Tuesday, March 11, 2003

People didn't like Joe Chamberlain...in a way that seems familiar

Earlier today we suggested that for those looking to compare George W to an English historical figure, Joe Chamberlain is the right answer. A new thread in the web-searches to support this thesis reveals this brilliantly polemic anti-Joe poem by the American poet Charles Erskine Scott Wood. We strongly recommend reading the whole thing for full effect, but these lines would work just as well after an Iraq fiasco as it does for Wood's target of Boer War atrocities.

Let him live on. The fleshless hand of Time
Shall taint upon his forehead, black as night,
Great letters telling his ignoble crime,
Then thrust him forward in historic light
Where all the world may read and none forget
These words: "He lied to hide his guilt, he swore
Most false. He plotted war. His hand was wet
With blood. The harlot's golden crown he wore.