Herman Cain sings God Bless America

Presidential candidate Herman Cain offers a touching rendition of God Bless America, set to footage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and a backing track of human screams. [via @Mat]

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Antinous / Moderator

‘Sings’?
hughstimson

I’ll go one better and say we must never never never never *never* forget.
- sideshow bill
  
  Forget what?
- http://www.facebook.com/tschapker Tim Schapker
  
  But you have to quote yourself in a video that’s released two days before the date you’re supposed to say it.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_425GVKQCLFZMQYYENR7CJBRDVA jb

OK, now I want someone to smack him.

I thought I’d seen the last of this vile disaster porn in the run-up to the 2004 election. Good GOd.
- librtee_dot_com
  
  It’s called getting the most from your investment.
  
  If you bought a car back in 2001, and now it’s sputtering, and wheezing, and letting forth a big cloud of smoke…can you say for sure you wouldn’t still be driving it?
travtastic

“Haunting Mysticism Spoken Creepily Over Disaster Porn and Tortured Screams”

If I wanted to make a touching tribute to someone who was shot to death, I don’t think I’d sing over a surveillance camera video of their murder.
http://www.facebook.com/postelwait Cameron Postelwait

i’m guessing no one will sing anything for the 10s of thousands of civilians killed because of our ‘retaliation’ in a country that had virtually nothing to do with 9/11.
- travtastic
  
  No, they will. Unfortunately, it’ll just be the same video from above.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_425GVKQCLFZMQYYENR7CJBRDVA jb

I made it 18 seconds before washing out my ears with MC Frontalot.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_OAUXAA362EXWLYVMPJOKLFB5JQ Incipient Madness

This is an official release from the Cain campaign? There is no way anyone should ever vote for this guy, although I do think his singing was pretty good. I’ve heard worse on American Idol.

Watched it on Youtube. Info box says “may we never forget!” Well, I’m not saying to forget 9/11, but it’s time to GET OVER IT. The whole point of terrorism is to influence outcomes through fear. Well I’ll tell you what Mr. Terrorist: We are in charge of what we do, and to an extent we are in charge of how we feel. Someday we’ll wise up and stop tearing ourselves apart over this. It’s time to refuse to be terrorized.
Guest

It’s like the limbo. How low can you go?
http://www.appliedesoterics.com bfarn

Woulda been better if Tom Waits did it while wearing his biggest Snark hat. Something like What’s He Building In There.
Brainspore

They’ve perverted the campaign spending rules so much I can’t tell if he actually approved that explicitly or if he has plausible deniability for when the inevitable blowback comes a-callin’. I didn’t catch a “…and I approve this message” in there. Anybody know for sure?
http://www.lightning-rose.com/ LightningRose

Too bad there are no gods.
librtee_dot_com

Oh dear lord. That’s an actual video? From the actual Herman Cain campaign?

*flabergasted*

I was sure…SURE..it was from a spoof account, someone making fun of him. HIS CAMPAIGN ACTUALLY POSTED THAT? HIM SINGING OVER SCREAMING?

Man..I knew he was a creepy fucker..but that…that just takes the cake, for anything I’ve seen a politician do in awhile.
sideunes

Let’s Cancel 9/11
Bury the War State’s Blank Check at Sea By Tom Engelhardt

Let’s bag it.

I’m talking about the tenth anniversary ceremonies for 9/11, and
everything that goes with them: the solemn reading of the names of the
dead, the tolling of bells, the honoring of first responders, the gathering of presidents the dedication of the new memorial, the moments of silence. The works.
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175437/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_tear_down_the_freedom_tower/
http://grumer.org/ Avram Grumer

Looks like it was posted by the YouTube user “thehermancain”. That user has donation buttons that point to HermanCain-dot-com, and says it was “paid for by Friends of Herman Cain, Inc”.
- http://twitter.com/Threedonia Threedonia
  
  It’s also mentioned in th Twitter feed at his website… so his official site is claiming it it seems too,
  
  http://www.hermancain.com/h
  
  and here’s a Yahoo snippet on the release….
  
  http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/herman-cain-sings-god-bless-america-9-11-214420864.html
  
  Creepy
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_MW5UGCBGDCNDP5LP7YQYNLFIXA cl

Unicorn Chaser, now please.
JProffitt71

Sweet. Now what about the first responders?
snagglepuss

Sweet Creeping Jesus. Herman Cain just took the shameless opportunist brass exploitation ring.

Which probably won’t last long.. I fully expect Perry, Santorum and Bachmann to plumb new depths of jingoistic depravity this weekend.
http://twitter.com/SingnWhlchrDude Vin Reilly

The video is like hearing a woman singing “Hush little baby, don’t say a word…” to pictures of wounded children. It creates a strange dissonance that makes the song sound like a lie. Very creepy. Are we sure that Mr. Cain’s “friends” aren’t working for Rick Perry?
- jerwin
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6S6TPVLuYw
jerwin

Perhaps the followers of Herman Cain really do find this uplifting, and can’t understand why the “liberal media” insists on mocking them. Aliens in America?
anharmyenone

I’m tired of people using that word “jingoism”. If you’re not cheering for America, then what country are you cheering for? And is it really necessary to tear down America to promote your country of choice? Or maybe you’re just trying to advocate nihilism in a roundabout way? America is not perfect, but it is the greatest force for good in the world since its founding and every one of its moral failings has been commonplace among other countries too. Judge America versus other countries, not a standard of perfection from Noam Chomsky. The United States is not a theoretical country in an ideal abstract model. It is a real living, breathing, nation made up of flawed human beings living their lives with all the good and bad aspects of human nature.

Also, I’m tired of hypocrisy being the ultimate sin. The only way to never be a hypocrite is to not stand for anything–to have no standards or values–to not believe in anything whatsoever–to have no standard of behavior at all, since nobody and no nation is perfect. When America fails to live up to its ideals, it’s because America HAS ideals. Better to have ideals and fall short of them than to be rudderless, directionless, bumbling about not knowing what one believes in or what one is trying to accomplish.

I remember growing up, I used to like to discredit the idea of moral absolutes because I didn’t like feeling guilty about having a normal sex drive. When I got older, I realized that a better way of dealing with the issue was to proudly tell people that I am a fornicator and that fornication is not a sin in a society like mainstream America where a woman doesn’t have to be a virgin to get a decent husband and the people who say it is are trying to put Christians back under the law. In other words, I learned to deal with the specific issue that was bothering me instead of trying to tear down the very idea of morality or rationality or America or Western civilization. Thank you for reading my core dump and thanks to the mods for indulging me.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  If you’re not cheering for America, then what country are you cheering for?
  
  You could cheer for something worthwhile like compassion or ending world hunger or eradicating AIDS instead of cheering for any overgrown tribal institution.
- spejic
  
  People who use the phrase “jingoism” are not against pride in your nation. Jingoism is an excessive, misplaced, or misdirected love of country. It’s like a person who has a shrine to popular figures, or stalks a target of sexual interest – it isn’t just fandom or love any more, it’s gone beyond that to something creepy, twisted, and yes even dangerous at times.
  
  People have to remember that the accomplishments of your nation are not necessarily your accomplishments, and love of country is not the lone domain of those with certain political views.
- atimoshenko
  
  If you’re not cheering for America, then what country are you cheering for?
  
  Why should one “cheer” for any country? Countries are not a particularly ‘natural’ way of grouping people. For instance, there are probably many more similarities between a typical resident of Seattle and a typical resident of Vancouver, than between the former and a typical resident of Jackson, MS. Besides, patriotism is not the mere cheering on for a group of people – it is taking pride in the accomplishments of that group of people, both present and past, as well as taking offence at sleight against them. This is patriotism most unfortunate aspect – taking personal pride for accomplishments you had nothing to do with is pitiably delusional.
  
  America is not perfect, but it is the greatest force for good in the world since its founding and every one of its moral failings has been commonplace among other countries too.
  
  In all of recorded history, every country has acted for its own interests and only for its own interests. Others may have sometimes benefitted from such actions, and at other times been hurt by them, but beyond the impact of this on a given country’s own interests, this was never directly considered. Indeed, due to the wide diversity of (flawed) people within any given country, countries are nothing if not amoral.
  
  Also, I’m tired of hypocrisy being the ultimate sin. The only way to never be a hypocrite is to not stand for anything–to have no standards or values–to not believe in anything whatsoever–to have no standard of behavior at all, since nobody and no nation is perfect.
  
  Hypocrisy is not the failure to live up to one’s ideals. Hypocrisy is a pattern of disregard of one’s stated ideals whenever those ideals are inconvenient for one’s interests. Hypocrisy is the criticising of others for failing to live up to your ideals, but never admitting it and never criticising yourself whenever you fail to live up to them. Hypocrisy is the ultimate sin.
  
  fornication is not a sin in a society like mainstream America where a woman doesn’t have to be a virgin to get a decent husband
  
  And it is exactly here that you demonstrate the relativism inherent to moral systems. Moral systems are always relative to what one knows and what one experiences, and once you learn something new, your moral system can evolve in response. As a result, when a person has a different set of morals from you, it is simply because they know something you don’t know, or you know something that they don’t. Moral relativism does not mean “anything goes”.
- Bob N Johnson
  
  1. Cheer for people, not institutions.
  
  2. America is not the name of a country. You live in the United States of America. Everyone living in the Western Hemisphere is an American.
  
  3. Never make a judgement unless it is against an ideal, otherwise you’re simply picking the lessor of two evils.
  
  4. The concept of sin is archaic. Hypocrisy is simply a failure to be honest with one’s self and others, and this is a critical failing indeed.
  
  5. Morality has nothing to do with consensual sex. Sex is an activity. Morality is an attempt to decide right from wrong by understanding how personal decisions will affect the well-being of others. To act immorally is to negatively affect well-being.
  
  6. Dealing with specific issues requires understanding generalities.
  - Donald Petersen
    
    Everyone living in the Western Hemisphere is an American.
    
    Well, sure, most of them live in the Americas. But some of them are Brazilians, some are Ecuadoreans, some are Chileans. What should we call those people who live between the Canadians and the Mexicans? ”Yankees”? ”Central North Americans”? ”The Fatsos”?
danegeld

Surely as of now, that’s Ex Presidential candidate Herman Cain
http://boingboing.net/ Rob Beschizza

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLSveRGmpIE
- snagglepuss
  
  Mistah Beschizza – I play that song every year on my Thanksgiving show. Nobody’s complained yet.
BarBarSeven

Crackpots and conspiracy theorists, your skills are slipping big time. Not only is this video weak, but I was just researching when the World Trade Center was first featured in the opening credits of the TV show Barney Miller. It wasn’t the first season, but the second season. And when did the first episode of the second season air? September 11, 1975!!! And what is the title of that episode? DOOMSDAY! And what is the plot of the episode? “Emmy-winner William Windom guest stars as a “human bomb,” who plans to self-destruct unless Barney arrests city officials and the Governor.” OMFG!!! Why is it that 10 years has passed and a bored guy who likes to watch Barney Miller casually came across this SHOCKING REVELATION!!!

Seriously, it’s an uncomfortably weird coincidence. But seriously, did Osama Bin Laden watch Barney Miller to study about NYPD techniques? WHAT IS THIS??!?!

http://www.hulu.com/watch/9757/barney-miller-doomsday
http://twitter.com/mjfgates Michael Gates

Oh mah Gawd…
Ohhhh mah GAWD….
Oh. Mah. Gawwwwwd….
OhmahgawdohmahGAWDohmahgawd…
Oh mah FUCKIN Gawd…
Ohh mah gawd…

just spent five solid MINUTES saying that. I just… don’t have any other words.
social_maladroit

There are only 3 words to say: Fuck Herman Cain.
RJ

I’m so god damn sick of 9/11. It makes me wish something else awful would happen just to make the idiots shut up about it, already. They need something else to spiral into idiocy over, for a change.

How do you suppose other nations with REAL terrorism problems feel about the pompous, dumbass Americans and their piss-ass little single incident from ten years ago? What about Northern Ireland and it’s decades-long problems with the IRA, Sinn Fein and other fringe groups? What about Afghanistan and the routine stadium executions carried out by the Taliban? What about Russia and the Chechen rebels sawing the heads off of young Russian soldiers? What about a hundred other situations around the globe which have been ongoing (or were ongoing) for years? Do you see the media in those nations standing over the victims’ graves and furiously jacking-off like they do here in the US?

Yes, 9/11 was awful. It was also ten years ago. Get a fucking hobby or something, you creepy, morbid idiots.
- http://twitter.com/scottyboyswa2 scottyboyswa2
  
  AMEN! Enough already!
- momus_98
  
  Tell me about it. As if 9/11 was the be-all end-all tragic event in the world. There have been plenty of other tragedies since then. The Onion put it best last week:
  
  http://www.theonion.com/articles/nation-would-rather-think-about-911-than-anything,21309/
millie fink

Holy crap! I mean, that video is really just, such . . . CRAP.

It’s tone deaf, in so many ways.
Bob N Johnson

“Nothing is more unjust, however common, than to charge with hypocrisy
him that expresses zeal for those virtues which he neglects to practice;
since he may be sincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his
passions, without having yet obtained the victory, as a man may be
confident of the advantages of a voyage, or a journey, without having
courage or industry to undertake it, and may honestly recommend to
others, those attempts which he neglects himself.”

Samuel Johnson
- anharmyenone
  
  Bob, you are spot on.
TheCrawNotTheCraw

So Mr. Cain supports Apple Pie, Mom and America? How… (un)surprising: generic approval of the things ALL Americans support.

He should be convicted of Felony Pandering to the “Base.”
http://twitter.com/msaw Matthew Sawyer

Is this supposed to be any more tasteful than Rosie O’Donnell singing the National anthem?
- millie fink
  
  ??
  
  What are you talking about?
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    He’s talking about Roseanne singing the national anthem, but can’t distinguish her from Rosie O’Donnell. But I bet he can tell the Olsen twins apart.
    - millie fink
      
      Yeah. And even knowing that, whatever point that apparently rhetorical question is supposed to make remains muddled at best.
http://twitter.com/scottyboyswa2 scottyboyswa2

Maybe next time he can sing it to video of our military killing thousands of innocents in various wars…
Scott McDaniel

Well, at least his voice is better than John Ashcroft’s!
snagglepuss

At least Rosanne was making an INTENTIONAL joke.
Jonny Burnham

I wish there was hell so he could burn in it.
zombiebob

What an asshole of an attempt at emotional manipulation. I figure that HE figures that it worked for Bush, why not him?
mak702

I thought it was touching and appropriate. Simmer down everybody.
- grimc
  
  Then you’ve got a pretty twisted sense of what’s touching and appropriate.
  - Brainspore
    
    Keep in mind this is coming from someone who thought the Lincoln Memorial should have depicted John Wilkes Booth splattering the President’s brains all over the balcony at Ford’s Theatre.
- bbmcrae
  
  Herman?
  - mak702
    
    I wish. I’d be sitting in a Godfathers Pizza now eating pizza for breakfast.
ill lich

I didn’t think anything of this at first, because it didn’t occur to me that this was made by Herman Cain himself as a actual “tribute”– my first impression was someone made it as some kind protest, or to troll the Cain campaign. Leave it to a clueless tea-bagger to basically troll himself and not realize it.
bibulb

Wow. This makes Throbbing Gristle seem family-friendly.
BarBarSeven

Folks, just came across these two 9/11 tribute makeup tutorial videos on YouTube. Fairly speechless.

9/11 Tribute: American Flag Inspired Look
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psiHnngyRL0

Tribute To 9/11 : Inspired Makeup Tutorial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQ7CgAQRQcw
NickD

This video shows everything that is wrong with nationalism.
nobodyman

At first I thought this was a cynical montage created by someone who doesn’t like Herman Cain. But then to find out that it Cain *authorized* this? Oh god. At first I was just going to to not vote for him, but now I think I’ll *very* not vote for him.
http://www.facebook.com/gingerintheuk Ginger Gregory

God Bless America and Herman Cain.
Brainspore

I notice that the person who uploaded that video recently disabled ratings and comments. Probably just too overwhelmed with praise for how tactfully Mr. Cain approached the subject.