Total Destruction
April 24, 2004
Vice President Dick Cheney, commenting on the current situation in Iraq and terrorism in general around the world:
“Such an enemy cannot be deterred, cannot be contained, cannot be appeased, or negotiated with,” he said. “It can only be destroyed. And that is the business at hand.”
These inflammatory words can only remind us of regimes that threated empiralistic domination in past eras, where there was no ability or desire to acknowledge cultural differences, to understand how other people think.
How have we inflamed the Islamic world? Why do they hate us? These are questions not being asked, they are not a part of the equation of the Bush Administration.
These are dangerous times because the world’s only superpower is bent on annihilation. They are not asking questions. They don’t even know what the questions are. Without questions there is no dialogue and without dialogue there is no reason. You are only left with militaristic thinking, and that is a recipe for total destruction.
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Four More Years?
April 22, 2004
Last night we staged the first Interface / Experimental Party in Washington, DC to rally support in the artist community to engage artistic mediation in this crucial election season. We showed works by a number of artists who have contributed to Department Works, Mixologies, and Transformations. More gatherings are in the planning so please stay informed by signing up to become a member of the Experimental Party.
As artists, we need to focus our vision on the seriousness of the current political condition. According to Robert Reich, former Clinton Secretary of Labor:
“Musings about a second Bush term typically assume another four years of the same right-wing policies we’ve had to date. But it’d likely be far worse. So far, the Bush administration has had to govern with the expectation of facing American voters again in 2004. But suppose George W. Bush wins a second term. The constraint of a reelection contest will be gone. Knowing that voters can no longer turn them out, and that this will be their last shot at remaking America, the radical conservatives will be unleashed.”
Four more years may be the last four years for this nation.
Randall M. Packer
Secretary, US Department of Art & Technology
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