As a new guy here, let me be the first to say, Jesus H. Christ. You've got to be kidding me. You took what Lucas said, and completely misquoted him left and right to suit your own purpose.
He was basically saying how he's making Episode III for his own enjoyment only
He did not say he was making them for his own enjoyment. He said he was making them the way he wanted to make them, and making them because he enjoyed making them.
that he has "earned the right to fail"
Way to take a quote completely out of context. Lucas said he was going back to making those small, independent type films, the kind of films nobody would want to see. He then stated he had earned enough and worked hard enough to be able to fail. What he was referring to was the fact that these films would make very little at the box office.
When asked if the critics had a point when they trashed parts of Star Wars, he totally avoided the question and started talking about issues of personal preference, rather than objective quality
That's complete BS! Lucas didn't avoid the question at all. In fact, he met the question head on. He noted that a lot of critics didn't like them, and even joked that it couldn't get any worse. To be honest though, both films are positive on rottentomatoes, so they obviously didn't get slammed all that much. Lucas then went on to make an analogy. He stated he made the films like he wanted. He said maybe the film should have been like the critics wanted, but he wanted to do it his way. There's nothing wrong with that at all.
Next time you want to slam someone, you best make sure you get the quotes right, rather than just make a bunch of crap up. Otherwise you'll come off looking stupid. At the end of the day, you've never even met George Lucas, so you don't know what kind of person he is. Simply because he doesn't kowtow to your way of thinking, that makes him a jerk.