Party Ben’s 2007 Mother Jones Mashup: Faithless vs. George W. Bush’s SOTU

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Hello internet. I’m Party Ben. You might know me from such films as “That’s My Monkey 2: Ookin’ it Up,” and “Arm & Hammer: a Company With a Future.” Not really. Actually, I make those most mockable of musical items: mashups! Plus I also DJ in the Golden State, and do something called “creative direction” for San Francisco radio station LIVE 105. Good times.

For reasons that are not yet clear to me, I’ve been asked to be a guest blogger on this blog, focusing on musical and cultural items of note. I guess I’ll bring a refreshing lack of “writing skills” or “journalistic ethics” that they couldn’t find around the Mother Jones offices.

To celebrate my acceptance into the liberal media elite, I’ve updated one of my more political tracks for exclusive download by readers of this fine blog. It’s based on a song by Faithless, “Mass Destruction,” a deceptively jaunty anti-war number that appeared on their 2004 album “No Roots.” At that time I produced a novelty version featuring some appropriate excerpts of George W. Bush’s anti-evildoer speechifying. Despite my version’s simplicity (like, wow, echo!) it proved inexplicably popular. As is my usual method, I produced at least six different versions, including a long one that appeared on my website and a shorter one that got some radio play on my own and other stations. This new version uses excerpts of Bush’s recent State of the Union speech as well as some of the clips I used in the original mix. Compare and contrast! It’s Faithless vs. George W. Bush, “Mass Destruction” (Party Ben’s 2007 Mother Jones remix). Enjoy.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

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