the dixie beastie boys

Yeah, we've all heard about how the Dixie Chicks have been screwed by their criticism of Bush. And at the Oscar's earlier this week, Mike Moore's unscripted bashing of Bush raised more eyebrows.

"They're here in solidarity with me because we like non-fiction. We like non-fiction and we live in fictitious times. We live in a time with fictitious election results that elect a fictitious president. We live in a time when we have a man sending us to war for fictitious reasons. Whether it is the fiction of duct tape or the fiction of orange alerts, we are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame on you, Mr. Bush! Shame on you! …You're time is up."

His rant was cut short by the orchestra, which started playing very, very loudly. Moore was booed off the stage. Seems like any celebrity who speaks out strongly against attacking Iraq is poorly received by the public.

Unless, the celebrity already has no public acceptance. Then they have nothing to lose. As it is in the case of the Beastie Boys. On http://beastieboys.com/ a new anti-war song, along with these quotes are posted:

"We felt it was important to comment on where the US appears to be heading now. A war in Iraq will not resolve our problems. It can only result in the deaths of many innocent civilians and US troops. If we are truly striving for safety, we need to build friendships, not try to bully the rest of the world."
- Adam Yauch

"Being together, writing and recording, we felt it would be irresponsible not to address what’s going on in the world while the events are still current. It didn’t make sense to us to wait until the entire record was finished to release this song."
- Mike D

"This song is not an anti-American or pro-Saddam Hussein statement. This is a statement against an unjustified war."
- Adam Horovitz

Download the song here. I normally don't enjoy the Beastie Boys but I'll make an exception.