The Interdigitale

Does new tech bring us together for truth and justice? Or for trivia?

Arise ye prisoners of linkedin
Arise ye bloggers of the earth
For tweeting thunders thru the nation
a better web’s in birth
No more the printed page shall bind us
Arise ye slaves of the telephone call
The net shall rise on new foundations
My mug shot on my facebook wall

Tis the viral conflict
Let each stand on YouTube
The international blogging class
Shall replace the boob tube

Tis the viral conflict
Let us rise from MySpace
The international twittersphere
Shall be the human race

Electoral Dysfunction

Addressing the angst of voting in a one and a half party system.

(O Say) Oh say can you spot
Why I might be distraught
An election so bought
Democratic? You’re dreaming
(Taps) Day is done, Vote for one
Of the parties of Wall Street, what fun!

It’s the guy nobody likes versus the guy who likes drone strikes
Oh how I hate to get up and go voting
Oh how I’d love to remain in bed

Now it’s true one has a wife who drives a couple of Cadillacs
While the spouse of the other wants to prevent our heart attacks

Now it’s true that social change comes from the bottom not the top
Once the money’s hurled, the flag unfurled, we may as well go shop
Two-party dance? Not a chance
One will rob you with a smile the other with a fountain pen it
never stops, speaking of flops can we abolish the Senate?

And whoever lives in the White House
Is mainly cause for me to grouse
In general to emigrate I’m willin’
Although I was glad when he gave the national medal to Dylan

I’m sure my niece could make peace in the middle east
And none of these bozos will
Some are spineless and witless
The rest scare me shitless
I’ve had my fill – my Uncle Bill said hey
Don’t throw your vote away
OK I’ll keep it here on the window sill

Mic check, I’m such a wreck
Sick and tired of it turning out just the way I sensed it would
There’s nobody to vote for, but plenty to vote against, I could be
Convinced we been Port-au-Prince’d

There is a system called preferential voting
Where you rank the candidates in order of your doting
And when your favorite loses you may get the second one you’ve chosen
But for me, it’s the reverse
I rank ‘em by degree that I’m opposin’ them

(As you can tell by now, there’s no practical advice here, just really well-researched bitching.)

Truth be told, I don’t like ‘em cause they’re corporate
I’ll be bold: I don’t like ‘em cause they’re tall
If you must know, I don’t like politicians
What’s the word I’m lookin’ for, oh yeah: at all!

OMG this whole thing is so disgusting
Are these the guys our kids are meant to be trusting?
Please believe me, I never meant to set it up this way son
It’s been like this since way before Ronnie Ray-gun

(folksong army)
Remember the campaign of Eugene Debs
That’s the kind where we all could be found
They may have won the election
But we had the moral high ground

It’s a question with no answer
Body politic has cancer
When the doctor says we’ll try two-party chemo
What am I supposed to say, “Oh primo!”?

But as the NDDA has made clear
If I were President, I could make you all disappear

(My Way)
You know this system stinks, it’s past its sell-by date
Even so methinks I should decide which one to mainly hate
Shall I hold my nose and vote or trade with Fred in North Dakota
Or write in Bernie Sanders then say that’s all she wrote-a
(& Jill Stein)

(It Don’t Mean a Thing)
It don’t mean a thing if you ain’t got them swing states like Florida
That’s where we decide which candidate to hide from
Cause he’s the one that’s horrider
There’s oh so much at stake, but I’m a vegetarian
If these two are my suitors, I’m not marryin’

(I’m getting’ married in the morning)
I’ve got electoral dysfunction
Ding dongs, how can I vote for them
Look at these choices
We’ve lost our voices
Got the constitution wrong that time

Any time our future is decided
By a guy who bought that many ads
Please give me your attention
I’ll bet you my pension
We – are – screwed.

Between the one who sold us out
And the one who’s more devout
I’ll take – a – Quaalude.

(Morning is Broken)
System is broken, vote of no confidence
Money has spoken, it’s people too

They get votes with the money
Super PAC’s their Easter bunny
Do it all for the money
Guess that’s why they’re so far right

(Battle Hymn)
Both get money from insurance, banks, law firms and agribiz
HMOs hedgefunds, securities, that’s really who they is
I’ve got sticker shock, I think I won’t be buying
Their mouths are moving, they’re lying

(If In Only Had A Heart)
When Obama gave the telecoms
Immunity for bugging moms
He really crossed a bridge
Mr. Bain would let them bug your mattress,
toaster, wallet, coffee cup, kitchen sink and fridge
You know, Big O said he’d get out of Gitmo
But Mitt would put his Mitts on every – oh wait Barry did that already, SO

If you like a world where torturers go free – gee thanks
Where Raytheon runs the Pentagon and Summers bails the banks
Where Mad Money Men win Tonys for their plays
They’re so acquisitive
Financiers have no new idears, they’re highly derivative
You don’t even have to choose
In this election, you can’t lose!
I would surely rather that I wasn’t in this position
But two words before you hand it off to Voldemort
Su – preme – court

If God Had Wanted There To Be Other Countries

Wild Bill Bailout has an offer you can’t understand: permanent war, everyone against everyone. Offer never expires.

Oh baby have I got a gift for you
You can’t imagine what I’m offering to put you through
No it’s not a war with Finland
Or as expected those ingrates in Greenland
This one will be immeasurably more fun
A war with pretty much almost everyone
 
Well I may not find a budget for your schools
But I can well afford to manufacture guns for you precious fools
We’ve got no funds for fridges, much less bridges
nor innoculations
But there’s a fire sale on bombing non-us nations

You know if God had wanted there to be other countries….
 
As I was saying, we’re not slaying just to prove we’re the greatest
Which we are of course, I’ve no remorse in praying for America
only
It’s so lonely at the top
Some day there’ll be a braver crop of suckers
But for now you’re the luckiest pluckers
You get to be my heavily armed  runnin-amokers
Good luck, and good night, all right!
C’mon alla you real men straight, or gay
Even the ladies can join the fray
Too many is not enough in my thrillers
How about a brigade of powder puff killers
 
Still we might run out of troops so there’s a plan for breeding
We’ll convert your amorosity to navy seal seeding
We’re gonna cut contraception – tiny holes of course
Convert your Trojans to a trojan horse
 
While you’re forced into foreclosure and dying of exposure
Unemployed and your savings expired
You can take consolation in the saving of the nation
By the weaponization of national pride
 
Don’t fret don’t worry
And for sure don’t think
On the double in a hurry
Here we go into the drink
Only question is, which drink? Lemme think,
Let’s see:
We won’t be rushin in to Russia
Though we’ll take it to the brink you know
But a war with Red China would solve our red ink flow
 
Though it’s true I never made a
Greater glory than Grenada
Take heart,  roll up your sleeves
With our shoulders to the tar sands
We can still sink the Maldives
 
In a pinch we could always attack the Swiss
With all those skiers how could even a dumb drone miss
They say they’re neutral but they speak 3 enemy tongues
So I’m gonna shout it out at the top of your lungs:
 
It’s not the titanic, it’s the Lusitania
No need to panic, just bomb Albania
My megalomania will steer us right
As long as you’ll vote for candidate that brings the most fright
 
You know if God had wanted there to be other countries….
There’s France, let’s take a chance, or we could bomb the Sudanistas
We’ll get into a war in starts and fits
I’ll stir your hearts if not your wits

We’ll go wittily into Italy
After all they’re a fairly failed state
I know it’s second rate, and it’s been done, lord knows, mama mia
But it’s our only chance to prevent a Mediterranean North Korea

Mergers & Acquisitions 

If a tree falls in the forest and one guy owns all the radio stations, and that guy doesn’t like you, will we ever know it fell on your head?

Banks do it, airlines do it
People with rapacious designs do it
Let’s do it, let’s fuse our assets

I want to merge and acquire other folks’ success
Don’t fence me in
I can’t believe you’d require variety in press
That’s wearing thin

Give me cash, lots of cash
So I can buy my rivals up
Like East Berlin
Got to accrue more airwaves
To make you my mental slaves
You lose I win

Yes I’m boasting of my mergers here
Best if I own everything
Fueled by peril and threats from the buyer
And stocks best sold before I spring

When I cut you down to size, I can see how much I own you
And it makes me realize
When I move to supersize,
I see all my dreams come true
When I monopolize

Who needs diversity, you’ve got the internet
Forget society, what I own’s what you get

On top of the media are owners like me
You ask for more viewpoints; American, please!

You know you can trust me to inform you so well
Cause money is speech, friends, and your minds I can sell

100, 200, 300 stations I’ve
Bought and converted so one point of view can thrive
Now you’ll know nothing, as you work from 9 to 5
So you can pay your cable bill. To me.

If you’re used to competition give it up
The free market’s free for me so give it up
There’ll be one big corporation
And I’ll own the entire nation
So give me your radio station, give it up

I’m Still A-Mergin’ Even More

Oh I marched to the battle of the Enron trench
In a scam that was bound to end all scams
Energy stocks were flying, who knew that we were lyin
But I’m still mergin even more

I foreclosed my share of houses in a thousand different towns
Maybe the house where you were born
The American dream is ending
Thanks to predatory lending
No I ain’t a virgin anymore

It’s always the rich to teach us how to fail
Always the poor to learn
Now look at all we’ve won
With deregulation
Tell me was it worth your house

Oh I marched through downturns of every stripe
At the end of every roaring boom
There were Panics and Depressions
And 21 recessions
Yes I was binge and purgin all along

For I ponzied up my default swaps till no one knew
What the hell they were selling on spec
Though it wasn’t strictly legal
At least we lost Glass-Steagall
Yes we were surgin through the store

It’s always the rich to hold onto the bonds
Always the poor in the stocks
Now look at all we’ve won
With deregulation
Tell me was it worth your job

And I marched in the battle of Seattle too
Though not in the streets with you
I was globalizing profit
You were yelling hey come off it
And now I’m splurgin’ even more

Now AIG and B of A are billions in the hole
City Group screams at Manhattan’s shore
Call it pyramids or teasin
I admit I am the reason
That they’re enlargin’ even more
And you’ve got no margin anymore
But I’m still chargin’ plenty more

Poor Penny Pritzker

If you want to evaluate the new Secretary of Con-us, consult with the workers at her Hyatt Hotels, or the schools she ran into the ground, or the folks she foreclosed on, or…

Poor Penny Pritzker is not so swank
She only owns one superior bank
She’s only got 1.5 billion thank you very much

Once she built a hotel, made it run
And a bank so sub-prime
Once she ran the schools and now they’re gone
Penny, can you spare a dime?

But Mr. President,
she’s an above average Cabinet resident
Off-shore trust in the Bahamas
Heir to Hyatt Hotels
High regard for housekeepers
Same as schools and neighborhoods
If the workers want a wage, she subcontracts out
Just like Hell-Mart

In Penny’s reign the banker shaves another customer

We see homeowners sitting waiting for a trim

Then the Pritzger people rush on in

Putting kids in pain…
Very strange

Subprime Penny, well what’s that worth?
Secretary of Commerce, what on earth?
Of qualified secretaries there seems to be a dearth
So a bank ruinator gets a cabinet berth

(Pennies from Heaven)
Folks in chains for bankers’ gains
Penny’s slum heaven

St. Peter said I’m deporting you Penny from heaven

She found her fortune foreclosin’ all over town

For sure that’s our economy upside down

I’d trade her for a package of corporate tax enforcement improvements
If you want the things you love, you must have labor movements
But what you hear’s not thunder, it’s simply plunder you see
There’ll be pennies left over of our economy

Say don’t you remember she cost the Feds
Half a billion that time
Based upon her record running a bank
Penny will take our last dime

I Won’t Bloody Buy It

We boycott all the unjust companies we can find, but why do we occasionally balk?

When I was with Gandhi I didn’t buy British goods
Nor during our own revolution wouldn’t wanta support those hoods
Boycotted buses in Montgomery
For freedom I would walk or even hitch
And when they made sexist t-shirts
I boycotted Abercrappie and Bitch
Nestles replacing breast milk,
mothers being bilked
Our health being pushed aside
They fill us up with pesticide
And GE is so into nukes, I ask you
When they contaminate you
Do you think boycotting is for kooks?
But yet you say it’s no crime
You’re not joinin’ in this time
I tell you

Chorus:
It’s the same as serving Gallo wine
It’s the same as playing Sun City,
Cross the apartheid line
Like buying Exxon after Valdez
Or BP after the Deep Horizon – please!
Chilean grapes under Pinochet
Monsanto, Agent Orange – nyet
It would turn me Tourette – Tourette!
So…I won’t bloody buy it
So why even try it?
I’m not for it, I won’t ignore it
You shouldn’t sell it
And I won’t buy it
Even if it’s half price, no dice
It’s too bloody bloody, and it’s not nice

And that’s why I don’t buy Ahava
Because in Palestine they kill the dream
OK I don’t buy beauty cream especially
if it’s Ahava, don’t you see
Because it comes from the Dead Sea, made in an illegal colony
I’ve also cut way back on buying bulldozers from Caterpillar yeah
Due to their demolitions, that’s how their dozers are applied
And also when I buy hummus
I make sure I’m not funding apartheid
Supporting colonizing felons
If it is that’s why I’m yellin’
As I child I ate no grapes
From social conscience there is no escape
So I decline to buy the fruit of the vine
From stores that ignore Immokalee
It’s the least that I can do, can’t you see
But yet you say it’s no crime
You’re not joinin’ in this time
I tell ya
Chorus

No of course I’d never boycott Hindus or Jews
But justice I always choose
I boycott states that seize another’s land
Till there’s nothing left to lose
Especially if the farm workers ask me to
I can do without whatever’s dripping blood – wouldn’t you?
Small suffering, won’t you join me in sitting on our bucks, this situation sucks
But we’ve got one shot, so why not boycott

And while we’re at it won’t you sign my petition, send off a letter, make a call
Show up in a downpour, or at the Corporate hall, sit at the factory gate
Otherwise –
Chorus

Look around, take stock of yourself
And take that chazerei off your shelf!

Ghostwriters of the Law

Who writes our laws? ALEC does. American Legislative Exchange Council. AKA the 1%. Surprise!

The American Legislative Exchange Council
Is so creative when they’re through our towns’ll be
Shells of their former selves
It’ll be as if old Santa had downsized all his elves
How so you say?
Listen, I pray thee
To a sad and sorry tale
Prepare to shed tears in a vale

Just who are these smart operators, you ask
Well, I read the whole internet so I’m up to the task
On the board there are just three cokes
The drink people quit, leaving the brother Koch blokes

Telecoms, big banks, and really big insurance
Assuring the ongoing corporate crime endurance
If you’re mom and pop well you just don’t rate
At the intersection of business and state

They’ve got a lot of energy, they’ve got Texaco
Chevron, Enron, Exxon, also Amoco

Yippie-eye-ay
Yippie-eye-aw
Ghostwriters of the law

It’s a corporate bill mill, they like to meet
Behind closed doors at a swank retreat
The NRA wrote stand your ground
More and more black youth are not around
Privatizing schools and prisons and social security
Selling of the wealth to the wealthy
Lease it back to the public, that ain’t healthy
For me, or you, but

Smart ALEC knows the score,
Smart ALEC knows what for
Gives all the money so it’s hard to trace
Finds its way to a friendly face
That’s more like arsenic than old lace
Before you know it they’ve taken their place
In the white house, state house, every other great house
They change the rules, play us for fools
And legislators are their tools

Yippie-eye-ay
Yippie-eye-aw
Ghostwriters of the law

They don’t even try to influence legislation
They promote love between government and corporation
They’re rarely seen in the lobby
But writing laws is their favorite hobby

They help thwart corporate taxes by hiding their wealth
And if we even try to expose how they destroy our health
They would love to silence us or even arrest us
Nearly as much as they love asbestos

Smart-ALEC knows what to do
To keep me and you in deep doo-doo
Writes legislation to ruin the nation
And lower the station of the 99 percent
Straighten your seat backs for our final descent

Yippie-eye-ay
Yippie-eye-aw
Ghostwriters of the law

They throw a smokescreen round those who try to sting them
For defending Big Tobacco, they love the plant kingdom
And besides the evil weed these guys are deeply pharmaceutical
With the Glaxo gang lawmakers are downright cahootical

Yippie-eye-ay
Yippie-eye-aw
Ghostwriters of the law