Then came ruminations on war ("Scorched Earth"), totalitarianism ("Every Bloody Emperor") and self-destruction versus survival ("Lemmings").
An utterly tragic piece about the intricacies of a country and a family torn apart by war, Scorched tells the story of a brother and sister's quest to uncover the histories of their parents, while consequently discovering the truth about their own origins.
Not until a war-scorched Union flag is draped around Asteria's shoulders, after she has been given in marriage to Andronicus, does it all dull-thud into place: Andronicus is Blair, so Tamerlane must be Bush, which would make the dead Bajazet Saddam Hussein.
Roiled by two decades of war and scorched by a four-year drought, the country is mired in an extended crisis, its rural economy in a shambles and its essential services all but nonexistent.
He is still deservedly revered for his honesty, and for avoiding the civil wars that scorched the region.
The modest exception is the post-war song "Scorched Earth," the one tune that is vaguer and less rooted in specifics than the rest.
Indeed, in a country where state security forces killed tens of thousands of civilians during the war in a scorched-earth campaign aimed at leftist rebels, support for a stronger military represents a stunning reversal of opinion.
As part of a scorched-earth war against Planned Parenthood, Texas wiped out funds for contraceptive services for poor women.
Instead of the Blue vs. the Gray, we have a scorched-earth war between two prescription-drug plans.
The tyrant Mengistu Haile Mariam aggravated the famine by waging a scorched-earth war against local dissidents, and then used the starvation as a pretext to resettle and collectivize the farms at gunpoint, making it even worse.
