Colin the Chameleon

Why, you may ask, have I been saying Colin Powell is a chameleon? It’s because he so perfectly exemplifies what the recent Fugs song, "Chameleon", by Tuli Kupferberg, is about.

From the liner notes to the song (from their "The Fugs Final CD (Part 1)"

"Here’s Tuli’s position paper on the tune: The English clergy are paid by the state as well they should be. The Vicar of Bray was the legendary most famous survivor of that system. He served under Charles II, James II, William III, Queen Anne and George the First. And he of course changed his belief with every succession, to that of his new monarch, which was no more than right. And so he was successively Catholic, Anglican, High Church, Low Church, Establishment, Disestablishment, and then Antidisestablishment … And he was Tory, Whig & Jew … No, that can’t be right … At any rate here is our song dedicated to him and his many disciples timewide/worldwide."

In the winter, I’m a Buddhist
In the summer, I’m a nudist
In Jerusalem Talmudist
In Hell-Fire Club the crudest

Chameleon, chameleon

When Democrats are winning
Liberalities I’m spinning
When Republicans are panting
Racist slogans I am chanting

Chameleon, chameleon

With the Proles digging ditches
With the brokers plotting riches
& with God was quite religious
Here in Hell sunk where hot pitch is

Chameleon, chameleon

BTW, Kupferberg was in his late 70’s when he wrote that. He’s past 80 now. The Fugs, fronted by Ed Sanders and him, were about the first political protest group, emerging out of the Lower East Side in NYC in the early 60’s. They continue to perform and record. Their most recent, the "Fugs Final CD (Part 1)", was recorded in 2003, and is maybe their best ever. They are currently working on "The Fugs Final CD (Heh heh, Part 2)"

From their website:

The right wing of the U.S. would like to create an American Gestapo (i.e., a slightly meaner Patriot Act) and the Fugs are going to do their share to sing and shout in defiance at its right-wing sleazomorphs.
— Ed Sanders, November 2005