Well, that depends on how you define jingoism. Is he just being patriotic? Or fanatically patriotic? I’ve heard the song, and I must miss the lines where he states that we should kill all rag heads, because they’re not Americans. Maybe I should listen again?
And as for making money? Who doesn’t want to make money at what they do? I cannot, in any way, blame any entertainer that makes money at what they do. After all, for every successful person making money at singing/songwriting/acting, I’m sure there are hundreds that toil and express themselves in writing/print/whatever that do it solely for their own benefit. But then, if you never show anyone your product, you’ll never let your point be known. And if you do show people, and it becomes overwhelmingly popular, then you’re a successful entertainer. Sort of damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Of course, if you’re making money by expressing your opinion, that makes your opinion utterly invalid and automatically makes the money the only reason you could possibly have expressed the opinion in the first place. Didn’t you know that?
I didn’t say his opinion was invalid, and I’m not saying this guy doesn’t love his country, but I will say it seems he’s using the flag-waving pro-war sentiment to sell records and boost his career. As far as hating the kind of skewed glurge this guy is spewing, I’m with Celtic.
Atrael, my point is that getting your international news from one source in one country is not going to give you a balanced (truthful) world view.
I’m not necessarily anti-war (hope you didn’t sprain anything jumping to that conclusion); I’m anti-ignorance. These friends of mine whom I mentioned have access to the Internet. They are perfectly capable of reading international news sites. But they don’t.
As stated in the OP, the problem with this song is that it is untruthful. The singer, with a lot of self-righteous angst asks the question “have you forgotten 9/11?”.
I take exception to that. This war in Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11.
Your statement is untruthful. Nor is it balanced. The war is not in retaliation for 9/11, but to say it has nothing to do with 9/11 makes me want to offer you a prybar to remove your head from the dark and warm place it apparently is.
Why are we invading Iraq? To dissarm them of WMD. Why is his WMD so “scary”? Because the administration has sated over and over that they believe terrorists may get their hands on those WMD. Who instigated 9/11?..
Well you see where I am going here. The doccumented reasoning is there. As a matter of fact, that is the official stance of the US government and her allies. For you to claim it as “untruthful” makes me want to “kick you in the teeth” because of your propaganda.
I do not want to kick you in the teeth. I just find the OP vitriol as uncalled for and spineless as my statement was.
OK I see your finer point. You are right, what I meant is that the war should not be in retaliation for 9/11. The problem that I have with the song is that the lyrics try to put a direct link between the terrorists of 9/11 and Saddam.
As you noted, there is a convoluted way to look at this war being justified as keeping WMD out of terrorists’ hands. It’s not my opinon tho.
So one day Buddy Rich (jazz drummer) was being interviewed by a nurse whilst laying on a gurney in a hospital. Nurse asks, “So Mr. Rich, are you allergic to anything?” He sits upright in his gurney and says “Yeah, country music.”
Couldn’t agree with him more.
BTW, my bro’ lives in Austin, but he just got a job up here in NJ, so I’m not gonna have an excuse anymore to go down there.
Sigh. Life just isn’t fair.
