Right. On.

It feels shocking, which serves to highlight what a bunch of fucking pussies we have in the media/entertainment industry.

I usually don't dig on songs like this over the total cheese factor. But this was actually pretty fucking good.

Well, she can certainly belt more than I thought she could. But it still seems cheesy to me, not THAT much different than the terrible (I mean, godawful) Bright Eyes song that attempted the same thing. It's not that I don't agree with the larger sentiment, it's that there's absolutely no subtlety in the work. Granted, the larger political discourse in this country has no subtlety in it, so it's a good fit. But still, it makes you ache for, I don't know, a revelatory metaphor or something, doesn't it? She's got a great voice, so why waste it on something that's essentially no different than all the other cries of "drunken frat boy" that are as reductive and silly as the right's caricatures of liberals? Again (ducking from the other commenters), it's not that she's wrong, it's that if she's right, she's presenting it in a fairly juvenile, uninteresting way.

I hate this administration as much as I've ever hated anything but that song did not resonate at all. In fact, I'll go so far as to the say that song is just...bad.

Pink is not the voice of the disgruntled [liberal] masses. Pink is the voice of those who want to get this party started right now. That melodramatic, disingenuous song will not change that.

God I love Pink. Yeah, the song's a bit cheesy, but is there anyone else trying to get such grit into Top 40-friendly songs? That's where she becomes a hero in my eyes (similar to Kanye in this regard). Not only does she have a message, she has the talent and courage to take it to the largest audience possible. This isn't Bright Eyes singing to the emo kids in the corner--Pink is a pop star who wants to change the world, and getting songs with substance into the iPods of America's teenage girls (and their moms) is a fucking brilliant step in the right direction.

Plus, the bitch can sing.

John Williams wrote: "It's not that I don't agree with the larger sentiment, it's that there's absolutely no subtlety in the work."

With Pink, context is everything. You can't compare her political discourse to that of politicians, but to that of, say, Beyonce. And while Pink's words might be embarassingly gauche in another context, in the world of pop music, they're fucking heroic.

For the record, it didn't take the President song to get my "Pink is Jesus" juices flowing. I've been just as impressed with her explanations/defense of "Stupid Girls." (For one example, see here.)

It's nice to see a megaselling pop star give the middle finger to Bush. We do need more of that. It's just too bad most of the song's audience can't vote.

loves me my pink!

Awesome. Iconic. A solid work of shambolic art. The song is essentially a retelling of Cindy Sheehan's confrontation of Bush in Crawford last Summer, the 'tank in Tiananmen square' moment of in the current neo-conservative war on American democracy. Like those gestures, this is profoundly stupid and simple-minded. (And catalyzing, and transformational.)

And, c'mon, the delivery of the 'whiskey & cocaine' line pulled a snicker out of even you most dedicated pactitioners of the ideology of irony. Admit it.

(Snarky aside to Dan: this slog post is a music topic. Why wasn't it assigned to your new Line Out music-talk ghetto?)

(Personal aside to Dan: Thanks for posting this. I sent it upstairs to the Mrs' chamber and heard sobbing a few minutes later. )

I'm all for getting the word out to the masses, even when it spawns more American Idol crap like this...
Where were the violins?

Pink is not a subtle artist. You don't listen to her records for, say, nuance. Not with songs like "U & Ur Hand," for instance. Nothing subtle about that.

And I love how quickly we label musicians nowadays. (I, myself, being one.) God forbid you release a single about fun and sex, then follow it up with a serious song calling for social/political change.....after all, NOBODY took Marvin Gaye seriously when he wrote both "What's Goin' On" AND "Let's Get It On" in the same year.

In a time when labels fear public backlash the most (Sony has only shipped the Dixie Chicks' controversial new single to a handful of radio stations, in hopes of downplaying any negative fallout), I think it's fantastic that a popular, internationally known singer such as Pink can release both "Stupid Girls" and "Dr. Mr. President," which has spawned countless discussions on taste, context, and sincerity.

Name me ONE Hilary Duff or Nickelback record that has had the same effect.

Ooops! Sorry about the triple post....damn computers. So smart, yet so stupid.

So, yeah, it's kind of neat that a pop star is trying to send a message out to the teeming masses (especially a message I sympathize with). However, I'll repeat what I said previously, this song is just plain bad. This song will do nothing for the cause except serve to reinforce the fantasy that some very celebrity-like individual/superhero is out there just waiting to save us from the evil corpora-fascist regime currently in power. I'm exaggerating to make the point that, well, Pink singing to the President is going to do exactly shit to move anyone to act. It's trite bullshit. Not to mention the fact she thinks Bush is the one with the gay daughter. I don't get the fawning at all.

We're not really comparing these two terrible songs ("Stupid Girls" being even worse than the President song, if possible) to "What's Goin' On" and "Let's Get It On," are we? Really, are we?

I just don't accept that this president song is "calling for social/political change." It's just a too-obvious, second-grade-level of political expression.

We're not really comparing these two terrible songs ("Stupid Girls" being even worse than the President song, if possible) to "What's Goin' On" and "Let's Get It On," are we? Really, are we?

I just don't accept that this president song is "calling for social/political change." It's just a too-obvious, second-grade-level of political expression.

guys, click post once. ONCE! god dammit.

and stranger css and html gurus, fix your slog comment layout, your chopping off about 15 pixels of text with your right-hand column.

I just find it interesting that people are slamming Pink as a "party, juvenile artist" and then criticizing her song because it was...well, juvenile. It's kind of like criticizing Dylan for being too verbose and then complaining his new single wasn't long enough.

Will this song change anything? No. That's not the function of art. Art is an expression. Pink was mad, didn't like the President, wrote a song about it, some people liked it, some people hated it, end of story.

And no, I'm not comparing Pink to Marvin Gaye artistically. but I'm comparing the shit they got from the public and the press. Nobody wanted Marvin to release "What's Goin' On." He was a crooner who sang great make-out music. He was a sex symbol, that was his image. His label didn't want to release that single or that album. He had to fight to get it heard. And when it was released, he was criticized as a superficial artist trying to make a non-superficial statement.

Aaaaand, if you actually looked at that song (What's Goin' On), it is REALLY that great of a song? Or is it because of the context that surrounded it?

At the end of the day, I'd rather a pop singer try and fail doing their own work than listen to another assembly-line produced American Idol Reject sing whatever Simon stuffs in their mouth.

John;

It's all a matter of the audience and their receptivity to the message.

If you want quietly but firmly in your face, go listen to Linda Thompson's Pavanne. You want an honestly felt opinion set to music, you listen to this brave bit of commentary, given the source.

Bottom line for me is that I have a 12-year old daughter that hears both Stupid Girls and Mr. President, and we have better conversations on both topics, which she starts, than through lectures from me or the news. And that matters.

"Will this song change anything? No. That's not the function of art."

There are many varieties of art and many of these perform a great variety of functions.

I tend to follow the postulate that feelings, the product of physiological phenomena in our bodies 'beneath' language, can produce neurological objects that constitute knowledge.

You may disagree. Some insist that knowledge is exclusively a product of socially constructed linguistic operations. At a certain point, I don't know what further to say to such persons except, "would you mind cutting me a huge slice of that delicious looking, what is that, cheesecake?"

The point is, anxiety is real. It's like the weather, the wind blowing through the body public. A population is a massive watery thing anyway, full of mysteries. And when Savage sent that link to my house this morning, within twenty minutes two worldly, skeptical adults succumbed to blubbering tearfully to Pink's schlocky little statement. That's not how it is in my house everyday. (No, really!) So, something happened. Something changed. But did Bucky Fuller return to steer the planet toward long-term plenitude? No. We are still doomed. Same as ever.

Richard:

That was impressive. I still think the song sucks and the fawning is unwarranted but I'll be damned if I didn't enjoy reading your response (and agreed with your postulate that there is sometimes a connection between emotion and knowledge).

My tip cup: http://www.teamyacht.com/temp/Help-The-Hippies.html

Cheers!