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Zusatztext “Only McSweeney’s could combine politics and theater in such a strange! amusing way.” — Los Angeles Times “Pokes fun at all manner of political persuasion! often in a tone reminiscent of Mad magazine—that is! mangled lyrics—but minus a tune to follow. . . . Jolly good fun.” —Leonard Kniffel! Booklist Informationen zum Autor McSweeney’s is a publishing company based in San Francisco. As well as running the daily humor website McSweeney’s Internet Tendency , McSweeney’s publishes McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern , the Believer , Lucky Peach , Wholphin , Grantland Quarterly , and an ever-growing selection of books under various imprints. Klappentext Ever since John Hancock broke into song after signing the Declaration of Independence! American politics and musicals have been inextricably linked. From Alexander Hamilton's jazz hands! to Chester A. Arthur's oboe operas! to Newt Gingrich's off-Broadway sexscapade! You! Me! and My Moon Colony Mistress Makes Three! government and musical theater have joined forces to document our nation's long history of freedom! partisanship! and dancers on roller skates pretending to be choo choo trains. To celebrate this grand union of entrenched bureaucracy and song! the patriots at McSweeney's Internet Tendency ("The Iowa Caucus of humor websites") offer this riotous collection (peacefully assembled!) of monologues! charts! scripts! lists! diatribes! AND musicals written by the noted fake-musical lyricist! Ben Greenman. On the agenda are . . . Fragments from PALIN! THE MUSICAL Barack Obama's Undersold 2012 Campaign Slogans Atlas Shrugged Updated for the Financial Crisis Your Attempts to Legislate Hunting Man for Sport Reek of Class Warfare A 1980s Teen Sex Comedy Becomes Politically Uncomfortable Donald Rumsfeld Memoir Chapter Title Or German Heavy Metal Song? Noises Political Pundits Would Make If They Were Wild Animals and Not Political Pundits Ron Paul Gives a Guided Tour of His Navajo Art Collection Classic Nursery Rhymes! Updated and Revamped for the Recession! As Told to Me By My Father And much more! FOREWORD Wyatt Cenac If you are reading this, it means that someone just gave you this book as a gift. Congratulations. Whatever you did was more than likely “gift-worthy.” You probably had a birthday or a half birthday. Maybe you graduated from an institution of higher learning or you escaped from prison. Or your significant other gave you this book to keep you quiet on a road trip to Oakland. In any case, you accomplished something impressive enough that someone felt this book would be the perfect thing that would speak to your sensibilities, amuse you, and keep you quiet on the 580 freeway. If you bought this book for yourself, then sincerest apologies that nobody likes you enough to buy it for you. But don’t give up hope. Not the hope that you will be more likeable. That is out of this book’s hands because there may be real reasons why nobody should like you. Reasons that can’t be found in the pages of this book. Still read this book, but afterwards find yourself a nice self-help book, like McSweeney’s Book of Self-Improvement, Actualization, and Musicals, which will be in bookstores next never. But putting that aside, the point is don’t give up hope in its most general sense. It is a truly American ideal. Apple pie is almost as American as hope. Or so it hopes. It was hope that brought the first colonists to this country in search of a better land that would allow them social and religious freedoms that they could then deny others. It was hope that put smallpox in blankets, thereby making this land a bit cheaper to purchase from its original owners. Hope put tea in a harbor, angering and confusing the British as well as today’s senior citizens. Hop...
