Washington, Sep 21 (THAINDIAN NEWS) Buffy Wicks, Deputy Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, Yosi Sergant, then Communications Director of the National Endowment for the Arts, and members of a hand-picked, pro Obama arts group were caught on tape discussing how artists receiving NEA grants could produce art that would support the Obama agenda.

A partial transcript and audio from the scandalous conference call has been posted on BigHollywood.com.

The call begins with Michael Skolnik, introducing himself at the conference call “I have been asked by folks in the White House and folks in the NEA about a month ago in a conversation that was held….We had the idea that I would help bring together the independent artists community around the country…and so I’m hoping that through this group and the goal of all this and the goal of this phone call, is through this group that we can create a stronger community amongst ourselves to get involved in things that we’re passionate about as we did during the campaign but continue to get involved in those things, to support some of the president’s initiatives.”

BigGovernment addresses the implications of this conference call: “Debating the role of government is and has been the goal of bringing this conference call to light. The NEA tainted the creative process by encouraging the art community to address highly controversial political issues. ‘How?’ you may ask. The NEA is the largest single funder of the arts in the United States. This government agency has the power and ability to fund arts organizations and recently expressed a desire to return to funding individual artists, bringing more from the group into the pool of potential grantees.”

“The NEA did encourage a handpicked, pro-Obama arts group to address issues under contentious national debate. That fact is irrefutable.