Inside Terry Jones's War on the War on Terror
The former Python takes aim at Bush and Blair -- without losing his sense of humor.
Interviewed By Jeff Fleischer
February 2, 2005
http://www.motherjones.com/news/qa/2005/02/terry_jones.htmlTerry Jones made his name as a member of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, writing and performing some of the most innovative and absurd comedy ever seen on TV.
Beginning in 2001, Jones -- who has also written scholarly books about Chaucer and children's books -- has turned his pen on George Bush and his "war on terror". His new book, Terry Jones’s War on the War on Terror, compiles a series of wickedly satirical columns Jones published in Britain’s The Observer, The Guardian and The Independent during the past three years.
In one column, he takes pointers from Donald Rumsfeld’s approach to information extraction (“The thing is if people don’t say where they’re going after choir practice, this country is at risk. So I have been applying a certain amount of pressure on my son to tell me where he’s going. To begin with I simply put a bag over his head and chained him to a radiator…”)
Another column finds him losing patience with two neighbors he’s convinced are plotting something terrible against him. Because the police require evidence to act, Jones invokes Bush’s doctrine of preemption, “since I’m the only one on the street with a decent range of automatic firearms.” In others, he congratulates American forces for their success in making Osama bin Laden “look haggard,” questions whether a leprechaun or a fairy godmother feeds Tony Blair his strategy, and laments that a “war on an abstract noun” is unwinnable.
Jones recently spoke with MotherJones.com from his home in London.
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