{"id":90,"date":"2005-12-13T19:54:00","date_gmt":"2005-12-13T19:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/?p=90"},"modified":"2015-11-02T15:29:30","modified_gmt":"2015-11-02T23:29:30","slug":"have-you-embraced-the-beast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/2005\/12\/13\/have-you-embraced-the-beast\/","title":{"rendered":"Have You Embraced the Beast?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/ayearofsongs\/images\/blogimages\/HaveYouEmbracedTheBeast.jpg\" alt=\"XXXXX\" align=\"left\" border=\"1\" hspace=\"6\" vspace=\"2\" \/><br \/>\n1984.<\/p>\n<p>Death squads and slaughter in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras&#8230; genocide against inconvenient indigenous peoples, murder of labor workers, missionaries, nuns, and priests &#8212; paid for, in large part, by US taxpayers with a wink and a nod from our government leaders and our legislators.<\/p>\n<p>This song is not long on subtlety or craft, I&#8217;ll admit it.<\/p>\n<p>What it has is no shortage of is corrosive, eat-your-guts-out anger&#8230; courtesy of yours truly. That&#8217;s pretty much how I walked around during the &#8217;80s&#8230; a hard-tempered steel spring coiled tightly inside me, ready to snap. It was a time when the &#8220;loyal opposition&#8221; were gutless toadies&#8230; the spectacle of the Iran-Contra hearings is still burned into my mind.<\/p>\n<p>The relentless covering up of ever-nastier, ever-more shameful secrets, greater crimes against the US Constitution, the US people, and the world, from the government of the popular Ronald Reagan, papered over by trepidatious Democrats&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>For every <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Jack Brooks<\/span>, there were ten <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Daniel Inouye<\/span>s&#8230; seemingly ready and eager to pave the way for the presidency of GHW Bush just a few years later. The &#8220;investigation&#8221; was a disgrace almost as shameless as the offenses it investigated.<\/p>\n<p>Anyhow&#8230; it still makes me mad.<\/p>\n<!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-90-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.archive.org\/download\/Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast_1\/AYoS20051213_Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.archive.org\/download\/Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast_1\/AYoS20051213_Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast.mp3\">http:\/\/www.archive.org\/download\/Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast_1\/AYoS20051213_Have_You_Embraced_the_Beast.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p><em><strong>HAVE YOU EMBRACED THE BEAST?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Have you embraced the beast?<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">I see the mark is on your face<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Have you embraced the beast?<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Are you a slave of greed and hate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Have you embraced the beast?<br \/>\nDo you serve the war machine?<br \/>\nHave you embraced the beast?<br \/>\nDid you trade in your soul on (for) the finer things?<\/p>\n<p>Have you embraced the beast?<br \/>\nDo your taxes buy bullets for fascist death squads?<br \/>\nHave you embraced the beast?<br \/>\nThey&#8217;ll be coming to <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">your <\/span>hometown before too long . . .<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Have you embraced the beast?<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">I see the mark is on your face<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Have you embraced the beast?<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Are you a slave of greed and hate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Have you embraced the beast?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 78%;\">(C)1984, TK Major<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>1984. Death squads and slaughter in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras&#8230; genocide against inconvenient indigenous peoples, murder of labor workers, missionaries, nuns, and priests &#8212; paid for, in large part, by US taxpayers with a wink and a nod from our government leaders and our legislators. This song is not long on subtlety or craft, I&#8217;ll [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,340],"tags":[700,281,45,561,500],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2282,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90\/revisions\/2282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ayearofsongs.org\/blg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}