Which Dem wants to repeal drug laws and who's stealing campaign logos from Britcore bands? Find out as Grind and Punishment explores the Democratic field of presidential candidates in terms your average metal head can understand in our new periodic segment, GRINDecision 2008.
(Editor’s note: G&P’s lawyers would like to make it clear that we have never, ever heard of anything called Indecision 2008 on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Neither do we own the Indecision 2004 DVD set nor America: The Book. Now if you’ll excuse us, we have to go sob into our pillow over the writer’s strike.)
Joe Biden, DE
Joe Biden doesn’t have talking points; he has
talking passages. Clearly the man has some Sunn O))) albums stashed somewhere in his collection because listening to the Delaware senator ramble is akin to be lulled into a daze by wave after wave of sub-bass drones.
(Google it for yourself: Joe Biden and
long winded: 18,600 hits; Joe Biden and
bloviate: 14,700 hits; Joe Biden and
boring: 139,000 hits). But the guy represents
Delaware f’chrissake. What do you want from him?
He wants a stable Iraq, better education and to do something about the nation’s pitiful healthcare situation. What exactly, we’re not sure because nobody has the fortitude to make it all the way through one of his interminable stump speeches.
Hillary Clinton, NYCold, mechanical and a Bush hater from way back, somebody‘s jonesin’ for just one fix of Mr. Jourgensen’s private stash.
While Ministry finally ended its 20 year run of blackened spoons and industrial beats, Hillarybot 2.0 seems content to saddle up with Jesus and ride that hotrod all the way to the White House. She’s got a
20 point lead over Barack Obama and John Edwards and who can resist the
thought of bringing back Bubba and his burger snarfing, bimbo boinking shenanigans?
No word on how Hillarycare would handle artistically inspired if life threatening heroin addiction, but we’re pretty sure she’s ready to draw some Rio Grande blood next year.
A significant swath of the country has the same reaction to another Clinton presidency as they have to a new Ministry album: Haven’t we heard this tune somewhere before?
Chris Dodd, CTIs the senior senator from Connecticut on the road to Jerusalem?
We went looking for classic Sleep albums in Dodd’s collection after he hinted he would
repeal marijuana laws to free up jail space for violent offenders.
Before you pack your bongs in triumph, that doesn’t mean a Dodd presidency would be a stoner paradise; he just said he would advocate not always pursuing criminal charges for processions of weedians on their way to Nazareth.
And like any two bit drug hustler, Dodd is all about the Benjamins. In 1998 Public Campaign bestowed on him the dubious honor of the
Golden Leash award (think a congressional
Razzie) for willingness to do donors’ bidding in return for cash. Several of the nation’s largest financial institutions were making significant deposit in the Senate Banking Committee chairman’s campaign accounts.
He used to
date Carrie Fisher and Bianca Jagger so somebody around him must have some pretty good drugs.
John Edwards, NCWho better to represent North Carolina’s one-time junior center and two-time presidential flop than hometown heroes Corrosion of Conformity?
No, not the halcyon days of Animosity C.O.C. Not even the respectable if still somewhat disappointing C.O.C. 2: Electric Boogaloo of Karl Agell. Edwards ’08 has that unmistakable past the expiration date reek of Pepper Keenan’s reign of terror on Deliverance.
Edwards’ major flaw is exactly opposite of the fate afflicting C.O.C.’s waning credibility. The Corrosive ones have belied their name with an endless parade of increasing
ly Southern fried good time boogie, shedding what’s left of their thrashcore cred. Meanwhile Edwards has sloughed off the aw shucks shtick he was pimping in 2004 for a more fiery, populist brand of politicking.
Think more “Vote with a Bullet” and less “Heal My Wound.”
But Edward’s own “Albatross” just happens to be another chump named John who failed to put together a coherent message to challenge one of the most universally reviled incumbents in recent political history. After a tour as first mate on that ill fated “Minnow,” Edwards has tried to roar back with a most strident and populist message, but like C.O.C., the comeback just makes you pine for better days and wish the corpse had been allowed to rest in peace.
Mike Gravel, AKWeird for the sake of weird, former Alaska senator Mike Gravel is campaigning like an extra from
Northern Exposure.
San Francisco and Alaska may be worlds apart, but we’re pretty sure Gravel could groove down to Mr. Bungle’s discordant skronk.
Just how screwy is Gravel? Let’s put it this way, hi
s official campaign
bio is penned by Ralph Nader who likens him to fellow oddball Dennis Kucinich with “political positions place him high on the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.” So who better to inject a much needed dose of Mr. Bungle-oid weirdness into the Dems as they fight over the carcass of evangelicals soured on Dubya.
Gravel wants an “immediate and orderly” withdrawal from Iraq (no line cuts) as well as scrapping the IRS in favor of a national sales tax as well as ending the war on drugs.
Disco Volante would be the perfect soundtrack for that Lynchianly absurd campaign video Gravel was
pimping on YouTube. Picture that set to cartoonish bounce of
"Ma Meeshka Mow Skwoz."
Dennis Kucinich, OHHe admits to seeing a UFO, he looks like the unholy love child of a Keebler elf and Gollum, but damn if wife wouldn’t be one hot
FLILF. Ladies and gentlemen, Dennis Kucinich
Look for this guy campaigning at your local renfaire and jamming to the unicorn-core sounds of Blackmore’s Night.
Yes, his campaign slogan is “Strength ThroughPeace," complete with a
logo that looks eerily like the cover of Unseen Terror’s
lone album, but we don’t think he’s up on his 80s Britcore.
He’s
emptied his pockets on the Colbert Report, he talks about creating a Department of Peace and he’s sure to draw the Naderites in the primary. Otherwise Dennis Kucinich is just wasting his time and other people’s money.
Barack Obama, ILLike Hirax mainstay Katon de Pena, Barack Obama is breaking a significant color line.
Unlike Jesse Jackson, who has been dry humping Martin Luther King’s corpse for nearly 40 years, and Al Sharpton, the Don K
ing of racial politics, Obama presents the best chance to break the white man’s 44-straight presidency winning streak. While the aforementioned ass clowns tried to capitalize on their race, Obama is the most intriguing minority candidate to date for reasons totally unrelated to his melanin levels, like de Pena, who lacked the benefits of any metal affirmative action program.
Unfortunately, like Hirax, Obama’s inability to capitalize on the hosannas that greeted his entrée onto the national political scene seems to be relegating him to the second tier. While Hirax never emerged from the Bay Area pack like fellow scenesters Metallica, Testament or Exodus, Obama can’t seem to make a dent in the Clinton juggernaut. Will he be a fondly remembered also ran or will he notch a place in the history books?
Bill Richardson, NMSome things just look better on paper. Take Bill Richardson.
The New Mexico governor is a past congressman, a former ambassador, energy secretary and with immigration driving a lot of talk from the right, being Hispanic with roots in Mexico City doesn’t hurt.
But like Lock Up, the disparate pieces just haven’t formed a
cohesive whole that anybody gives a rodent’s posterior about, and Richardson has wallowed in the lower tier of the Democratic field.
Napalmers Jesse Pintado and Shane Embury tried to revive the glory days of early grind in 1998 when they recruited drummer Nick Barker and vocalist Peter Tägtgren (later Tomas Lindberg) for Lock Up. What should have been a glorious throwback album that combined the best of the foursome’s groundbreaking past just came across as another tired Terrorizer retread from the guy who penned all of the Terrorizer tunes in the first place.
Like Lock Up, expect to see Richardson in the cut out bin of finer Democratic conventions everywhere.
Coming next: The Grind Old Party?
Sayyadina
