Janos Gereben at [log in to unmask] wrote: >New attorney general may investigate opera monopoly on federal subsidy, >protect country music poor boys > >"I tend not to be an individual who has invested a great deal of my life >in opera," Sen. John Ashcroft told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in a 1997 >intereview, noting that his musical tastes run to gospel and country. > >"Now the opera gets a subsidy from the National Endowment for the Arts, >but, by and large, Willie Nelson and Garth Brooks don't. Those of us who >drive our pickups to those concerts don't get a subsidy, but the people >who drive their Mercedes to the opera get a subsidy." Irony, the Republican Senator who lead the compromise over the NEA, and secured its only increase in funding during the Clinton era, Slade Gorton, was defeated for re-election this year. But it is likely that the compromise will largely remain in place, neither side really wants to start this fight up again. Stirling Newberry <[log in to unmask]>