John Davis wanted rock ‘n’ roll, but he didn’t want to deal with the hassle. The Superdrag frontman broke up his band in 2003, got religion and issued a pair of solo albums, putting a seemingly tight lid on the legacy of his Knoxville, Tenn., outfit. Apparently, Davis is willing to be bothered again: Superdrag’s original lineup reconvened to record Industry Giants, a new album due March 17.
This week, MAGNET celebrates the return of Superdrag by handing Davis the reins to our website, where he’ll share his favorite music, films, food, literature and more. Read our Q&A with Davis about the comeback here.
Davis: The Project For The New American Century (PNAC) was/is a neocon think tank whose membership and/or Signatories to Statement of Principles have included William Kristol (pictured), Randy Scheunemann, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. Its 90-page September 2000 document Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategies, Forces And Resources For A New Century remains highly controversial, as its “core missions” for the U.S. military included “fight(ing) and decisively win(ning) multiple, simultaneous major-theater wars” in the interests of American global hegemony.
The PNAC had been calling for U.S.-led “regime change” in Iraq as early as 1998, and its 1997 Statement of Principles stressed the importance of “shap(ing) circumstances before crises emerge” and “meet(ing) threats before they become dire.” Maintaining nuclear strategic superiority, performing “constabulary” duties in critical regions around the world, developing and deploying global missile defenses and controlling the “international commons” of space were other key objectives. But there’s one passage in particular that reads less like an article in Soldier Of Fortune and more like a piece of crime-scene evidence: “The process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event—like a new Pearl Harbor.”
Recommended reading: The New Pearl Harbor: Disturbing Questions About The Bush Administration And 9/11 by David Ray Griffin.