agitprop version 2.0

Dispatches from Gilead

Last year I created a collage of photos and newspaper clippings. I bound the pages in a large book and continue to add new entries when I can.

This time-capsule began as a way to document the social-political turmoil of Bush World. In my view, our society is at the beginning of a downfall. I am not sure how far down we will go, but I am prepared for the worst. This time-capsule will serve to document the commencement of our dissension into the gaping mouth of hell.

I have digitally scanned some pages from my book and present them here for your viewing. Please click on the images to get a larger view.

Exposition: America's Slumber Uninterrupted

Fear and Loathing at the Republican National Convention

The Second of November Seals the Fate of the World

War, Intelligence and the Demise of Reality

Stay tuned. There is more to come in this series . . .

Time to Switch to Geico

The Return of Friday Dog-Blogging!

Chillin' in the mornin' with Cairo:

Daddy can I sleep some more please?

American Idiot

The Presidential iPod Commission was a highly successful undertaking which received an overwhelming response. I would like to personally thank all individuals who contributed songs to this venture. I will continue to post politically astute song lyrics in this category. If the revolution had a soundtrack, this would be it.

American Idiot by Green Day

(from the album American Idiot, 2005 Grammy winner for Best Rock Album )

Don't wanna be an American idiot
Don't want a nation under the new media
Hey can you hear the sound of hysteria?
The subliminal mind fuck America

Welcome to a new kind of tension
All across the alien nation
Where everything isn't meant to be O.K.
Television dreams of tomorrow
We're not the ones who're meant to follow
For that's enough to argue

Maybe I am the faggot America
I'm not a part of some redneck agenda
Now everybody do the propaganda
And sing along to the age of paranoia

Welcome to a new kind of tension
All across the alien nation
Where everything isn't meant to be O.K.
Television dreams of tomorrow
We're not the ones who're meant to follow
For that's enough to argue

Don't wanna be an American Idiot
One nation controlled by the media
Information age of hysteria
It's calling out to Idiot America

Agitprop recommends the entire American Idiot album. Lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong delivers a particularly biting message to President Bush in the bridge of  Holiday.

Happy Birthday Mr. Hussein

Agitprop would like to wish ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein a Happy Birthday! Today Saddam Hussein turns 68 years old:

It is the dictator's second birthday behind bars at a US base near Baghdad airport since his capture in December 2003 near his hometown of Tikrit. Saddam faces a number of charges of crimes against humanity for his regime's campaign against the Kurds and the brutal suppression of a Shiite Muslim uprising in 1991. No date has been set for his trial.

Hey Saddam, Iraq must look great from your prison cell. Today the new prime minister chose cabinet ministers, effectively creating Iraq's first freely* elected government in over fifty years. Just keep on praying that your country collapses into complete civil war because that's your only ticket to escaping prison. In all honesty I will enjoy hearing the news about your coming trial as you deserve to be punished for the crimes you have inflicted on your people. Too bad that other evil dictators/CIA stooges like Mobutu and Pinochet have gone unpunished. You're a good place to start though.

*The current Iraqi government is in fact a U.S. puppet government which was brought about by questionable elections in which people voted for party lists, not individual candidates. The media continues to use the world "freely" to describe the nature of the elections thus I use it here.

Dubya 15, Press 0

Tonight President Bush held a rare prime-time news conference and once again the liberal press let him slide into home plate unscathed--and Gannon wasn't even in the audience! The reporters spoon-fed him some pretty easy stuff with a few exceptions (note: Helen Thomas still in exile). Other than saying "we're makin' progress" about twenty times Bush dropped the bombshell that his Social Security reform plans include means-testing and a sliding scale benefit formula. The major newspapers will have a field day with that one tomorrow.

During his press conferences Bush stutters, speaks in semi-incoherent sentences and doesn't seem to understand what he is talking about half the time. But do you know what? I can't stop watching or listening to his press conferences. I really get a kick out him. The style is strangely comedic and the delivery has a zen-like kookiness that only Bush could provide. He comes off as a regular guy--someone I'd want to down a beer with in the backyard. I don't care if he's talking about torturing terror suspects or the threat of a North Korean nuclear attack because I'm sucked in by that sweet Texas charm.

Now if only the intelligent segments of American society would get with the program and follow his lead then this country would be a lot more calm and naive. Come on, scarf down some Instant Dubya, its a Rove family recipe.

Justice Thursday

Pyramids, Oral Sex & Celebrity Romance: It's the American Way

Mark Fiore uses the new USDA food pyramid to explain Bush administration policy in Pyramids. I happen to think that the new food pyramid looks like the bastard love spawn of the Homeland Security Alert System and the Gay Pride flag.

Does an non-consensual blow-job constitute rape? In Norway it apparently does:

OSLO (Reuters) - A Norwegian court has sentenced a woman to nine months in jail for raping a man, the first such conviction in the Scandinavian country that prides itself for its egalitarianism. The 31-year-old man fell asleep on a sofa at a party in January last year and told the court in the western city of Bergen he woke to find the 23-year-old woman was having oral sex with him. Under Norwegian law, all sexual acts with someone who is "unconscious or for other reasons unable to oppose the act" are considered rape.

And for some useless celebrity news . . . Tom Cruise is back in the game after dumping Penelope Cruz. Aww, poor Dawson:

Move over, Brad and Angelina, there's a new hot couple in Tinseltown. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have coupled, according to publicists for both actors. The confirmations came late Wednesday after Cruise, 42, and Holmes, 26, were spotted canoodling this week in Rome. The Mission: Impossible man is in town to pick up a lifetime-achievement award Friday at the David di Donatello Awards, Italy's version of the Oscars.

Welcome to Zen Corner

Agitprop's Zen Corner is a place to reflect on issues of being, nothingness, and everything else in between. A place to draw comfort from the eternal discomfort of our postmodern existence. A place to wallow and think about the depths of this life.

Death is our eternal companion . . . The thing to do when you're impatient is . . . to turn to your left and ask advice from your death. An immense amount of pettiness is dropped if your death makes a gesture to you, or if you catch a glimpse of it, or if you just catch the feeling that your companion is there watching you.                                                                  -- Carlos Castenada

You live in illusion and the appearance of things. There is a reality but you do not know this. When you understand this, you will see that you are nothing, and being nothing you are everything. That is all.             -- Kalu Rinpoche                                                                

The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.  -- William Shakespeare.

                                                                                                                               

I believe in the essential unity of all that lives. Therefore I believe that if one person gains spiritually the whole world gains, and if one person falls, the world falls to that extent.                                                                         -- Mohandas K. Gandhi

As the World Burns...

The showdown regarding the fate of the filibuster and the execution of the nuclear option is upon us. Democrat Harry Reid has offered Republican Bill Frist a compromise regarding the president's judicial nominees. Frist's response: Fuck Compromise!

. . . In a rare news conference conducted on the Senate floor, [Frist] said he would not accept any deal that keeps his Republican majority from confirming judicial nominees that have been approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Heretik has been keeping track of this escalating situation in a column titled Armageddon on the Potomac. Today he writes in lyrical prose:

What we have here with these anxious shovelers who dig by day at the tree of liberty and who by night shovel lies and untruths is a fundamental misunderstanding of how the United State Senate and the United States Constitution work.  The misunderstanding is first a mere thing of word of the law.  Worse it is a misunderstanding and perversion of the spirit of the law.  And strange it is that those who speak so often of some greater spirit on high take the spirit down so low.

I believe that every mini-apocalypse deserves a soundtrack. We might as well have some good tunes while the capitol building goes down in flames. So crank up the Chemical Brothers' Galvanize while D.C. burns and watch the embers of the Constitution fall on the White House lawn.

World, the time has come to . . .  Push the button

World, my finger, is on the button . . .  My finger, is on the button

My finger, is on the button . . .  Push the button

The time has come to . . .  Galvanize!

Dick Cheney has already publicly expressed his support for the nuclear option and indicated that he would make the tie-breaking vote to shoot down a Democratic filibuster. President Bush hasn't given his opinion on the matter but I do believe that we can speculate where his sympathies lie . . .

Coronating Our Holy Warriors

Due to the recent ascendancy of religion and "values" as a fierce socio-political force and a prime media talking point, Agitprop wishes to induct the following religious individuals into the Axis of Evil 2005. Their dogmatic adherence to fundamentalism has fueled an insanely powerful lust for dominion and destruction.

Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue, on his belief in Christian theocracy:

I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good . . . Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism.  Our goal must be simple. We must have a Christian nation built on God's law, on the ten Commandments. No apologies.

After the Christo-Fascist Revolution, Grand Inquisitor Randall Terry will organize the Christian re-education camps and revolutionary justice tribunals. Here he directs his words towards doctors who perform abortions:

When I, or people like me, are running the country, you'd better flee, because we will find you, we will try you, and we'll execute you. I mean every word of it. I will make it part of my mission to see to it that they are tried and executed . . . There is going to be war, [and Christians may be called to] take up the sword to overthrow the tyrannical regime that oppresses them.

There are many ideological holy warriors in America but one must not forget the military commanders who help wage Christian Jihad. General William Boykin, the deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, has led our troops on the battlefield. Here he discusses fighting Muslims:

I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol . . . Our spiritual enemy . . . will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.

General Boykin on the outcome of Bush v. Gore:

Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him . . . I tell you this morning that he’s in the White House because God put him there.

Lt Col. Gareth Brandl rallied his troops before going into Fallujah in November 2004 saying:

The enemy has got a face, he's called Satan. He lives in Fallujah and we're going to destroy him!

Ruthless, power-hungry and lusting for blood. Now that's following in Christ's image!