Secretary Rallies Artists

10:42 A.M. EST
Washington, DC

Randall M. Packer
Secretary, US Department of Art & Technology

THE SECRETARY: Thank you, all. (Applause.) Thank you, all, very much.

I am really proud to be here with the good men and women of the USA Exquisite Corpse, the artist's call to service. (Applause.)

We're also proud to be here today with our artist friends who have joined Operation Artistic Freedom. (Applause.) Over the last week the world has witnessed the skill and honor and resolve of the cultural community engaged in passionate dialogue and acts of artistic mediation. We have seen the character of a new generation of artists. Millions of Americans are proud of our artists, and so am I. I am honored to be the Secretary-in-Chief. (Applause.)

Every artist in our coalition of the willing understands the terrible threat we face from our government-in-action. Every artist here refuses to live in a future of fear, at the mercy of politicians and the corporate oilgarchy. And every artist here today shares the same resolve: the only valid experimental approach is one based on the uncompromising critique of existing conditions and their conscious intervention.

Our artists are making good progress; yet the war on war is far from over. We cannot predict the final day, but I can assure you, and I assure the long-suffering people of America, there will be a day of reckoning for the President, who has revealed the principles of arrogance, abuse of power, personal gain and a frightening lack of charisma, through his contempt for the opinion of the world.

Day by day, George W. Bush is losing his grip on reality; out of fear of the unknown, pain, and death - the Gods, surfacing from the immemorial depths of time and space - he has used his lethal weapons to bring down fire from the heavens, death and destruction that devours us all.

In the early stages of this war, the world is getting a clearer view of a terrible and deep anxiety resulting from self-created and deadly dangers that are growing beyond our control.

Our enemy in this war on war is the existential darkness that has possessed our government, that grips its soul. (Applause.)Ý

The goal of artistic freedom unites our coalition. And this goal comes from the deepest convictions of the avant-garde. The artistic freedom we defend is the right of every artist and the future of our nation.

The liberty we prize is not America's gift to the world, it is the artist's gift to humanity.

That's what we do. That's our job.

Thank you.

(Applause.).