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Yosi Sergant Resigns
  • From Politico: The National Endowment for the Arts said Thursday that its communications director, Yosi Sergant, has resigned. “This afternoon Yosi Sergant submitted his resignation from the National Endowment for the Arts. His resignation has been accepted and is effective immediately,” said a spokeswoman, Sally Gifford, in a statement. Sergant, who helped make artist Shepard Fairey’s “Hope” image ubiquitous as an organizer of Obama campaign support from artists, had seemed [...]
    • Yosi Sergant Speaks
  • Yosi Sergant, you may recall, was the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) official who took the fall for the infamous conference call last summer exposed by BigJournalism.com for organizing media propaganda in support of the White House political agenda. The NEA initially defended his role in this affair, but he was demoted from his Director role and ultimately resigned in September 2009 as the controversy continued to swell within [...]
    • NEA: Do It for the Revolution
  • propaganda-artBig Hollywood has its NEA expose up. Patrick Courrielche writes: The NEA did encourage a handpicked, pro-Obama arts group to address issues under contentious national debate. That fact is irrefutable. This practice has never been the historical role of the NEA. The NEA’s role is to support excellence in the arts, to increase access to the arts, and to be a leader in arts education. Using the arts to address [...]
    • Blockbuster: Political Coordination With NEA Initiated By White House
  • A few weeks ago, a blogger on BigGovernment.com broke the story regarding an inappropriate (if not illegal) conference call between White House staff and representatives and members from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), to solicit “artistic” support for the President’s health reform agenda. The NEA representative who facilitated this call, Yosi Sergant, has since been “re-assigned”. However, according to a story today in the Washington Times, the NEA [...]
    • First Draft of NEA’s Conference Call Statement
  • Big Government provides a link to this statement by the new NEA Chairman (italics mine): As chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, I would like to clarify the issues concerning an August conference call in which an NEA employee participated. Here are the facts. Fact 1:             The former NEA Director of Communications helped organize and participated in an August 10th conference call to introduce members of the arts [...]
    • Buffy Wicks Departs White House, Joins Axelrod’s Old Media Firm??
  • Buffy Wicks, remember, was the Deputy Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement who was implicated (along with Yosi Sergant) in orchestrating a propaganda campaign for health care reform with the National Endowment for the Arts. Sergant ended up resigning over this incident, but I believe “Buffy the Integrity Slayer” was more to blame. Anyway, I’m not sure how this news slipped through the cracks but according to this press [...]
    • The White House’s Secret Participation at College Dems Convention (Update)
  • I posted last week on how the White House, starting last May, organized a grassroots lobbying campaign with the arts community in support of ObamaCare. Yosi Sergant, a former White House staffer who had recently moved over to the National Endowment for the Arts, was ultimately scape-goated and lost his job. But there should be no doubt that the White House, through the Office of Public Engagement, was completely behind [...]
    • Obama: I Got Smeared Too!
  • Well the polls are out now, the ones that take into account whatever bounce the Republicans received last week, and the news is not good for team Obama. Both Zogby and Gallup show McCain up 3-4 points, for the first time ever I believe. In my opinion, one of the things helping push the Republicans over the top is the relentless smears on the very likable Sarah Palin. We’ve noted [...]
    • First Lady Presents Award to Chicago Arts Group Calling for Open Borders
  • LadyApplaudsThe President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities presents an annual award – called the “Coming Up Taller” award – which recognizes a select number of local youth organizations for “fostering the creative and intellectual development of America’s children”. This year’s awards were presented by First Lady Michelle Obama at a White House ceremony on November 4. The recipients were each awarded $10,000, and included 15 organizations located throughout the [...]

    • How’s that Hope Working for you, Yosi?

    Morgen on September 25, 2009 at 4:50 pm

    As John posted earlier, Yosi Sergant resigned from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) yesterday. While Sergant has not yet commented directly, his departure was undoubtedly a result of his role in the conference call scandal uncovered by BigGovernment.com. And while I don’t think there is any question that his comments on the call were inappropriate, the real blame for the politicization of the NEA should be placed squarely on the senior White House staff who initiated the organizing campaign with the arts community back in May. From all appearances, Sergant was only following their lead in soliciting grassroots political activity in support of ObamaCare.

    There may be others within the conservative movement who would celebrate the resignation or removal of every partisan liberal within the Obama government. But I think it’s a borderline travesty when someone like Sergant essentially takes the fall for relatively minor misdeeds which were clearly coordinated from the upper echelons of the White House. And while I don’t expect Sergant to echo these sentiments, I imagine he is pretty disillusioned by this whole experience. (You can check in on his Twitter feed here. He’s been noticeably quiet for the past week.)

    The White House should start taking responsibility for their decisions and policies rather than throwing low-level staffers under the bus in order to shift the blame.

    Category: Politics |

    6 Comments

    1. Bobachek

      Dance with the devil and eventually the bill comes due….If he thought this spineless admin would somehow back him up then he’s a fool…

      September 26, 2009 @ 5:47 am
    2. Jim

      A partisan liberal will be replaced by another partisan liberal so it’s much ado about nothing. Obamnaure is only out for himself so this doesn’t really surprise me.

      September 26, 2009 @ 11:02 am
    3. Marc C

      throwing the low level people under the bus is an example that trickled down hypocrisy really does work.

      September 26, 2009 @ 2:01 pm
    4. » Buffy Wicks Departs White House, Joins Axelrod’s Old Media Firm?? - Big Government

      [...] campaign for health care reform with the National Endowment for the Arts. Sergant ended up resigning over this incident, but I believe “Buffy the Integrity Slayer” was more to [...]

      April 27, 2010 @ 6:18 am
    5. BIG Propaganda

      [...] campaign for health care reform with the National Endowment for the Arts. Sergant ended up resigning over this incident, but I believe “Buffy the Integrity Slayer” was more to [...]

      April 27, 2010 @ 7:54 am
    6. Buffy Wicks Departs White House, Joins Axelrod’s Old Media Firm??

      [...] campaign for health care reform with the National Endowment for the Arts. Sergant ended up resigning over this incident, but I believe “Buffy the Integrity Slayer” was more to [...]

      April 28, 2010 @ 4:11 am

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