"Lighten up and get a life"

"It's now been watched nearly 11,000 times on YouTube since being posted seven hours ago," reports USA Today re John McCain's musical triumph, "Bomb Iran." Asked about the attention it's getting, the Senator told AP: "Please, I was talking to some of my old veterans friends . . . My response is, Lighten up and get a life." (Venerable Red Oak frames neighbor's house in the early-morning light of Easter 2006 at Goomp's)

"Lighten up, folks. I mean we are becoming a girly-man nation," Bernard Goldberg tells Steve Doucy this morning in response to the tut-tutting of media blowhards like CNNs Bill Schneider -- who professed shock, shock that a politician would shoot from the hip for a change -- re John McCain's hilarious take-off of the Beach Boys' "Barbara Ann" to a receptive audience the other day, where the "maverick" presidential wannabe intoned -- in response to a listener's question re when do we "send an air mail message to Tehran" -- "Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran." We could swear Bernie was channeling McCain's and our own opinion sent in earlier to Fox & Friends (we're still waiting for them to read our email on air):

Can we lighten up, please? I laughed out loud with joy at a politician's saying something fun and funny.

Even gravitasoid muckymuck Chris Wallace, interviewed by F&F as a teaser to his weekend show, agreed, recalling something wicked amusing Ronald Reagan had said during a microphone check prior to a broadcast way back when, where the President joked that he had just signed legislation to outlaw the Soviet Union:

"The bombing starts in five minutes."

We totally agree with Brian Kilmeade, who commented:

I think America wants less script, more reality.

That's what's so bad about Obama, whom we had been inclined at first blush to take a shine to. Did you catch his abominable cobbling together of his stump-speech talking points with the Virginia Tech horrors -- "equating the literal killing of humans with verbal coarseness" -- earlier this week? Don't get us wrong re Senator McCain. His utterly disingenuous campaign to muzzle freedom of speech in the name of campaign finance "reform" left a lingering bad taste in our mouth, and the MSM's fawning over his "Straight Talk Express" during the last presidential election cycle made our blood run cold. But we're talking politics, here, and strange bedfellows are where it's at. With apologies to the Beach Boys:

Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran . . .
You got me rockin and a-rollin
Rockin and a-reelin . . .
One more time
You got me rockin and a-rollin
Bomb Iran
Woah

Imus's gratuitous "nappy-headed hos" is one thing, but give us a break. What's wrong with calling Ahmadinejad a spade? Shall we dance?

Update: The cut-and-crawl piranas of MoveOn are already on the case:

At a campaign stop on Wednesday, Sen. John McCain was asked what to do about Iran. His response? He sang "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" to the tune of the Beach Boys' "Barbara Ann." Seriously. He says it was a joke, but the bottom line is that it is reckless saber-rattling against Iran at a time when tensions are high. Will you help us counter his message on TV?

War with Iran would be a disaster. The best way to stop this idea in its tracks is to make sure politicians who talk loosely about war pay a political price. We've made an emergency TV ad to call out McCain on his reckless remarks. Click here to watch the ad, and then please donate $25 to get it up on the air.

The root of all evil rears its ugly head. MoveOn insists we toe the party line, or else. Beware of those who cannot laugh in the face of the abyss. As we've blogged here early and often, the forces of darkness -- those who would impose fear societies heavy or lite on us freedom lovers -- are forever waiting just outside the campfire of civilization to move in for the kill. Will the netroots be the end of humor?

Comments

[Laura Lee Donoho]

Love it Sissy. I'm warming to Mr. McCain recently. Definitely.

[goomp]

Freedom is on the line. Despair as we may at the lack of principle in most politicians, maybe the people in their confused wisdom will once again chose the one to lead us to a new birth of freedom.

[amba]

I think that was one of those jokes that's just so irresistible that you can't help making it even though you know you shouldn't. I wouldn't assume that McCain literally means it. It's just one of those jokes that had to be made, and chose him as its way into the world.

[Sissy Willis]

Amba: Like God, jokes move in mysterious ways.

[GreenmanTim]

Anyone in grade school during the Iran hostage crisis knew the lyrics to "Bomb Iran". Also a version of the Oscar Meyer Baloney jingle with the the closing line: "'Cause Jimmy Carter has a way with screwing up the USA." Whatever else McCain's crooning may have been, it was hardly an original composition.

[Laura Lee Donoho]

It's the kind of joke that stays with you. I've been humming it all day.

[hnav]

"we're still waiting for them to read our email on air"

LOL !

outstanding...

i enjoyed the fun of Sen. McCain singing as well.

but i must admit, it seems like he needs to change his horrid image very quickly.

something keeps telling me, if this McCain chap and his associates, had been outspoken throughout the last six years on the GWOT, including the battles in Iraq and such, we would all be in much better shape.

instead they sort of quietly let the World beat upon this President, leaving him quite on his own.

McCain and Graham were busy playing nice with Democrats in the Senate, cutting deals on judges, as if they run the World.

and how his one speech, correctly condemning the Democrats suddenly received such acclaim, from the likes of NRO, etc, etc...

didn't they notice he was tossing the President and the fine Men and Women in Our Armed Services, who bravely tried to implement McCain's advocated policy in Iraq?

'mistakes'?

as if John McCain never made a mistake in a combat zone?

He is a hero, and i like him, but please, if anyone should know how difficult the challenges are in War Zone, it is John McCain.

the Mission in the heart of the troubled Arab World is extremely challenging, but well worthy of all these admirable efforts.

and John McCain should know better to try to appease the liberals in the MSM.

Leadership is not in Senator McCain.

songs about the dangerous Iran are fine, they deserve to feel the pinch.

but this Man has not served his Nation well as a Senator.

even Joe Lieberman isn't tossing the Bush Administration under a bus for some 'mistakes' in Iraq.

grrr...

hhehehehe...

McCain can bother me, cause he should really know better, than to encourage Liberal Democrats.

[Nick]

I think you're missing the point. Say what you like, joke, and enjoy yourself on stage. That is not the point of the moveon crowd. There are people in this world with differing opinions. Some people hope for diplomacy with Iran. To have an American leader jest that they would like to bomb Iran kind of inflames people who pray for diplomacy. You may disagree with others politics and make a point of why we should bomb Iran but saying the other side is just blowing it out of context is not the fight you want to start. Both sides agree you can be yourself, unscripted and joke around, but respect the other opinion. You don't want a liberal joking that they are secretly adopting kyoto protocols in the next couple weeks, do you? It's not about shooting from the hip.

[Sissy Willis]

Nick, honey. I wasn't suggesting we should bomb Iran. When humor is in play, it's important to read between the lines. Also, hope is not a strategy.

[Gayle Miller]

I don't recall electing the MOVEON.org crowd to any supervisory capacity over me or my life, nor will I ever do so. On that basis, they can just put some Krazy Glue in their lip gloss and spare me the cacaphony!

[B Dubya]

I, on the other hand, strongly recommend that we pre-emptively strike Iran tomorrow.

Once Iran gets nuclear material in weaponized form, it's going to be a far different world. If we deny them the pleasure, a la Israel and the Iraqi enrichment reactor in the 80's, then they return to a military capability that is almost enough to beat Jordan in a strait up fight.

This nutroot moveon theology of surrender just isn't selling where it counts. With me and people like me. My government has a responsibility to me and to you to protect our interests abroad and our security at home. I see an Iranian strike as fullfilling both obligations.

Can you feel the irony? One of the probable byproducts of knocking the ayatollas from the seat of power is the saving of thousands of Iranian lives from the predation of this repressive theocracy.