Get Your War On II [Paperback]

David Rees (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 7, 2004

Get Your War On is the comic that became a popular sensation for waking America up and being brave enough to make people think--and laugh--in the months following 9/11. Now, David Rees returns to do it once again--just in time for the most anticipated election in years. He's taking on the Bush Doctrine, Operation Iraqi Freedom, the war in Afghanistan, tax cuts, the 2004 campaign--and much, much more!

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Rees began assembling his comic commentary on U.S. politics after 9/11, and since then he's remained faithful to his simple, remarkably powerful style. In each strip, anonymous office workers (portrayed as one-dimensional clip art figures) discuss the day's political events, either over the phone or while sitting around the conference table. Oddly, this combination of expressionless characters and strident commentary makes for some of the most consistent, wickedly funny political cartooning out there today. This collection presents the series of three- and four-panel comics Rees has posted on his Web site (www.mnftiu.cc) at regular intervals since late 2002. The characters ponder the effect of the war in Iraq on Afghanistan's citizens, wondering, "Remember those leftover civilians in that country where we waged our last war a few months ago? Do they realize they're one war away from being completely forgotten?" They contemplate the Patriot Act: "You think once they have Benjamin Franklin's body spinning in his grave fast enough, they'll be able to power an internal combustion engine with it?" And they question the possible reinstatement of Henry Kissinger to the September 11 Commission: "Jesus Christ, are we fucking MOVING BACKWARDS IN TIME???" Rees's work is a comic juggernaut; with a laugh and a groan in every strip, he never misses. Although this relentless skewering could grow stale, Rees's keen understanding of politics and history, and his passion for American freedoms, keeps the work surging forward.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

The clip-art office workers whose bland looks contradict the foulmouthed political sarcasm that threatens to burst their speech-balloons in Rees' originally Web-based comic strips are back. Not that they've been absent since the first Get Your War On (2002); indeed, they've gone places and now appear regularly in Rolling Stone, which may increase the attractiveness of this collection. Meanwhile, of course, the War on Terror and U.S. intervention in Afghanistan morphed into the second Gulf War and U.S. occupation of Iraq, so there has been no end of things for them to talk about. The bloom is rather off their rose, however, and they are starting to sound less like comedy-sketch dialogue and more like a stand-upper's braying rant emanating ventriloquist-like from several different wooden heads. The most memorable sequence here is about the strip's monotonous cursing instead of any aspect of the forever wars; predictably, it ends in petty defiance. Newcomers to Rees' hissy fit will probably laugh harder than veterans at the second helping of it. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Riverhead Trade; First Edition edition (September 7, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594480486
• ISBN-13: 978-1594480485
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #222,293 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

101 of 112 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars a review, hopefully helpful to all, October 28, 2004

By 

Jonah Cohen (Connecticut) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Get Your War On II (Paperback)

You know what I've noticed? At the bottom of every review on Amazon, it asks "Was this review helpful to you?" and lets you click on yes or no. Yet perusual of books on any controversial subject - especially politics - leads me to suspect that people often vote yes/no on "do I agree with the politics of the reviewer?"

I'll try to review GYWO2 in a way that at least will be helpful for anyone, whether you saw "Farrenheit 9/11" or whether you never trust anyone not on Fox News.

This book collects a comic strip, which is entirely 3-panel strips using clip art. Presumably Rees wanted to do a comic but can't draw. The illustrations all show office workers talking, with a few variations, enough to suggest Rees is trying (and partly succeeding) to use the comics medium fully. It also suggests an "everyman perspective" for the material. All of the strips are on politics, almost always foreign policy - as the title suggests, the war on terror is the main focus. Here's a typical one-liner from this collection:

"Will future historians describe Bush's foreign policy as the Grand Theft Auto school of diplomacy?"

If you found that amusing, this looks like the book for you. If you're a conservative who found that to be a pile of crap, then definitely avoid this book, because it is pretty much all scathing criticism of the Bush administration.

A couple other factors that might influence your purchasing decision: this is also not a book for those who feel uncomfortable/offended by lots of swearing. Also of note, the author's royalties go to a charity that clears landmines from Afghanistan and other areas (though you could just contribute to them directly if you like).

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A merciless mockery of post-9/11 America, January 25, 2006

By 

Michael J. Mazza - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Get Your War On II (Paperback)

After completing a tour of duty in Afghanistan, I read David Rees' "Get Your War On" and was not overly impressed; I wrote a decidedly unenthusiastic review of the book. I read that book's follow-up, "Get Your War On II" about two years later, after completing a tour in Iraq. Either Rees' writing has gotten sharper, or I just became more receptive to his work, because I think that GYWO2 is brilliant. This book of cartoons maintains the general format and style of its predecessor, and also follows up on the original's subject matter. The cartoons generally depict a bunch of anonymous white-collar office drones who discuss the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as other topics from early 21st-century headlines.

Rees has crafted a richly ironic volume of political satire that is full of profanity and scathing dialogue. Nobody is safe--along the way his nameless characters mock George Bush, Tony Blair, Halliburton, Fox News, Fidel Castro, Condoleezza Rice, Joe Lieberman, _The New York Times_, Ahmad Chalabi, Tom Daschle, North Korea, Pat Robertson, Ted Koppel, and many other entities. Rees covers many topics: gang rape, abortion, genocide, anthrax mailings, the search for WMDs in Iraq, political saber-rattling over steroid abuse, the 9/11 commission, the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, proposed designs for the new World Trade Center, and more. Adding to the pungent flavor of the book are the characters' many absurd pop culture references--Paris Hilton, 2 Live Crew, _Tiger Beat_, _The Family Circus_, etc. It's all made even funnier by the generally bland appearances of Rees' characters.

Rees is at his best when he is deconstructing and reshaping the jargon and catchphrases of the post-9/11 U.S.: "Axis of Evil," "Coalition of the Willing," "Freedom Fries," and many more. He offers a lacerating meditation on the use of language as a propaganda tool. His characters exchange some harsh and thought-provoking comments on language--I love it when one drone chides another, "Parsed much?" Although most of the characters are his typical anonymous office workers, this book also features "Uzbekikitty," an absurd yet tragic metaphor for U.S. coalition building in the War on Terror. At times Rees also plays with and mocks his own format. Among his routines in the book is a series of biting knock-knock jokes.

Despite the humor of the book, I consider it a serious interrogation of the language, icons, orthodoxies, and pieties of the post-9/11 era. Rees doesn't just slaughter America's sacred cows--he drops a nuclear bomb on them. GYWO2 could serve as a scalding counterbalance to the many inspirational and heroic narratives that have been spun from the Global War on Terror. For a great companion text I recommend "Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq," by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber.

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Funnier than . . ., September 30, 2004

By 

A. C. Fricke "Art Fricke" (Texas) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Get Your War On II (Paperback)

. . . a bagfull of monkeys drafting foreign policy. And the most straightforward political commentary since Tom Paine. On speed. If you have even one cynical bone in your body (you know -- that sense of slightly defeatist but NOT defeat-ED humor that's produced when you actually perceive the breadth of incredible social possibility utterly pulped by realpolitik "reality"), GET THIS BOOK. You will laugh 'till you pee. And you'll register to vote again the very next day. Three times, probably.
Guarantee it.