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With most of the nation and our media outlets still celebrating the election of Barack Obama, it seems that the public no longer has much interest in dealing with the legacy that former President Bush has left behind. Obama himself has all but announced that he will not be investigating his White House predecessor, perhaps worried that setting such a precedent could be used against him once his own term is over. The hip hop community, so vocal just a couple of months earlier in its call for change, seems content to pat itself on the back for its success, as if helping to get Obama elected will magically undo everything that Bush and his quislings perpetrated over the past eight years. Unfortunately, a rather significant amount of harm has been done to this country - the Patriot Act, the war in Iraq, FISA, the economy, the failed "wars" on Drugs and Terrorism, etc. - and despite the label changing from "Republican" to "Democrat," the same power structure still exists in our government, a power structure that benefits from maintaining the status quo.
That being said, I thought it would be worthwhile to offer up something of a refresher course on the past eight years, as told through hip hop. What follows is a brief mix, along with some commentary on my part, featuring eight songs about the Bush administration. To save bandwidth, a link to download the mix is at the bottom of the post (though you can listen to each song, as usual, through this site).
A lot of rappers have made reference to the war in Iraq, but the Perceptionists' Memorial Day was perhaps the most direct indictment of Bush's justification for going to war, the search for W.M.D.'s. I tried to only use songs for this mix that were not available on any official release, so for this one I used MF Doom's remix, which I think is better than the original version anyway:
The Perceptionists - Memorial Day (MF Doom remix)
The president's ability to respond to domestic situations was just as poor as foreign issues, as Hurricane Katrina showed us in 2005. Hip hop's response to Katrina first began with Kanye West saying, during a national telethon, that George Bush doesn't care about black people, leading to a wave of songs expressing a similar sentiment. A handful of artists from New Orleans, including Juvenile with Get Ya Hustle On, released songs dealing with Katrina, but two rappers from outside of Louisiana put out the most notable tracks:
The Legendary K.O. - George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People
Mos Def - Katrina Klap
Though it's sometimes easy to forget with all of the Lil Wayne hysteria of today, there was a long stretch of time during the earlier part of this decade when Eminem was, for better or worse, the face of hip hop for mainstream media. As such, virtually everything he did became headline news. When an unfinished version of his song We As Americans leaked onto the internet, it became a minor controversy due to a line in the song that was perceived as a threat against the President's life, leading to an investigation by the Secret Service. Though it came toward the tail end of his popularity, Em became one of the most vocal rap critics of Bush, most notably with Mosh Pit, a song that was released on the eve of the 2004 elections.
Eminem - We As Americans
Since the start of both their careers, Cage has long accused Eminem of following in his footsteps. On the issue of Bush, Cage has a legitimate claim, having released Grand Ol' Party (GOP) Crash with Jello Biafra long before Em showed any real signs of political awareness:
Cage - Grand Ol' Party Crash
Immortal Technique has been a vocal critic of George Bush since day one, though too often he mixes his criticisms with wild conspiracy theories that end up diluting the impact of his words. On this collaboration with Saigon and Dead Prez, however, he is at his most coherent:
Saigon, Dead Prez and Immortal Technique - Impeach the President
Pittsburgh emcee Boaz who, previous to this, had never showed any inclination toward political rap, surprised me with the release of Crazy World this past summer. Perhaps the only rap song to make reference to FISA and illegal wiretapping:
Boaz - Crazy World
And finally, one of the few rappers not to get caught up in the superficial labels of "Democrat" and "Republican," Diabolic offers up the sad truth with the line, "Fuck Bush, but it would've been the same with Kerry":
Diabolic featuring Akir - The Master Plan
Download Link for the President's Day Mixtape (mediafire link)
I generally don't use curse words on this blog, as I'm of the opinion that when you're writing and have time to gather your thoughts there's usually a more creative way of saying whatever it is that needs to be said. In this case, however, there's really only one phrase that can accurately sum up my thoughts of the past eight years:
Fuck Bush.
While we're at it: Fuck Cheney and fuck every corrupt, treasonous politician - Republican, Democrat, whatever - that helped chip away at our Constitutional rights and used the lives of our own citizens to serve the interests of corporations and foreign nations these past eight years. I have very little hope that the new administration will offer much in the way of change, but in honor of President's Day I'm willing to concede that anyone is an improvement over Bush. Good riddance.
02/16/2009 08:00:01 AM posted by Fresh