Interesting find... hadn't seen it here.. I wonder why??? Meet the pro-Bush punks link to article The most anti-establishment of music genres is being used in support of the US Republican party. Dorian Lynskey reports Wednesday July 7, 2004 The Guardian (picture) Gotham Road's Michale Graves: 'the cool thing now is to hate the government' One would have thought punk's capacity to shock was exhausted when, in the 1980s, GG Allin defecated on stage and either ate the result or flung it at the audience. Today, punk has come to mean safe, multiplatinum groups such as Blink-182 and Green Day, and Ashton Kutcher playing pranks on celebrities on MTV. There is one tattooed, mohawked New Yorker who knows how to outrage the punk scene: Nick Rizzuto - and he votes Republican. "Conservative punk is not generally what people think of when they hear of a punk," says Rizzuto. A smart, articulate 22-year-old, he founded the Conservative Punk website six months ago, and has since received hate mail from disgusted punks, excited phone calls from the Republican party and intrigued coverage from the US media. To his critics he's a crank bringing punk's good name into disrepute - but to his supporters he's the fearless voice of a formerly silent minority. Raised on the Clash and the Dead Kennedys, the vast majority of today's punk bands lean towards the left, and Bush and Iraq have radicalised the scene once again. Horrified by the closeness of the 2000 election result, "Fat Mike" Burkett of the Californian band NOFX founded Punkvoter, the leftwing voter registration organisation, and convinced 200 bands to lend their endorsement. "The last time I saw anything like this was during the Vietnam era with Nixon," says Al Jourgensen of Punkvoter supporters Ministry, whose latest album boils with anti-Bush sentiment. Yet, the politics of punk have never been clear-cut. In late-1970s Britain, as the Clash were fronting Rock Against Racism, Oi! bands such as Skrewdriver were backing the National Front. In America, early punks spat in the face of liberalism, establishing a precedent for extreme views. Today, the militantly abstinent, purity obsessed hardcore punks known as straight-edgers oppose drug use with a zeal that would make an evangelical Christian applaud. The fact is, the meaning of the word punk is no longer clear. Andy Greenwald, author of Nothing Feels Good: Punk Rock, Teenagers and Emo, argues that while punk once meant something specific, that's no longer the case. "People now feel like you can be a punk anything," he says. "If everyone else is saying don't make money, it's pretty punk to say, well, I'm going to make money. If everyone on the punk scene is liberal why not be a punk Republican?" It's this frustration with the punk scene's liberal orthodoxy that fires the conservative punks. "You could say we're anti-anti-establishment," says Michale Graves, Conservative Punk columnist and frontman of Gotham Road. "I think in American mainstream culture the cool thing to do now is to hate the government and speak out against the war." It's certainly easy to see how a Republican musician might feel like a scorned minority. Johnny Ramone, punk's sole big-name Republican, became the right-wing's answer to Michael Moore or the Dixie Chicks when the Ramones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two years ago, and he announced from the podium: "God bless President Bush, and God bless America." The right-wing website Free Republic recently attempted to out "conservative" celebrities; its brief list of confirmed Republican musicians outside the country-music scene comprises Ramone, anti-drugs/pro-NRA rock veteran Ted Nugent, and actor/songwriter Vincent Gallo. Rizzuto insists there are many more who are reluctant to make their opinions public. "I'm very wary of mentioning these guys on the record, especially in a European newspaper. They have to worry about being blacklisted from playing certain clubs and from playing Europe altogether." This may sound paranoid but Graves says his European tour was cancelled after the promoter read a New York Times article about his politics. Rizzuto has always felt like an outsider. He turned conservative after 9/11, while he was studying at the famously liberal State University of New York in New Paltz. From a certain angle, punk's individualistic creed and me-against-the-world rhetoric overlap with conservative values. "On some level punk is inherently libertarian," says Greenwald. "You don't tell me what to do, I won't tell you what to do, I'm just going to worry about myself." Follow that logic and Bush's bullish approach to foreign policy - basically, screw what anyone else says, I'll do what I like - seems quintessentially punk. Such thinking is anathema to most punks. While Punkvoter's Rock Against Bush CD can boast the likes of Offspring and Sum 41, Rizzuto concedes that the few bands that support Conservative Punk, including Drawback, Style Over Substance and Nation of Suspects, aren't exactly household names. But this demographic, however small, is promising territory for Republicans. Right-wing commentators have coined phrases such as "gonzo conservative" and "South Park Republican" to describe young voters who like tattoos, swearing and Donald Rumsfeld. Conservative Punk has already inspired sympathetic sites such as GOPunk and Anti-Anti-Flag, and Rizzuto hopes to compile a benefit CD in aid of Students for a Free Iran. Conservative Punk and Punkvoter regard each other with what might be described as polite hostility. "We're all for people expressing their opinions but it just sits a little weird to see anybody in the punk world be pro a guy who's done a job on tearing away civil liberties," says Punkvoter's political director, Scott Goodstein. "It's not a new thing for punk to be reacting against what folks don't like in the government, but punks in favour of the government is weird." Rizzuto counters that by saying he opposes Bush on abortion and has turned down work with Republican activists. "We don't even go as far as to say vote for Bush. Our independence is what sets us apart. We have posted pieces that are critical of Bush. My preference in this election just happens to be Bush over Kerry." His response to critics: "As punks we should be most accepting of different beliefs. We should be a diverse crowd." If you didn't know better, you'd call that liberal.
That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard. Punk isn't Republican (don't worry, it isn't Democrat, either). And the "right-wing" early "oi" punk movement it is trying to use as an example? They were called skinheads. They didn't vote Republican, either. Of course, my 11-year old niece thinks she is punk because she wears an armband...even it got commercialized.
OMFG is the writer high or something.Bush quintessentially punk !! I can't wait for him to do a Pat Boone at the RNC.
"Stars And Stripes Of Corruption" Finally got to Washington in the middle of the night I couldn't wait I headed straight for the Capitol Mall My heart began to pound Yahoo! It really exists The American International Pictures logo I looked up at that Capitol Building Couldn't help but wonder why I felt like saying "Hello, old friend" Walked up the hill to touch it Then I unzipped my pants And pissed on it when nobody was looking Like a great eternal Klansman With his two flashing red eyes Turn around he's always watching The Washington monument pricks the sky With flags like pubic hair ringed 'round the bottom The symbols of our heritage Lit up proudly in the night Somehow fits to see the homeless people Passed out on the lawn So this is where it happens The power games and bribes All lobbying for a piece of ass Of the stars and stripes of corruption Makes me feel so ashamed To be an American When we're too stuck up to learn from our mistakes Trying to start another Viet Nam Whilke fiddling while Rome burns at home The Boss says, "You're laid off. Blame the Japanese" "America's back," alright At the game it plays the worst Strip mining the world like a slave plantation No wonder others hate us And the Hitlers we handpick To bleed their people dry For our evil empire The drug we're fed To make us like it Is God and country with a band People we know who should know better Howl, "America riles. Let's go to war!" Business scams are what's worth dying for Are the Soviets our worst enemy? We're destroying ourselves instead Who cares about our civil rights As long as I get paid? The blind Me-Generation Doesn't care if life's a lie so easily used, so proud to enforce The stars and stripes of corruption Let's bring it all down! Tell me who's the real patriots The Archie Bunker slobs waving flags? Or the people with the guts to work For some real change Rednecks and bombs don't make us strong We loot the world, yet we can't even feed ourselves Our real test of strength is caring Not the toys of war we sell the world Just carry on, thankful to be farmed like worms Old glory for a blanket As you suck on your thumbs Real freedom scares you 'Cos it means responsibility So you chicken out and threaten me Saying, "Love it or leave it" I'll get beat up if I criticize it You say you'll fight to the death To save your worthless flag If you want a banana republic that bad Why don't you go move to one But what can just one of us do? Against all that money and power Trying to crush us into roaches? We don't destroy society in a day Until we change ourselves first From the inside out We can start by not lying so much And treating other people like dirt It's easy not to base our lives On how much we can scam And you know It feels good to lift that monkey off our backs I'm thankful I live in a place Where I can say the things I do Without being taken out and shot So I'm on guard against the goons Trying to take my rights away We've got to rise above the need for cops and laws Let kids learn communication Instead of schools pushing competition How about more art and theater instead of sports? People will always do drugs Let's legalize them Crime drops when the mob can't price them Budget's in the red? Let's tax religion No one will do it for us We'll just have to fix ourselves Honesty ain't all that hard Just put Rambo back inside your pants Causing trouble for the system is much more fun Thank you for the toilet paper But your flag is meaningless to me Look around, we're all people Who needs countries anyway? Our land, I love it too I think I love it more than you I care enough to fight The stars and stripes of corruption Let's bring it all down! If we don't try If we just lie If we can't find A way to do it better than this Who will?
Yeah, he had like a skull painted on his face. The best is when he was singing some song, it didn't sound like punk, it was like death metal or something, but you couldn't hear a word he said because he was singing so fast, so the Daily Show puts the "lyrics" on the screen for you, and it's an intelligent breakdown of Republican policy or something, of course that's not what he was really singing.
Two can play that game, Meowgi: Big A, little A, bouncing B The system might have got you but it won't get me 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 External control are you gonna let them get you? Do you wanna be a prisoner in the boundaries they set you? You say you want to be yourself, by christ do you think they'll let you? They're out to get you get you get you get you get you get you get you Hello, hello, hello, this is the Lord God, can you hear? Hellfire and damnation's what I've got for you down there On earth I have ambassadors, archbishop, vicar, pope We'll blind you with morality, you'd best abandon any hope, We're telling you you'd better pray cos you were born in sin Right from the start we'll build a cell and then we'll lock you in We sit in holy judgement condemning those that stray We offer our forgiveness, but first we'll make you pay External control are you gonna let them get you? Do you wanna be a prisoner in the boundaries they set you? You say you want to be yourself, by christ do you think they'll let you? They're out to get you get you get you get you get you get you get you Hello, hello, hello, now here's a message from your queen As figurehead of the status quo I set the social scene I'm most concerned about my people, I want to give them peace So I'm making sure they stay in line with my army and police My prisons and my mental homes have ever open doors For those amongst my subjects who dare to ask for more Unruliness and disrespect are things I can't allow So I'll see the peasants grovel if they refuse to bow External control are you gonna let them get you? Do you wanna be a prisoner in the boundaries they set you? You say you want to be yourself, by christ do you think they'll let you? They're out to get you get you get you get you get you get you get you Introducing the Prime Sinister, she's a mother to us all Like the dutch boy's finger in the dyke her arse is in the wall Holding back the future waiting for the seas to part If Moses did it with is faith, she'll do it with an army Who at times of threatened crisis are certain to be there Guarding national heritage no matter what or where Palaces for kings and queens, mansions for the rich Protection for the wealthy, defence of privilege They've learnt the ropes In Ireland, engaged in civil war Fighting for the ruling classes in their battle against the poor So Ireland's just an island? It's an island of the mind Great Britain? Future? Bollocks, you'd better look behind Round every other corner stands P.C. 1984 Guardian of the future, he'll implement the law He's there as a grim reminder that no matter what you do Big brothers system's always there with his beady eyes on you From God to local bobby, in home and street and school They've got your name and number while you've just got their rule We've got to look for methods to undermine those powers It's time to change the tables. The future must be ours Big A, little A, bouncing B The system might have got you but it won't get me Be exactly who you want to be, do what you want to do I am he and she is she but you're the only you No one else has got your eyes, can see the things you see It's up to you to change your life and my life's up to me The problems that you suffer from are problems that you make The **** we have to climb through is the **** we choose to take If you don't like the life you live, change it now it's yours Nothing has effects if you don't recognise the cause If the programme's not the one you want, get up, turn off the set It's only you that can decide what life you're gonna get If you don't like religion you can be the antichrist If your tired of politics you can be an anarchist But no one ever changed the church by pulling down a steeple And you'll never change the system by bombing number ten Systems just aren't made of bricks they're mostly made of people You may send them into hiding, but they'll be back again If you don't like the rules they make, refuse to play their game If you don't want to be a number, don't give them your name If you don't want to be caught out, refuse to hear their question Silence is a virtue, use it for your own protection They'll try to make you play their game, refuse to show your face If you don't want to be beaten down, refuse to join their race Be exactly who you want to be, do what you want to do I am he and she is she but you're they only you