Well, it's been a weird week...out on Highway 61

 

I've been quiet lately. Posted some crap at Facebook and Twitter that I found other places and figured either didn't need or deserve my comments. I've been toiling away at a few things, and have no excuse. Of course, between the budget deal and the Ryan Budget and the Obama budget and Libya and Michele Bachmann and Donald Trump and such, there really hasn't been a lot to write about. However, got a few things to at least refer to...

Larry Kirwan is an Irish immmigrant and now citizen who wandered into the Brnonx with a Telecaster, an excellent Irish education from the schools of Eire, a collection of adventures and the attitude that allowed him to form, with friends, Black 47. Unlike a lot of Celtic Rockers, they have a strong reggae influence and have actually got a bit of hip hop in the closet. However, he's in the best of the Irish-Catholic-liberal-working class tradition, and Black 47s political stuff can be as exciting as the best rock stuff, and sometimes they overlap. Anyway, he had the opportunity to speak and play at a Labor Rally commemorating the Triangle Shirt Fire recently, and that led to an excellent discussion of how impossibly hard it is to keep us focused on what's important.

“You don’t say,” says Your Man up in Pearl River. “We didn’t think you were performing at a Sarah Palin Rally!”  I do have to admit that it was a thrill to stand on the same stage where a rather more stellar Republican, Abraham Lincoln, gave one of his greatest speeches. Besides, Sarah is auld hat now. Everyone and their granny knows that Michele Bachman is the new inheritor of Margaret Thatcher’s mantle. (AXE comment.  Thatcher looks like Elizabeth I compared to the US Bachmann-Palin-Coulter Underdrive. However, she stayed too long, and that gave the British Tony Blair and David Cameron. Reagan-Thatcherism, the gift that keeps on giving -- venereal disease.)

Kirwan is well worth reading on this and listening to as well. I dislike a lot of the Black 47 Ballads. That said, I have most of their CDs because they have fantastic up-tempo stuff. The ballads suffer from the Irish "Oh, Danny Boy" syndrome...we can't help it...like Danny Boy, it's a legacy of the British occupation and cultural rape. Like venereal disease. But, he can rise above it --and I think he sums our situation up well here.

All of us, Left, Right and Center, are being manipulated by that top 1%. It’s just that we’re so busy trying to keep our heads above water we don’t have time to stop and think about it.

Consider this! Back in the bellbottom 70’s manufacturing workers were pulling in $15-20 per hour. The recently negotiated UAW contract guarantees new hires $14 per hour. Thirty years of progress!

That great American ineluctable right – or rather assumption – that one can make the middle class is now a mere pipe dream for much of the population.

Many who lost their jobs in the recent financial debacle stand scant chance of regaining their standard of living, for those decent union jobs of 30 years ago have been replaced by low paying service industry positions, if at all. The great factories that I once drove past on Route 80 are now boarded up shells. Buffalo, Toledo, Detroit are graveyard cities, their populations declining by the year.

How did this come about? Well we trusted venal politicians in the pocket of lobbyists employed by the top1% oligarchy. Meanwhile, we allowed ourselves to be divided by a media more interested in selling ads than seeking the truth; and the sad part is - nothing has changed.

There is a great moment in the Scorses film about Dylan where Joan Baez says that after 40 years, she doesn't expect Dylan to show up at any "movement" function. He isn't about that stuff anymore. Hasn't been for over 40 years. Probably wasn't then -- she advises people to get over it, and appreciate him for what he is. Although he'd probably blanche at the comparison, for the AXE, Dylan is Kierkegaard in Leather, with a Telecaster swung over his shoulder and an XM radio. He doesn't really show up, he just is there sometimes. In the first Farm Aid concert, there was a moment when he was playing with his band, and he glanced up and saw Willy Nelson jamming away -- he was taken aback, and Nelson shrugged and grinned. That's the way to appreciate Dylan -- he goes where he goes and does what he wishes. And then he does a tour in China and Vietnam, and it's seen as a betrayal?  

I've expressed my love and contained lust for Maureen Dowd in this space for years. However, she can get very irritating. Her attitude toward the Dylan show and it's set list shows a number of things, including that she isn't really a Dylan fan. There is nothing in the Dylan songbook from the protest period that would be controversial in the Chinese Communist Party mind. Hell, they could start chanting Mao, Mao, Mao and waive their Little Red Books in adulation of the old fat bastard and be right in sync... There is nothing universal about Master's of War or Hurricane -- they're American songs about America. When a poltical song becomes specific, it loses it's universality. So, the Chinese apparachniks could actually have felt at home with With God on Her Side...because it's about the problems of American aggression, based on a tune stolen from Dominic Behan called the Patriot Game. And, Blowing in the Wind isn't all that optimistic and positive..."The answer my friend is blowing in the wind, the answer is blowing in the wind."I think Jerry Jeff Walker put it well in it's proper place in the American songbook when he sang "The answer my friend isn't pissin' in the wind, the answer is pissin' in the sink..."

The stuff that Dylan got to sing was a helluva lot more subversive than the stuff Dulcinea Dowd wanted him to play, and she has the balance to quote people who point out that Dylan is not the guy with the old Martin guitar and workshirt anymore. Anyway, here's the setlist. If "A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" isn't subversive enough, as another commentator put it, Highway 61 really speaks to the Chinese...meaningless slaughter just because sure sounds like Mao; exploitation for the manufacture and sale of crap; and, of course, war and militarism. From another point of view, the most subversive song Dylan ever wrote, the one that changed popular culture, music and the way a lot of people thought was the first encore...Like a Rolling Stone. Maureen probably doesn't really get Dylan. Remember, we're roughly contemporaries, and I'm sure she was into Judy Collins, Joni Mitchell, the Beatles and Laura Nyro over at Catholic University. Hell, I could picture her feeling daring drinking a 3.2 beer and singing along to "Danny Boy" on St Patrick's Day. Or that fucking Unicorn thing...

Then there's the dueling budget issues. I wish Obama wouldn't be so damn subtle...his speech that got Boehner and Ryan and Fox News all upset about his tone was what we need to hear him say about most stuff, and needed to have him say during the whole first two years. Hey, collegiality is nice, but calling bullshit and backing the call with facts is critical to the survival of the any Civil Society. And, the Ryan plan is bullshit. The delays in changing programs are sops to a special interest group -- old bastards. Like me. My wife. My sister. Our friends...to paraphrase the President when the mic was left on -- do we really think that was an accident -- do they think we're stupid? Well, yeah, they do. And, in general, we've justified that...the Tea Party consists of ignorant old farts who are confused about the government role in things like Medicare and Social Security, funded by people who'd just as soon go to a world run like the unpublished and lost fouth volume of Ayn Rand's Atlas saga,  Atlas Jacked Off a Mongrel Dog and Swallowed the Cum, where poor people were taken to rendering plants when they're dying for dog food and the human version of whale oil. The Republicans have encouraged not only the plutocrats, but the goddamn loonies to excess...People like Barbara Boxer, Anthony Weiner, Barney Frank and the branding iron-toting governor of Montana are peforming a great service by being vocal and direct, but the Bully Pulpit belongs to the President. As long as he's trying to be vague, collegial and inspirational, the Fox News gang is able to be crazy...and asshats like that clown from Texas who's had a career now ranting at people about how much he hates the American Flag from the steps of the capital in Austin need to be answered. I'm actually amazed that nobody has pistol whipped the clown and his compatriots yet. Where the fuck are Walker, Alex and Trevette when you need them? Or, Tom FUCKING Landry?

You know what I'd like to hear? Someone like Jim Clyburn of South Carolina or maybe Eugene Robinson say what they're really thinking, and what most of us are feeling. Every time somebody says Obama and birth certificate and Kenya what we hear is "Nigger." That's really what it is...why are we kidding ourselves. Everytime someone claims that all Muslims are evil, what we hear is "Nigger..." Everytime someone talks about Eastern Elites, what we're really hearing is "Kike..." Abortion complaints, unintended to be factual statements about Planned Parenthood, and similar nonsense about Gays -- all should be understood in one simple way -- "Eine Partie, eine Stadt, eine Volk! Seig Heil..." Look, the Celts in this country have been there -- NO IRISH NEED APPLY and No-Nothingism is as American as toxic waste and as corrosive. We just forget, a lot. We need to remember, say what we're thinking, stop being silly and get focused and stay goddamn focused.

If you're not rich, you need to get your ass to the polls and vote Democratic. If you're a soldier, sailor or Marine, you need to get your ass to the polls and vote Democratic. If you're a woman, you're gay, you're in a minority, have a job, have children, have parents, want the roads to work, the sewers to work, the power lines to work, the food to be edible, people to have jobs, people not to lose their homes and on and on and on and on...you need to get to the polls and vote Democratic.

If you're a Democratic lawmaker, you need to pass laws that are punitive to those who hurt the nation. We don't need a goddamn Flag-Burning Amendment. We need an Amendment to the Constitution stripping corporations of the legal fiction of them being people. If a kid selling or possessing a rock of crack cocaine can get 10 years to life, a bank executive who led his company on a spree of fraud, deceptive and predatory lending, and the destruction of lives and hopes and jobs and aspirations needs to do 10 years to life. Mandatory sentencing for white collar crime...similar to that for drug possession. I wonder how many years Countrywide Executives would be looking at ...

Comments

[sglover]

Greetings from Athens! You know I'm nodding along with everything you say*, but I just can't give the Donk another vote. Sure, they're not sadistic and batshit crazy, but they are every bit as bought as their supposed opposition. By now, after two years of Barry, gutlessness and stupidity no longer suffice to explain the shit they've pulled. I loathe them MORE than Republicans, for the same reason you've probably heard -- at least the GOP is more or less honest about how and to whom they're going to give the shaft.

Athens is nice. But if you haven't visited Istanbul, do it. It is the center of the world.....

* Except for the Dowd bit. I could see fucking her, but otherwise, how can you stand her?

[Crusader AXE]

Again, it's the choice between having rice and a bowl, or no rice and no bowl. There are some good to great Democrats fighting this nonsense, and then there are the Republicans. God help us. Well, Tiffany help us, remembering that God is not all that helpful.I prefer inept to sadistic, stupid and batshit crazy. What really bugs me is that they can't even do math...yet claim fiscal responsibility and freedom. Palin world is Rand world...which actually is attractive, since Ayn Rand couldn't have spent five minutes in a room with Palin and Bachmann and the rest of that crowd.

At times, mainly past, I find Dulcinea worth the love; at other times, like the Knight of the Mournful Countenance when he saw his Dulcinea, I feel compelled to decide she's been bewitched. She needs to be put on a strict diet of no more than 1 or 2 puns per month. She was so much better with the Bushes and Clintons...

Anyway, I find the site of begging families in this country repulsive and disgusting. The Democrats will do what they can to minimize this with things that might work. The Republicans, who claim Christianity and largely advocate a fundamentalist approach to that faith, have somehow managed to forget the beatitudes and consider abject and hopeless poverty a sign of survival of the fittest and inevitable in terms of human evolution.

As Mike Cooley says, fuck that acoustic shit, I can only be a rock star for so long...

[Brian M]

But the problem, Axe, is the Democrats are not giving us any bowls either. Instead, they are giving our bowls to a slightly different set of corporations than the repubs. And, I'm not even sure insurance industry leeches are morally superior to oil industry goons. At least the oil industry goons are producing a useful product or something.

[Crusader AXE]

The problem of the incremental versus revolutionary gain. Problem with revolutionary gains is that they tend to be chimeras. Problem with things like the healthcare thing -- the gift to the insurance companies -- is that they are too damn incremental in some cases, and don't make a lot of sense objectively. Nothing about health insurance makes sense -- there's a reason that the rest of the industrial and modern world have moved on. And, I admit that they settled for a half a loaf. Better than no loaf, and might make people eventually decide to go after the whole loaf -- Single Payer -- but in the meantime, an improvement. Marcus Aurelius wrote in his Meditations something to the effect that when everything is incredibly fucked up, even a slight improvement can be a major accomplishment. On the other hand, if the problem is swamp drainage, alligator control may be less of an issue than you think, at least for someone outside of the swamp. And, of course, if you're being chomped by the alligator, long term solutions can be mainly long and no solution.

But, my argument is not that the Democrats are great. My argument is that they're better. And, I do not believe that letting the loonie, vicious, stupid and sadistic triumph is a really good solution. In fact, I think that it's exactly what evil needs to triumph. I quote Yeats a lot from the Widening Gyre -- "The best lack all direction; the worst are filled with passionate intent." Well, we need to direct ourselves toward stopping the worst while encouraging the best. I do have some hope with people like Anthony Wiener and Kristin Gillibrand and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz starting to take more and more leadership roles as we move ahead.

The best argument for not electing Republicans to anything is Clarence Thomas. He was a dumb motherfucker in college, and has remained one. However, in college he had some ethical gravitas and some integrity. Obviously, that leached away long ago. However, we'll have a couple of opportunities in the near future and the option is between more Alitoes or perhaps more Ruth Bader Ginsbergs. I know my preference.

[Brian M]

I don't know. The best argument for being skeptical about electing Dems is the INCREASE in drone strikes in Afghanistan.

[Crusader AXE]

This is just one fucked up war. Clarence has been fucking things up on the court for 20 years. The Afghans aren't ever going to love us. I still believe the best solution there is a wall around the entire fucking country and air drops at random of munitions and weapons so the bastards can all kill each other. The Russian Army tends to agree; in fact, I think I got the idea originally from one of those Russian soldier ballads. Unfortunately, I can't find it anywhere in my stuff.

The wars are just diversions. I'm not an isolationist, but we are so fucked here at home that I strongly believe we need to focus our energies on un-screwing THIS GOVERNMENT, THIS ECONOMY, and THIS CULTURE. Then we can help the rest of the world and actually do it. I wonder if WWII had not followed the Great Depression, if the US would have had the sense to do the Marshall Plan? Greatest success in US foreign policy and many of the Republicans then who seem to bear a striking resemblance to the current crop opposed it. Wisdom comes from hard experience.

[oldfatherwilliam]

I believe you are absolutely right abt the court, IMO the worst effect Republicans have when in office is to place thugs and moral neanderthals above us all. Obama deserves support if for no other reason. And thanks for all the music vids-- I'd do the 60's again, naivete and all, for that feeling of being on the wave and pointed right.

[Crusader AXE]

The music is what I think of to illustrate a point and, much as I might hate to admit it, I am just a prisoner of rock and roll and country and soul. Actually, I don't hate to admit it. I'm proud of that shit. Occasionally I find stuff that I really like that's more current, and I use that as well.

Unintended consequences. Had the Dems blocked Clarence Thomas who was definitely a "fuck you" nomination, would Dubya have been president? Probably not. Alito really looks like a long-term disaster. And yeah, we need Obama and a solid Dem majority at least until Scalia, Kennedy and Ginsberg go their own ways as well as any other liberals who might choose to, I don't know, die or quit or go clinically and demonstrably insane. Liberal is the wrong word, I guess...people who understand people and care about the country and the law and the future. Well, if the word fits...