What Becomes a "Semi-Permanent" Collection Most?

I don't really have a dog in this particular fight, per se, but as someone working to have the art by the artists we represent acquired by museums, I do feel my opinion on the matter in general is worth considering carefully. The following is meant to spark conversation as well as point out my personal observations only (i.e., not suggest I have any authority in this realm):

In response to a controversy over the deaccession of two paintings by New York's National Academy Museum, the New York Times' Jori Finkel (full disclosure: who I am acquainted with and adore) surveys those on both sides of the question of whether the strict rules by which museums must abide when deaccessioning work should be reconsidered. Titled "Whose Rules Are These, Anyway?" Jori's article focuses on two questions:

Why, several experts ask, is it so wrong for a museum to sell art from its collection to raise badly needed funds? And now that many institutions are facing financial hardship, should the ban on selling art to cover operating costs be eased?

Before Carmine Branagan, the director of the National Academy Museum, sold two Hudson River School paintings to raise much needed cash, she reportedly put out feelers to two museum associations she belonged to:

She knew that both the American Association of Museums and Association of Art Museum Directors had firm policies against museums’ selling off artworks because of financial hardship and were not going to make an exception.

Even so, she said, she was not prepared for the directors group’s “immediate and punitive” response to the sale. In an e-mail message on Dec. 5 to its 190 members, it denounced the academy, founded in 1825, for “breaching one of the most basic and important of A.A.M.D.’s principles” and called on members “to suspend any loans of works of art to and any collaborations on exhibitions with the National Academy.”

Ms. Branagan, who had by that time withdrawn her membership from both groups, said she “was shocked by the tone of the letter, like we had committed some egregious crime.”

OK, so Ms. Branagan followed the proper chronology here, IMO, by withdrawing from the groups before moving forward with her obviously tough decision. As for the rest of the museums who might consider following her lead (and the slippery slope argument seems to be the museum associations' biggest concern), it does seem to me that the time to suggest that rules are antiquated is before one breaks them, not after. In other words, the members of the associations should work to change the rules, not complain when they are enforced.

The AAMD considers the rules important enough to list its position on it at the top of their Position Papers and Reports. Indeed, their position seems fairly clear:

Deaccessioning is practiced to refine and enhance the quality, use, and character of an institution’s holdings. There are two fundamental principles that are always observed whenever an AAMD member art museum deaccessions an object:

• The decision to deaccession is made solely to improve the quality, scope, and appropriateness of the collection, and to support the mission and long-term goals of the museum;
• Proceeds from a deaccessioned work are used only to acquire other works of art—the proceeds are never used as operating funds, to build a general endowment, or for any other expenses.

Funds from deaccessioning can be invested in an acquisitions endowment earmarked to support the long-term growth of a museum’s collection.

Again, I'll stay out of whether or not the AAMD was unduly harsh in their response to the National Academy Museum's decision, but in researching this question, one phrase museums use jumped out at me as perhaps sorely in need of reconsideration. What does it mean to have a "Permanent Collection" if deaccessioning is not so seriously regulated or discouraged? The National Academy Museum takes considerable pride in discussing their "Permanent Collection" and discusses it in terms that suggest they understand that the need for regulations is how such a collection comes to be:

Masterworks in these and other styles have come into the Academy's collection mainly as gifts from newly elected National Academicians in compliance with membership requirements; thereby continually enriching the collection. [emphasis mine]

Moreover, what does the term permanent even mean if a museum can define "financial hardship" in any way they wish and use that as a reason to sell off work for purposes other than increasing the collection? Actually, to be quite literal about it, what does permanent even mean if they ever sell any of the work in it at all?

UPDATE: Don't miss Tyler's take on this.
UPDATE 2: Also be sure you catch Donn Zaretsky's well-balanced discussion of the strict anti-deaccessionists arguments.