Square dancers, round dancers, contra dancers, callers, cuers, my fellow Americans.
Tonight I stand before you to report that the state of square dancing in America is strong. Through the herculean efforts of dedicated square and round dancing activists our opponents have been successfully thwarted. The hip hop advocates on the left and the vast ballroom conspiracy on the right have failed in their efforts to silence those who would return to the proven pastimes which for generations have served so well and which form an integral part in our developmental history.
Thanks to the pioneering leadership of all of you, we have turned the corner, so to speak, and the future looks bright.
But I am here tonight to tell you also that things can be better and I am going to do my best to see that the trend continues. I will work as hard as I can to see that new programs are introduced to further our lofty goals and to see that funds are appropriated to implement those programs.
With the number of elderly Americans set to double by the year 2030, the "baby boom" will become the "senior boom". So first and above all we must save traditional square and round dancing for the 21st century. In order to adequately fund our programs, I am going to propose that a payroll tax of of 1% be adopted at the beginning of the next fiscal year. This tax shall be augmented by an equal contribution on the part of the employer. The funds thus collected will be distributed to the various approved dance clubs throughout the United States by means of dance grants, either square grants or round grants. The funds will be administered by coordinators to be appointed for each of the sovereign states and shall be apportioned in accordance with distribution formulas to be determined by the demographic data obtained in the year 2000 census.
To jump start this ambitious program I intend to call for the hiring of an additional 100,000 dance instructors. Each instructor will be supplied with the appropriate musical accompaniment paraphernalia including but not restricted to a 2000 watt surround sound system and a CD or record library of 500 approved dance routines.
My Dance Education Accountability Act will require every dance instruction program receiving federal help must end social promotion. No [person shall graduate from level to level without mastering the routines. But we cannot abandon the less adept or less skilled. My plans triple the funding for summer and remedial dance classes to keep the aspiring students in the program.
Furthermore, I will propose that dance students be issued vouchers with which they can enroll at any training session the prefer in any part of the country. Also I will recommend a tenfold increase in scholarships for dance students who then commit to teach in inner cities, isolated rural areas and in Indian communities. Let us bring square and round dance excellence to every part of America.
A new Federal Bureau of Dance, headed by a newly appointed Lord of the Dance, will be established in Washington, D. C. for the primary purpose of developing training curricula, licensing of instructors, and the issuance of SQDRD cards. The SQDRD (Square Dance Round Dance) cards are to be carried on the person at all times and shown to official dance monitors at the door when attending official dance functions.
A hundred years from tonight, another American leader will stand in this place to report on the State of the Dance. He-or she-will look back on a 21st century shaped in so many ways by the decisions we make here and now. So let it be said of us then that we were not thinking only of our time, but of their time: that we reached as high as our ideals; that we put aside our differences and found a new bond of friendship through traditional square and round dancing; that we joined together to serve and strengthen the land and the pastime we love.
Thank you, good night, and may the Lord of the Dance bless you.
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