You just created this wonderful segue into Body of War, the other film to which you've contributed music, because Tomas Young's relationship with his mom is critical. He couldn't live without her, almost literally. I understand you met with Tomas and these songs just flowed out of you? Songs are just flowing out of you these days!
They're all motivated. They have a purpose. I've always felt motivated in the band, obviously. Pretty much at all times music motivates me. How can I say this without sounding in any way proud of myself? Obviously I've always written songs that are critical of our government, and talk about our times. Hopefully you attempt to be timeless while doing it. Tomas' story allowed me to write the song that I was always thinking of. I think the other thing with all these songs is I just kind of got out of the way. I didn't say, Well, it needs to sound more like this. Maybe because they weren't ''band'' songs, I wasn't thinking they had to sound like the band. I just played what I felt and got out of the way.
And how did you get hooked up with Phil Donahue? That's not an obvious relationship.
Phil and I were part of Ralph Nader's support group in 2000. And then I just bumped into him and he said, ''I need you to watch this film.'' After that it was real easy.
Were there things this movie brought to your attention that you hadn't understood before?
Plenty of stories have been told — and not enough people have heard them — about what's been criminal about this war. You have the violence, which is downplayed. And the misinformation — why are we there, and can we afford to be there, and where is all this money going? There's the political side to it, there's the monetary side, it's all intertwined. But this is the human side of it. It's incredibly violent to me just watching what Tomas has to go through on a daily basis to survive. To wake up and have a cup of coffee. Just to live every day, because he signed up on September 13th, and went over to fight the good fight in Afghanistan. He ends up in Iraq. He thinks he's fighting the bad guys; now he doesn't know. He's questioning why he's even there, and then he's paralyzed almost upon arrival. And now he has this incredible challenge. And I'll tell ya, with a lot of friends you always say, ''Well, if you can get through this it'll get better.'' Or ''I helped you make it better. I got this guy on it, we'll help you out.'' For Tomas, it's not getting better. In fact, it's just getting worse. Phil and Ellen's movie is incredibly violent, without showing any kind of blood, or guns, or bombs. Just what the remnants are. And that's as powerful as anything I've ever seen. Just one person. Just one soldier. One casualty, of which I think now we have over 25,000. And then they don't get the proper care. When he came to visit in Seattle, Tomas' wheelchair didn't have any brakes. It was a piece of s--- that the government had given him. I watch on the news about how these are great men and patriots fighting for freedom, but then the real story comes out about Walter Reid. The real truth is they're giving 'em jacks---, and there's like billions and billions of dollars that are unaccounted for that have all gone into the hands of wealthy businessmen that are all somehow connected to the administration. The ineptitude is frightening.
So...what are your plans for election season? What are you focused on?
Um, I'm gonna vote. [Laughs] I'd like people to be educated on the voting machines, making sure that our democracy isn't being hijacked by computer technology. There's no reason there can't be a paper trail on those machines. We had Diebold machines when I worked at a gas station in 1989, so big trucking companies could keep track of the gas they used. I know those machines really well. And there's no reason why they can't have a paper trail. And then you have the owner of the company saying in public he'll do whatever he can to deliver the vote to Republicans — people need to be educated on that.
Will there be a Vote for Change-type activity this time around?
Maybe we'll just play Ohio. For a month. Ohio and Florida.
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