{"id":3739,"date":"2007-07-24T16:45:34","date_gmt":"2007-07-24T23:45:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2007\/07\/24\/give-it-to-the-soft-boy\/"},"modified":"2007-07-24T16:45:34","modified_gmt":"2007-07-24T23:45:34","slug":"give-it-to-the-soft-boy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2007\/07\/24\/give-it-to-the-soft-boy\/","title":{"rendered":"Give It to the Soft Boy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the years our Viewpoints section has featured some interesting essays by artists of various sorts, including Monty Python<\/em>‘s <\/em>Terry Jones and chef-turned-author Anthony Bourdain. One piece I wish we had excerpted was this bit by English musician Robyn Hitchcock from late 2002 (back when people like Randy Barnett, Glenn Reynolds, and Andrew Sullivan were pissing themselves over Saddam’s unmanned aerial vehicles of doom). Hitchcock isn’t a hyperpolitical do-gooder, but he did pen a great antiwar song back in 1980, the punky, acerbic “I Wanna Destroy You<\/a>.” From his Slate diary entry of Dec. 9, 2002<\/a>:<\/p>\n

7:07 a.m. Grey dawn. The silhouettes of bare trees slowly take shape against a sky several degrees darker than the porridge that I have just eaten. The branches, and the twigs that grow from them, wave in the freezing air. From my window I can see the shapes of people scuttling along the path in the nearby park, followed by the brake lights of the Civil Defence trucks.<\/p>\n

It has been several hours since the last Iraqi air raid. We are lucky, I suppose, here in West London, that the majority of collateral damage has been at Heathrow Airport, 15 miles away and now, obviously, uninhabited. Furthermore, the immense improvements in the homing devices in unmanned missiles since the V2 rockets that hit us at the end of W2 (the last time Britain suffered air raids) have meant that, barring the odd stray bomb pulverizing a mall or side street, the devastation has been confined to the former airport.<\/p>\n

At this stage, the bombing is largely for show. Britain is taking it on the chin; it is only the older people who remember the last time we were attacked who seem extremely upset. When the first Iraqi missiles struck, before the reintroduction here of petrol rationing, many families would actually drive out to Heathrow to watch the gradual demolition of this once-flourishing metropolis. When I say families, I mean mostly the men. Security, too, has been blas\u00c3\u00a9 by World War II standards. Today’s smart missile can find you whether you are there or not: This time around, there’s no black-out. Getting into my office this morning and switching on the light hasn’t provoked any hassle from the wardens.<\/p>\n

Uh-oh\u00e2\u20ac\u201deither the tube-trains have woken up, or that was a stray coming down. I felt the house flicker just a moment in shock, then go back exactly the way it was. Hopefully it won’t wake Mich\u00c3\u00a8le upstairs. I can hear Figgy jump off the chair outside my door, where I saw her sleeping on my crushed velvet trousers when I came in here with my tea. What amazes me is that I’m not more terrified. As Mich\u00c3\u00a8le said, it’s scary what you can adjust to.<\/p>\n

Why, oh why, did the Iraqis refuse to believe us when we showed them, beyond doubt, that we do not have weapons of mass destruction? Every cupboard and cellar door was opened wide for their inspectors. To date, less than a thousand people have been killed here, according to the Daily Express\u00e2\u20ac\u201dbut what happens when the sites are set on Central London?<\/p>\n

The rumor is that Britain does possess some kind of nuclear or biological bomb, but that Downing Street will not deploy it until (or preferably unless) Saddam Hussein orders an attack on Buckingham Palace.<\/p>\n

… Sorry, where was I? Daydreaming again! Oh, yes. \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Other links of interest:<\/p>\n

Terry Jones:
\n“Let Them Eat Bombs<\/a>”
\n“God: I’ve Lost Faith in Blair<\/a>”
\n“Julius Caesar Had Gaul; George Bush Just Has Gall<\/a>”
\n“They Have Made a Killing<\/a>”
\n“Call That Humiliation?<\/a>”
\n“McCain’s Solution: A Nuclear War With Iran<\/a>”
\n“A True Land of Opportunity<\/a>”<\/p>\n

Anthony Bourdain:
\n“Watching Beirut Die<\/a>“<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the years our Viewpoints section has featured some interesting essays by artists of various sorts, including Monty Python‘s Terry Jones and chef-turned-author Anthony Bourdain. One piece I wish we had excerpted was this bit by English musician Robyn Hitchcock from late 2002 (back when people like Randy Barnett, Glenn Reynolds, and Andrew Sullivan were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[676],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-3739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-antiwar-movement"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3739\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3739"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=3739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}