burn ’em if you got ’em…

will he or won’t he?

burn the Koran, i mean. that dipshit down in florida. last i heard he had bailed the plan, ’cause the people that were going to build a muslim community center near ground zero were going to move their building. here’s my question…

…who gives a shit? about any of it, i mean.

if he burns the book, he burns the book. people say that it will spark (pun intended) violence against our troops in the middle east. never mind the fact they shouldn’t be there anyway, but do you really think that would set the locals off? i mean, they burn our flag pretty much every day at 2pm, and we don’t freak out on ’em about it. for that matter, they had the whole of islam after salman rushdie, and not only is he STILL alive all these years later, but he was able to date AND marry a woman that looks like THIS:

shit, if i get me some of THAT where the fuck do i sign up to piss these people off?

correct me if i’m wrong, but one of the founding principles of this country is freedom of religion…so they should be able to build a muslim community center near ground zero if they want to. i mean, if the IRA had brought down the towers would we give a shit if they built a CATHOLIC community center or church near by? no – but these are BROWN people. brown, non-christian people. but this country was FOUNDED on the ideals that they could be non-christian, and that was okay…

…now, at the time it WASN’T okay to be brown (see the blacks, mexicans, and any tribe that now gets to own a casino as our way of saying “our bad”) – but that’s been fixed now. at least in most of the states. if they had brought down a tower in selma, alabama that would be different. how tall are buildings there, anyway?

forgive me, i’m digressing…

the bottom line is it doesn’t matter what book you burn or who wants to plop down a community center where. it’s a COMMUNITY center. we’re all part of the same community. regardless of your color or what deity (if any) you cling to, this country was founded BY immigrants FOR immigrants. a lot of people like to forget that. if they can afford real estate in NYC, let ’em do what they wanna do. and it’s just a book. if you burn the Koran, i won’t give you grief…but i won’t do it if you burn the Bible, either. a tim dorsey novel might get you some shit from me, though…

…moving on. or back, to be more realistic – i remember the most memorable sight i saw on september 11th, 2001. it was an AR-15. the business end of it. pointed at me. why? ’cause i worked a mudvayne show the night before at stubb’s, and swapped all the money and paperwork from my black oakley bag (much more incognito) to the company briefcase, which looked like this:

to people in the concert industry this looks like any other road case – very durable, very rock n’ roll.

and this is what i was carrying when i walked by the jj jake pickle federal building in downtown austin and saw all the fbi swat team guys. being the curious type i started to walk across the concourse to get a better look – which was when they saw me. next thing i know, i’m being shouted at and told to drop the case. again, to people in the concert industry this looks like any other road case – very durable, very rock n’ roll. to fbi swat, an hour after the first tower got hit, this looked like a bomb.

in hindsight, i can see that.

so, without hopping on the flag-waving, “these colors don’t run” bullshit bandwagon that made lee greenwood and toby keith an assload of money (and guaranteed them airplay today), i have to say it was a shitty day for a lot of us…and whether you think it was terrorists (that we did train and bankroll, it should be added – and that is indisputable) or an inside job (still doubt that myself) it was still a day that will forever live in american infamy.

july 4th, 1776. september 11th, 2001. few other dates EVERY american can name…

…then again, a frighteningly large amount of americans failed the question “who did we win our independence from?” on a july 4th poll, so i guess there’s a chance that they don’t know those dates either.

ah, education – it’s a good thing. with it, you can be anything. without it, you just end up being something like this…