Since John McCain has been deprived of campaign theme songs (Cindy McVicodin shoots down Been Caught Stealing and Mother's Little Helper) Don Surber has some suggestions:
Go country, John. Outside of Willie Nelson, few country stars are lefties.
Here are songs that McCain should consider.
Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man.”
Sticking it to the Clintons is always popular among Republicans.
Except that people would think that McCain was addressing Conservatives who hate him, just like they hate:
A) Black people
B) Mexicans
C) Enlisting
D) All of the above
Martina McBride’s “Independence Day.” It’s actually is a protest against domestic violence. But the chorus is terrific: “Let freedom ring, let the white dove sing …”
Sean Hannity uses it as part of his intro every day. That’s a guy McCain might want on his side.
Except that Sean Hannity hates John MCain just like (see above). Also, these aren't exactly the lyrics that you want blaring from the PA system:
Well word gets a round in a small, small town they said he was a dangerous man But mama was proud and she stood her ground she knew she was on the losin’ end
..when McCain has a reputation as a hot head. Oh yeah, at the end of the song the wife kills daddy by burning down the house. McCain 2008: Woot!
Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA.”
If I were running for public office, this would be the song I would burnish in the ears of every audience member. People love this song.
No. People hate that song. That song sucks. The only people who sing that song are high school glee clubs in places like Tulsa who are forced to sing it at assemblies, and after school the kids go smoke meth at someone's house where the parents aren't home in order to get the bad taste out of their mouths. It's that fucking awful.
Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Freebird.” Mike Huckabee uses “Sweet Home, Alabama.”
Dork.
What part of “I’m as free as a bird” does he not understand?
What part of a song that is about leaving (If I leave here tomorrow Would you still remember me?)
does Don think is appropriate for a seventy-two year-old man? Besides, the election will be over before the guitar solo ends.
Finally, Charlie Daniels’s “Long-Haired Country Boy.”
Yes, there are drug references. But again, the chorus is terrific
Please see Cindy McPercocet above.
Far be it from me to help out the McCain campaign, but this might help...
Callin' me high on the telephone
Came by plane all alone
Spend the afternoon making a speech
Speech made you nervous that you couldn't eat
You came to show your mad love
You came to tell me it's not enough
McCain 2008: Woot!
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I see McCain and I hear “Swing Low Sweet Chariot”
I’m thinkin’ more like John Prine: Your Flag Decal Won’t Get You Into Heaven Anymore.
Were McCain to choose the CSS song I might have to consider voting for him… its an awesomely cool song.
I can relate, just so Tired of Being Sexy.
Think S&L Scandal-ero McCain, up to his flysuit in Keating…the song for McCain is ‘I Hate Banks’ by Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper.
Didn’t John McCain say, in response to the “how do we beat the bitch” question, “I thought she was talking about my ex wife”? Good choice, Don, he should definitely go with the McBride song. Absolutely Sean Hannity should, too.
Do conservatives *listen* to lyrics at all? I know the only part of “Born in the USA” they ever listened to was the chorus, but Jesus, are they that way with all songs?
I’d suggest the theme song from Shaft.
He’s a baaaad mothafu–
Shut yo mouf
But, I’m talking bout McCain
OK let’s get this out the way (@1, you sure this isn’t what’s in your mind’s ear?):
“Swing Low, Sweet Cadillac” (youtube)
by the incomparable Dizzy Gillespie (with James Moody). Consider this a loading dose.
Maybe Brush will lend him
Faubus Fables.
For you younguns out there, that’s a tribute from Charles Mingus to Gov. Orville Faubus of Arkansas, who entered glory when he called out the National Guard to prevent black children from attending a certain high school in the state capitol. That little bounce when the rhythm gets going reminds me of the current occupant’s little dittybop to the lectern in that famous “It’s scripted” pc.
Wow, that’s “Orval” Faubus, not “Orville.”
Cherrypicking lines and ignoring the bigger picture pretty much defines the conservative thought process.
And now the end is near
And so I face the final curtain…
But I mean the Frank Sinatra version, of course. Not the Sid Vicious one.
Paul Anka’s version of Teen Spirit would be perfect. Sung live on a Las Vegas stage, it captures the essence of a man ready to be cinc…eight years ago, but now is an embarrassment to both his people and everyone else.
“Swing Low Sweet Chariot” as performed by PFunk, circa 1976.
Seriously, “God Bless the U.S.A.” is a terrible, terrible song reminiscent of the worst commercial jingles ever, e.g., “See the U.S.A in your Chevrolet.” Unfortunately, it’s played before the National Anthem at every home Ravens game and local custom is that everyone stands for it. I, along with the guys behind me, refuse to stand on the theory that it’s disrespectful to the National Anthem, which after all, was written in Baltimore, to give any other song that honor.
Best I can come up with is Ted Nugent. Do you think Stranglehold or Wang Dang Sweet Poontang fits the McCain campaign better?
Ironically, the ironic song “America, fuck yeah” would probably be well received by the GOP.
Beatles: “hello, goodbye”
Was that the ex-wife that John sprung the divorce on while she was in the hospital with cancer? Or am I thinking of a different GOPster?
Keep it classy, Johnny.
The Fugs’ “Kill for Peace.”
You’re thinking of everyone’s favorite serial adulterer, Newt Gingrich. However, it ended well, as the woman Newt left his cancerous wife for was also dumped, for the woman who became wife #3…
Okay, maybe not “well” so much as “predictably”.
No, I think this would be the ex-wife who waited for him to return from Vietnam only to be dumped for a much younger and wealthier woman who could finance his campaigns.
Real family values crowd over there.
There’s a Simpsons tune that he could use with a minimum of editing, and it would support the tough-guy image that Goopers (and the idiots who vote for them) love:
The rules that constrain other men
Mean nothing to McBain.
The punches that bring pain to other men
Mean nothing to McBain.
McBain! McBain!! McBain!!!
How about Ozzy Osbourne’s “Thank God for the Bomb”? Militarism and religious pandering right there in the chorus. Sure, there’s some lyrics about peace and nuclear winter and crap, but nobody ever listens to those anyway.
Thank God for the bomb! Nuke ya, nuke ya!
Guilty
Yes, they are. not deep thinkers or listeners, that crowd.
I vote for “Still Crazy After All These Years”. It captures McCain’s two most striking attributes: he’s nuts, and he’s really old.
As much as I love Bonnie Raitt, nothing matches the original version by Randy Newman.
(Oh, and check out the handle of the person who posted that video. Sad, sad, sad.)
Besides, the election will be over before the guitar solo ends
My favorite line.
Conservatives don’t know their pop culture any better than they know anything else.
“Goodnight, Saigon”: And we would allllllllll go dowwwwwwn togetherrrrrrrrrrrrrrr….
P.S. Don’t knock Tulsa; it’s the closest thing to a real city that Oklahoma’s got. Now Oklahoma City, on the other hand…
Here Come The Bastards–Primus.
They’re bastards.
And they’re definitely on their way.
We are talking about the party whose most recent standard-bearers unironically used Won’t Get Fooled Again, right? That whole “meet the new boss, same as the old boss” wasn’t making Cheney squirm in his seat; that was his ‘roids talkin’ back.
Here’s yer campaign song, Straight Talkin’ McBain — The Mob Goes Wild by Clutch.
Money excerpt:
Condoleezza Rice is nice, but I prefer A-Roni.
And that man on the T.V. who speaks to the dead, you know that man’s a phony.
Everybody move to Canada and smoke lots of pot.
Everybody move to Canada right now. Here’s how we do it:
Bum rush the border guard before he and his dog ever knew it.
And that’s about the least political part.
Iris DeMent’s “Wasteland of the Free”
We kill for oil, then we throw a party when we win
Some guy refuses to fight, and we call that the sin
but he’s standing up for what he believes in
and that seems pretty damned American to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free
Living in the wasteland of the free
where the poor have now become the enemy
Let’s blame our troubles on the weak ones
Sounds like some kind of Hitler remedy
Living in the wasteland of the free
While we sit gloating in our greatness
justice is sinking to the bottom of the sea
Living in the wasteland of the free
Given McCain’s dangerous predilection for creepy-looking women of a particular hair color, perhaps INXS’s “Suicide Blonde”?
I was stuck in an office where they played Sean Hannity. He was ape about the raw deal Charlie Daniels got for some “A’m an Amerakun” - type song. After numerous rants he finally had Charlie Daniels on the show and he made the mistake of singing that song. I didn’t hear Sean complaining after that, although he continued to identify Daniels as a “Great American”, and also continued to use some other song for his theme music.