Education—both as to form and content—is irrelevant to what Conard appears to have written about.  (Going by the review—I don’t think anyone here has actually read the book.)

I have a B.A. in the arts, and it does nothing for me
of value.  My cheap sheet of paper from bartender’s
school has returned more money than my college
degree.

I don’t know that I condone that mindset, but we have
endorsed a course of action where people get a degree
in something they love instead of something more
practical.  Just because you didn’t get a degree in
Classical Guitar doesn’t mean you can’t play
classical guitar.

All of the performing I do now is for free anyway.  I
do at least one show a week, and I have a job with a
drivers ed company to survive from week to week. 
Earning a degree in something a little more tangible
or functional would have made my life much easier. 
Eating ramen into my 30’s was never my idea of being
an artist.

Actually, I think this Conard fellow is very
interesting, and I think his values and worldview are
far more pervasive than the comments here give them
credit for.  To assign them just to Romney or the
Republican Party is silly.

The financial sector produces nothing of useful value. This dude is quite simply a
parasite. A very successful parasite to be sure, but a creature who’s sole purpose is to
live by harming it’s host. His world view therefore, is similar to that of an
anthropomorphised tape worm. It is nice that he’s being so honest though.

Marian Griffith- Thanks for your thoughtful comment…far more level-headed than mine for sure. I simply can’t believe that there aren’t hoards of protesting citizens in the streets 24/7 railing against the likes of the billionaires. Unfortunately, you are absolutely correct, most people have sold their souls to the (false) god of capitalism and as long as they are “happy” they aren’t going to rock the boat. As Niel Postman so prophetically noted in “Amusing Ourselves to Death,” Huxley’s vision of the future is here!

Can’t these dickheads come up with any new ‘traitors’? Art history majors and Muslims are all they’ve got. The art history majors have always been traitors but only since the theatrical event they call 9/11 have the Muslims joined them. To call this man a ‘meglomaniac douche bag’ is to underestimate how extremely dangerous he and his thinking are for ordinary people.

And the sad part is that the poor sucker who’s working
till 11pm instead of being home with his baby and wife
is not making himself wealthy, but is instead just
struggling to pay the bills and is making the Conrads
of this world obscenely rich.

Its the Conrad’s of this world that have created this
chart of worker productivity versus compensation.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/05/40-years-of-
workers-left-behind-chart.php

The irony of course is that anyone with any sense at
all can see its the business majors and MBA’s that are
destroying this country.

So there’s something good about majoring in art history
after all.

we all are talented—- else we wld not have been producing talented
people.
it is us, or nature/us, that endows each one of us [excluding those
nature/us injures-impairs-etc] with a special talent and one cannot put a
price or special importance on talents. talest are not there for profit
making, but for equal benefit of all people.
an apple grower is as important as a doctor, lwayer, professor, piano
virtuoso.

So this is the one guy who will on his death bed say “I didn’t spend enough time at work.”

The quote referred to above: “God didn’t create the universe so that talented people would be happy,” he said. “It’s not beautiful. It’s hard work. It’s responsibility and deadlines, working till 11 o’clock at night when you want to watch your baby and be with your wife. It’s not serenity and beauty.”

What kind of utter nonsense..no, excuse me, fucking bullshit is this man spewing? Somehow I have a sense that he has never worked a hard day in his life…I mean real hard work that literally broke his back, cut his fingers to the bone and occasionally landed him in the hospital (I’ve done this kind of work and I’ve worked long 18 hour days away from my loved-ones myself). If he has, he would not speak such horse shit.

Please forgive my nastiness, but who the fuck do these wealthy jerks think they are and who the hell do they think they’re speaking to?

Ultimately, his hubris is embodied in his assertion that he knows what god thinks about creation. What a megalomaniac douche bag.

There’s alot of truth in Art.

I often find myself the subject of ‘the scream’.

http://todayentertainment.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/02/11509256-painting-the-scream-sells-for-record-120-million-at-auction?lite&ocid=ansmsnbc11