OK, here's a good thing the federal government does. Every year since 2000, the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress has chosen 50 records worthy or preservation. The 2006 list is out, and I don't think this is much of an exaggeration:
“The National Recording Registry represents a stunning array of the diversity, humanity and creativity found in our sound heritage, nothing less than a flood of noise and sound pulsating into the American bloodstream,” Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said ...
Just look at the complete list: Calvin Coolidge's inaugural address, Roy Acuff and Count Basie, "The Fred Allen Show" and Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis, Studs Terkel's interview with James Baldwin and a speech by William Faulkner, Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa. America has such a wonderfully rich and varied cultural heritage, and it's good to know some of our tax dollars are going to making sure it doesn't get lost.
