that "Losing the NEA would be a disgrace; but the loss of the NEH [National Endowment for the Humanities] as well would be a cultural tragedy for all Americans." This despite his admission that "corporate and foundation support for the arts outweighs federal support -- $16 to $1."
On federal interest in education, he offered this insult: "Other Americans, whether ordinary, short-sighted materialists or mere yahoos, have often opposed this noble idea." Going biblical, he painted opposition to arts funding as a "vengeful current of Fundamentalist apocalyptic religion" and with those who "have no idea that there is a vast, complex and valuable tract of images between Norman Rockwell's Thanksgiving turkey and Andres Serrano's photo of a crucifix in urine." But he didn't deign to trace this trail.
If the cuts pass? "Some will not notice it; others won't care; ...perhaps the next generation won't know what happened. Partial lobotomies work that way. They favor Beavis and Butt-head. Is that the business of American government?"
Time has yet to devote a cover story to denouncing liberals, so why give Hughes a platform? His editor, Christopher Porterfield, explained in the publisher's letter that "we give him a little more leeway, as long as it's clear that what you're getting is Bob Hughes opinion." But Time did not label it in any way as opinion.
Newt Gingrich, Time's Nancy Traver wrote in 1989, takes on "his mission with a humorless holier-than-thou style that makes him easy to dislike." Hughes should know.
