PITRIFF - You're right.

SK - This is divide and rule, the old Roman principle. You divide your people and you rule them. Bush has learned this lesson from his daddy really well.

PITRIFF - (laughs) That's right, and unfortunately, there's too many people in my opinion that feel it's inconvenient to seek truth or seek an alternative, so they just blindly follow what's in the lead, you know?

SK - Yeah, well the setup for this whole thing was definitely a tricky one. I mean, 9-11 completely charged the country emotionally. That really gave Bush the grounds on which to seize even more power and release things like the Patriot Act, cementing himself and his government into the oddest position America ever had, you know?

PITRIFF - Exactly. A damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.

SK - Exactly, and you just wait, you know? He's going to get re-elected and he's going to stay in power, and then the next thing is Iran, and then the mess will be really fucking complete.

PITRIFF - And the only comfort I take through Bush staying for four more years is the music ought to be good, in reaction to him being in power still.

SK - I'm not sure exactly what's going to happen with us, but I don't think I want to live here in this country any longer if...you know... I'm not keen on living in a police state. I'm from Germany, we have our problems, we had our past, and there's actually a very high level of alertness and awareness in Germany about things like dictatorial regimes and stuff like that. I mean, yeah, I love this country, but I don't love it enough to sit through another four years of Bushisms and, you know, this sort of ongoing McCarthyism and the blackballing, that kind of shit.

PITRIFF - You're right. Now I want to switch gears on you a little bit and I want to talk about one of my favorite KMFDM songs, "Sucks." I just love how you rip on yourselves, so what was the inspiration for doing that at the time?

SK - The inspiration was kind of....I was driving my friend from England from my house to the studio, and we were talking about a song that we had just started the night before and what we were going to do with it, and somehow, as we were driving, I started babbling and he started writing down and by the time we reached the studio, it was ready! (laughs)

PITRIFF - (laughs)

SK - Good to go.

PITRIFF - Yeah.

SK - Yeah, it was just like, a take a piss kind of song.

PITRIFF - Right! It was hilarious, man, and it had a good groove to go with it.

SK - Well, you know, back to the writing aspect, often times it is...the first line, you just go like...oh, here's a good opening line for a song, you know, 'I declare war on the world!' and the rest of the lyrical content develops itself just by that one line, so to speak, you just get the drift, and with "Sucks," it was the same thing. 'We like talking dirty, we smoke and we drink' and okay, let's start writing, you know?