“Just Shut Up And Sing…”

Ry Cooder is the latest celebrity to open his mouth and showcase his ignorance, egged on by a somewhat less-than-impartial ‘Guardian’ interlocutor:

GI:Did you see the opening ceremony? This will lead somewhere, this question, I hope ...

RC: Oh, sure. Absolutely.

GI:And what did you make of it?

RC: Well, the whole thing with the beds and the National Health was interesting from over here, as you might well imagine.

GI:Well, that's what I want to ask you about because we read here that there was some criticism of that segment of the ceremony in the US.

RC: Well, I didn't know there was any criticism of it at all. I hadn't heard that. First of all, you can't believe the media.

Translation: ‘What? Of course not. No-one in my tiny, unrepresentative circle thought so, so it must be untrue. And if others are saying so, why, they must be fakes…’

GI:I don't know if you're familiar with the mayor of London, a character called Boris Johnson ...

RC: Never heard of him.

GI:He's a Conservative buffoon. He's so ridiculous that there's a point at which some people start to find him funny. Is there an element of that with the Sarah Palins of this world? Or are they too dangerous to ever find them funny?

RC: They're too insanely dangerous. Look, what did Gore Vidal say recently? The interviewer asked him what he thought of the Republican party and he said it's not a party any more, it's a Hitler Youth mindset and they're out to destroy the country, and he was 110% right.

He’s now 110% dead, so what does that tell you?

GI:Is Mitt Romney the least worst candidate to have emerged from the Republican ranks?

RC: I don't agree with that. Romney is as bad as anyone can be. He's a dangerous man. He's a cruel man. He's a perfect creation for what the Republican party is all about. And that is to say, a rapacious capitalist.

Cooder, I’m assuming, only gives away his records through socially-conscious diverse enterprises? Not through some medium of ‘rapacious capitalism’?

*checks iTunes Store*

Oh...

GI:It's a bit different to the protest songs of the 60s. Is that because you think those songs were never really effective or because the times have changed?

RC: Well, I don't know how to write soldier music. They were soldiers' songs so people could go out and hit the frontline. We shall overcome and so forth. And you need those types of songs. Especially in the Occupy movement. I think they're going to want to have songs like that, it'll be helpful.

Well, it’ll be a lot more helpful than their current efforts to persuade people of the righteousness of their cause.

GI:On the new album, the song Cold Cold Feeling pictures President Obama pacing the Oval Office on his own in the dark. Is he a good man trapped in an impossible situation?

RC: Yes, 110%. He's set upon by dogs. He's prevented from doing anything because the Republicans ensured that no president and no Democrat president can ever do good again. That's what Bush was sent in there to do: destroy the presidency, and that's what I think he did.

Ry Cooder, folks. The David Icke of the music world…