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The story begins in New York in the year 2011. This is John McCain's recession-riddled America, where gas has edged above 8 dollars a gallon, the best-selling video game is Infidel Massacre: Los Angeles, and, with 10,000 troops in Iraq, the war is still going strong.
The book opens on snot-nosed, trendy twenty-something video-blogger Jimmy Burns as he's filming an anti-corporate rant outside a Starbucks in hip, gentrified Brooklyn. A veritable nobody, he's rocketed to fame when the cafe behind him explodes in a terrorist bombing. From there, he's quickly rushed off to cover the war in Iraq—at this point, most other journalists have already fled the country, fearing for their lives. Only die-hards and fools like Jimmy (and Dan Rather, in a desperate move to resurrect his career) remain to cover the carnage.
Though often grim and heart-wrenching, Shooting War has moments of sharp humor, particularly when Mr. Rather pops into the story to deliver one of his trademark Ratherisms. "Courage, Burns, the frequency is courage!" he advises.
Originally published as a serialized web comic on smithmag.net, Shooting War transitions seamlessly to the printed page. Dan Goldman's art is simply breathtaking, blending photographs with computer art and hand drawings. The resulting collage effect sharpens the story's satirical edge. It's no mistake that brand names and logos of US corporations appear everywhere in the background, or that the charismatic leader of the story's fictional terrorist organization, Sword of Muhammad, looks eerily like Che Guevara.
Moreover, author Anthony Lappe imbues the comic with a certain sense of credibility. And no surprise—an investigative journalist who spent time in Iraq, Lappe produced the award-winning Showtime documentary about the Iraq war, Battleground: 21 Days on the Empire's Edge, and serves as executive producer of the Guerilla News Network.
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this is truly ground breaking. the recession must have been going for at least a couple of years to push oil above $8 a gallon! and 10,000 troops in iraq isnt going strong its absolutely gang busters.