This space is dedicated to the proposition that we need to know the history of the struggles on the left and of earlier progressive movements here and world-wide. If we can learn from the mistakes made in the past (as well as what went right) we can move forward in the future to create a more just and equitable society. We will be reviewing books, CDs, and movies we believe everyone needs to read, hear and look at as well as making commentary from time to time. Greg Green, site manager
The Art Of The Defeated-“Inventur-Art
In Germany-1943-1955 At The Harvard Art Museums-A Comment
By Lenny Lynch
Of course I am way too
young at thirty-five to have been affected by even the tremors of the post-World
War II happenings in Western culture like a number of my older writer
co-workers were in what in America was the “golden age” of lots of things. In
talking to Sam Lowell, now a retired by still feisty former film editor here
and Frank Jackman who still writes little sketches here as well about this art
exhibit at the Harvard Art Museums which features the work of many German
artists in various media they were quite surprised about how many of those
artists dealt with struggling as a defeated nation. Strangely this included
artists who were well-known anti-Nazi and anti-fascist who either had been in exile
(those who could get out before the curtain came down and they were stuck), had
been Jewish and yet had survived the camps somehow or had been stuck in Germany
and worked their creative skills as best they could. Included too a catalogue of
artists who showed up in the infamous “Degenerate Art” exhibits of the late 1930s
in Germany.
Two things stuck out that
I carried with me from the exhibit. In the art world, the serious part, sometimes
necessity is the mother of invention. A defeated nation, heavily bombed by
Allied warplanes, huge destruction of infrastructure, hobbling along on American
rations and black markets nevertheless provided room for artists to come up with
new ways of creating art from other than traditional material like oils and
canvass. Shingles, scrape metal, house paints and the like let these folks create
some new ways of making art. The other thing that stuff out was that even in
defeat and isolation many of these artists were aware of, took part in, and expanded
the new theories in art in their work from expressionism to abstraction and colorism.
Minimalism in sculpture. Interesting exhibit if you are in Cambridge sometime soon.
The Clarinet Is Not The Only Instrument That Goes Rooty-Toot-Toot-With Myna Loy And William Powell’s “The Song Of The Thin Man” Based On The Dashiell Hammett Characters In Mind
DVD Review
By Bruce Conan
The Song Of The Thin Man, starring Myrna Loy, William Powell, Keenan Wynn, based on the characters Nick and Nora Charles created by Dashiell Hammett in the crime novel The Thin Man,
The general reader is probably not familiar with the name of the reviewer, Bruce Conan, in this publication because unfortunately it is an alias as has been a previous one used by the same person, Danny Moriarty. The reason that I have had to use these pseudonyms is to protect myself and my family, mostly my family as it turns out, against the wrath and vengeance of a nefarious criminal enterprise based out of London but apparently with tentacles internationally called the Baker Street Irregulars. This nasty band of cutthroats, pimps, con men, whores, bandits, petty thieves and murderers was formed in the distant past to venerate one Lanny Lamont, real name Lanny Lamont after exhaustive investigation, aka Basil Rathbone, aka Sherlock Holmes and who knows how many other names. They are said to practice blood rituals, have serious drug addiction problems just like their so-called deductive reasoning guru Lanny, and to be responsible for half the robberies and unsolved murders in London town over the last few decades.
One might wonder why a notorious gang of dangerous felons and there hangers-on and wannbes would be harassing and threatening murder and mayhem toward a placid film reviewer and his precious family across a big ocean in America. Fair question. And the fair answer is that I have been on a steady, unswerving recent campaign to unmask their idol, their homeboy Lanny as a fraud and a two bit amateur parlor pink fairy tale detective. (I refuse to call him their preferred name of Sherlock and that has even further inflamed them although they know as well as I do that is his real name and that he was brought up in the slums of West London despite all that fake highbrow pronunciation and blather talk he carried on with when he was alive.) Worse, worse in their collective books I “outed” him and his paramour Doc Watson as a pair of diddling agents of the Homintern, closet homosexuals in a day when detectives with that predilection were not allowed into the profession under penalty of expulsion (now they can be same-sex married for all anybody cares including me) and longtime devotees of the utterly corrupt and venal Kit Kat Club where all those with frankly weird sexual proclivities ply their wares.
With that burdensome background in mind I begged our current site manager Greg Green to let me do a review of the epitome of a real detective from that same cinematic time period who did not have Lanny’s nasty and counter-productive habits (really perverted habits but I am being kind). A guy who could figure two and two makes four while lapping up some high shelf booze and running his eyes suggestively up and down every stray dame he saw, and some not so stray. Of course that is our beloved Nick Charles and his lovely wife Nora along with that irrepressible mutt Asta in one of the series of films that William Powell and Myra Loy did together to light up the private detection firmament back in the day. Wrap up a case so it stays wrapped without help from incompetent coppers who would rather sit around with coffee and crullers. Not as Lanny always did hand the messy details over to the “on the take” boys at Scotland Yard.
Take the Tommy Drake case as featured in the film under review The Song of the Thin Man. Nick was smooth as silk on that one, a be-bop daddy who took down the tooting town in the edge of the cool jazz age when the Duke and Count roamed the cities bopping the bop. Yeah, no question half the world, the male world, the gambling world had reason to do Tommy boy in no matter that he was the cat’s meow fronting for the band in the cream of big band era time. He was going to blow the gambling boat scene run by Phil Brant, you remember him the famous jazz aficionado who showcased a lot of new talent like Fran Page, Peggy Davis, Cindy Lowe and a host of other young torch-singers, the customers drank up his overpriced liquor and lost their shirts at the gaming tables when he had his latest gig for the big time provided by a big band jazz promoter, Mitchell Talbin. Yes, that Talbin who had all of New York café society crying jeepers-creeper for Charlie, Dizzy, the Monk and who saw in Tommy some of that glitter and gold-solid, man, solid.
This is where it all falls apart for dear Tommy though. He is in hock up to his ears to a gambler for 12 K, big money then. Tommy puts the bite on that Talbin for an advance to pay off the debt and leave for greener pastures. No soap (no soap for a reason though not the one given by Talbin about chancy band acts and maybe it will snow in July). In any case Tommy winds up dead, very dead trying to jimmy the safe of his current boss Brant. Brant and his society bride married on the fly down in nowhere Atlantic show up at Nick and Nora’s the next morning looking for help.Tommy death had Brant’s frame all over it. He is going down, going down for the big step off, the juice if the truth be known if Nick can’t save the day.
After a few drinks, couple of dances with Nora and a swift few look sat the belles on the side just to keep thinks interesting he cracks the case wide open one night when Brant’s gambling ship reopens for business. (In one of the great cinematic private eye moves ever recorded Nick by sleight of hand is able to get a key clue, a piece of music with exonerating information for Brant right over in front of the town coppers who also are happy with coffee and crullers just like their Scotland Yard brethren. Sherlock would still be sitting in that rundown rooming house apartment he and Doc shared sucking on the old opium pipe wondering what to do next. Brant and his lovely bride that high society dame, the guy who Tommy owed the gambling debt to and his wife decked out in diamonds and that Talmin and his wife all prance in for the turkey shoot.
You know Brant and his bride are off the hook since they went looking for Nick and Nora’s help. So it settles on the gambling guru and the jazz promoter. What if I tell you that dear sweet Tommy beside that gambling jones was sex-addled, was a skirt-chaser without limits on who he might get his claws into. Yeah Tommy would be too bright a boy to fool with a mobster’s wife, no percentage there. But a holy goof jazz aficionado no problem. So jealous jazz man Talmin bonked the now departed jazz band leader after his wife and Tommy’s lover covered Tommy’s gambling debt. In response after the jazz agent man confessed in open dance hall that he did the deed out of jealousy his dear wife plugged him rooty-toot-toot. Nice clean job for Nick and time for booze and bedtime. Touche Lanny.
Yet Again On Bond, James Bond-Will The Real 007 Please Stand Up- Daniel Craig’s “Spectre” (2015)-A Film Review
By Seth Garth
Spectre, starring Daniel Craig, Lea Seydoux, Christoph Waltz, 2015
Sometimes you just can’t win, just can make a simple statement without starting a civil war, a verbal civil war any way. Even in a seemingly placid profession like film criticism, hell, maybe this profession is worse than the academy when it comes to “turf wars.” The average reader is probably not aware of the cutthroat nature of the business, the dog eat dog aspect as each film critic tries to outdo the other either with superlatives or catcalls. It was better in the old days believe me when everybody just took whatever copy, press releases they called them, what a joke, the studios sent out and you just rewrote the thing with maybe a few asides. Jesus you didn’t even have to watch the damn things which from reading the press releases half the time you didn’t want to do anyway.
Then Pauline Kael, no, well her and her highbrow pieces and the notion in the film schools that film criticism, cinematic studies is the usual ploy, was the way to fill classrooms for those who were clueless about what to do in the industry but were hungry to learn something about film. You wouldn’t want any one of these kids to get within fifty miles of a camera much less a movie studio but a few witty comments wouldn’t hurt anything since nobody read that stuff anyway-film attendance was all word of mouth among neighbors. Then somehow people started taking them seriously since they were from the academy just like they started taking weathermen seriously once they had Doctor or something behind their name.
Sorry for going off but I had to get that off my chest because frankly I didn’t really want to review this film, this can you believe it 24th Jimmy Bond film starring Danny Craig in the 007 role in Spectre. This is where two bad situations occurred, converged, a couple of fellow film critics and a drummed up from fluff “controversy” over who is the real Bond, James Bond. Like my old friend and mentor Sam Lowell, who has probably written about a billion film reviews, said every time something came up from nowhere and hit him in the face-WTF. This one started out innocently enough when I reviewed Timmy Dalton’s The Living Daylights a film I did want to review and mentioned in passing the “controversy” between older film critic Phil Larkin and younger critic Will Bradley.
The controversy was over whether the original 007 ruggedly handsome Sean Connery or pretty boy Pierce Brosnan represented the real James. They have scourged each other in several reviews going back and forth like two wombats some of the stuff thrown pretty funny. My mistake? I happened in one doomed sentence to mention that while I took no sides in the “controversy” between them that those two contestants were the only real contenders.
That simple unembellished declarative sentence set off a fire-storm if you can believe that. Phil used that first part about Sean Connery being ruggedly handsome to mean that he had been entirely correct when championing Sean as the epitome of 1950s and 1960s manhood when eye candy was for loving and leaving after a little bout in the silky sheets (implied then not shown), when brute force was as likely to defeat the bad guys as some techno-gadget dreamed by Q’s crew and when craft and guile were at a premium. Will took the later part of the sentence about the “pretty boy” to mean that Pierce used his charm and good clean looks to do in the bad guys and that part of that was to take full advantage of the techno-world possibilities afforded by Q’s brain works to foil the bad guys. Worse of all both parties, seeking their respective real goals to tarnish my reputation and tout their own, taunted me for being wishy-washy when I took a hands-off approach to their silly dispute. Yeah, WTF. In any case I had to take this foolish assignment just to have a place where I could expose these holy goofs for what they are-holy goofs.
So to the film. I won’t even dream of trying to place Danny Craig in whatever position he deserves in the Bond-ian pantheon and just give a summary. Although except for the names of the bad guys and who plays the eye candy all of which could have been photocopied from a film review of the first cinematic Bond film Doctor No. (I will say that the role of eye candy had gotten better with time giving the young women a more professional role as here with Lea Seydoux as a psychiatrist and more decisive part in doing in the bad guys). This time Spectre is back in the total coverage intelligence racket with a front guy who is a high ranking member of MI6 called “C” by Bond looking for the main chance to use the new technology to gain power and profit. The go round this time involves the leader of Spectre Blofeld, played by Christoph Waltz who turned out to have been the kid whose father raised Bond after he had been orphaned. So a scorched earth quasi-sibling rivalry.
Going through a million escapades Jimmy and that talented shrink fold the bad guys’ plans without much difficulty even though their fire-power was vastly greater than Jimmy’s. Nice cars, nice gal, nice finish where Jimmy walks away rather than waste the bad guy Blofeld although “C” got blasted to kingdom come when Jimmy decided to blow the joint up. Ho-hum this one is for the holy goofs in the film critic business to dissect.
Films To Class Struggle By-"Incident At Ogala: The Leonard Peltier Story"- Leonard Peltier Must Not Die In Jail
Recently I have begun to post entries under the headline- “Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By”-that will include progressive and labor-oriented songs that might be of general interest to the radical public. I have decided to do the same for some films that may perk that same interest under the title in this entry’s headline. In the future I expect to do the same for books under a similar heading.-Markin
DVD Review Incident At Ogala: The Leonard Peltier Story, Leonard Peltier, various leaders of the American Indian Movement (AIM), defense attorneys, prosecuting attorneys, witnesses and by-standers, directed by Michael Apted, 1991
Let’s start this review of this documentary of the incidents surrounding the case of Leonard Peltier at the end. Or at least the end of this documentary, 1991. Leonard Peltier, a well-known leader of the Native American movement, convicted of the 1975 murder, execution-style, of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota after he had been extradited from Canada in the wake of the acquittal of two other Pine Ridge residents. In an interview from federal prison in that period the then still relatively young Peltier related that after receiving his life sentences and being told by prison officials that that meant his release date would be in 2035 he stated that he hoped not, for he would then be an old, old man. Here is what should make everyone interested in the case, and everyone interested in the least sense of justice, even just bourgeois justice, blood boil, he is now an old sick man and he is still in jail for a crime that he did not commit, and certainly one that was not proven beyond that cherished “reasonable doubt”
This documentary, narrated by Robert Redford in his younger days as well, goes step by step through the case from the pre-murder period when Native Americans, catching the political consciousness crest begun in the 1960s by the black civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam war movement, started organizing, mainly through the American Indian Movement (AIM), on the Indian reservations of the West, some of the most impoverished areas in all the Americas. The focal point of this militant organizing effort came in the war zone-showdown, the siege at Wounded Knee in 1973. The tension that hovered in the air in the aftermath of that war between the American government and its Indian agent supporters on one side, and the AIM-led “warrior nation” on the other is the setting for this incident at Ogala.
Through reenactment of the crime scene; eye witnesses, interested and disinterested, voluntary or coerced; defense strategies at both trials from self-defense to lack of physical evidence, and on appeal; the prosecution's case, its insufficient evidence, and it various maneuvers to inflame white juries against unpopular or misunderstood Native Americans in order to get someone convicted for the murders of one of their own; the devastating, but expected effect of the trials on the political organizing by AIM; and the stalwart and defiant demeanor of one Leonard Peltier all come though in this presentation. As a long time supporter of organizations that defend class-war prisoners, like Leonard Peltier, this film only makes that commitment even firmer. With that in mind- Free Leonard Peltier-He Must Not Die In Jail!
It’s A Natural Born Thing- With Bluesman Taj Mahal In Mind-For Laura
From The Pen Of Bart Webber
Sam Lowell and his long-time companion, Laura Perkins, had something of a standing question between them concerning seeing musical performers these days whom they had originally seen and admired in their younger days, those who were still alive if aging, and who were still putting on performances in public. The question: did, or did not, the performer have anything left from the old days or were they, the performers, and this was not an abstract question after seeing the painful decline of some artists which even kindness could not save, banking on nostalgic post-World War II baby-boomers now also having lost a step or two ignoring reality and give them a pass for old time sake. Worse losing all critical judgment and calling for encores.
That particular question had had taken on more urgency as the years have gone by since the number of performers from back in the day, from back in the 1950s classic age of rock and roll where only a few like Jerry Lee and a very wobbly Chuck Berry are still standing, from the folk minute of the 1960s where stalwarts like Dylan, Baez Rush and Paxton still play but that list is getting shorter by the year, from the seemingly eternal blues filled days where Muddy/Howlin’ Wolf/Mississippi John/James Cotton/Koko Taylor/Etta James and almost all the old names known through flipping through the bins at Cheapo’s in Central Square, Cambridge have passed on, whose music had bailed Sam out of more than one funk. Yeah, many had hung up their instruments or had passed to the great beyond had been mounting with alarming frequency as Sam and Laura have reached old age themselves, oops, matured.
The passing from the scene, and that nagging question about who did or did not have it now, was no small thing to the music crazed pair so Sam and Laura had over the previous several years been attentive when any of the venues they frequented had booked old time rock, folk or blues performers (the latter like with the still active James Montgomery who still had it mostly those who had sat at the feet of the 1960s legends like Muddy Waters, Howling’ Wolf, James Cotten). Every time they did go to concert they would make the same comment, and would reflect as well on previous concerts to give a roll call of who or who did not make the cut. Sam insisted this analysis was no academic matter as recent concerts have attested to (although members of the academy, budding members itching to write that big definitive dissertation about the important message about teen angst and alienation in Jerry Lee’s High School Confidential, which lady friend Dylan wrote Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowland for, and the truth of whether the blues “ain’t nothing but a good woman on your mind” that knocked the known world on its head with insightful nuggets about such speculation are probably even as I write running through the possibilities).
Take, for example, what for Sam and Laura is the classic case of Bob Dylan and his seemingly endless tour (and now endless production of bootleg material placed in appropriately numbered CD containers, some very good, others which should have been left on the editing floor), the man, no matter what number of tours he feels he has to perform each year can no longer sing, no way. He gets a thumbs down on this question, no question, although only a fool would throw away their treasure trove of Dylania from the golden days from about 1960 to a little after 1970 since that is what will have to sustain us all in the slow nights ahead. Same thing was true several years ago about the late Etta James who had stolen the show at the Newport Folk Festival in the mid-1990s (from none other than the headliner Chuck Berry who was ancient even then) but who when last seen was something of an embarrassment. Another thumbs down. Going the other way recent concerts by a couple of members of the old Jim Kweskin Jug Band, Jim Kweskin and Geoff Muldaur, at Club Passim in Cambridge (the former Club 47 of blessed folk minute memory where Sam fled to when times were tough at home in high school and he needed that spot to survive his teen-hood or when without dough the Hayes-Bickford in Harvard Square to keep him going) showed that they both had increased their knowledge and respect for the American songbook and that they still had it (a concert a few years ago, also in Cambridge, by another member of that jug band, Maria Muldaur, solo, and later when the three united for a 50th anniversary of the band reunion showed she still had it as well). As did a concert a few years ago by the late Jesse Winchester.
Sam and Laura had jumped at the opportunity to see deep-voiced, kick ass bluesman Taj Mahal who was making one of his now less frequent stage appearances at the Rockport Music Hall up in that North Shore town by the Atlantic about forty miles from Boston, on the Sunday of the Patriot’s Day weekend (that Patriot’s Day, a Massachusetts state holiday of sorts, commemorating the time a bunch of determined American farmers and small tradesmen, many of whose forbears had been kicked out of Mother England under threat of the gallows, gave old John Bull all the hell he wanted out in Concord and Lexington). On the afternoon of the concert as they were riding up the highway Sam kept thinking to himself the eternal question of whether old Taj still had the old magic that he had shown over a decade before when they had last seen him in Somerville where he had brought the house down. He mentioned that concern to Laura who added, having been through all the concert wars of the last decade or so with Sam and had observed the fit and halt going about their business, she hoped he was not too frail to hold the instruments. Of course once they got on the subject of who did and who did not still have it they had to run through the litany as well as acts that they hoped to see before the performers faded from view. That “game” got them through the hour’s ride as they hit the long one lane road into Rockport and the concert hall.
Sam had wondered since this concert had been scheduled as a late afternoon concert (something that both he and Laura were happy about since as they joked would not interrupt their normal bedtimes like most concerts, maybe not interrupt Taj’s sleep schedule either) whether the Shalin Liu Performance Center (the official name for the concert hall opened in an old converted and expanded storefront building in 2010) would have the ocean view windows in back of the stage open or closed. They had been to this venue a couple of times before so they knew that it was at the artist’s discretion whether that was done although with Sam’s personal maniacal love of the ocean he hoped that it would be open to give an appealing backdrop to the music inside (Laura, generally indifferent to the ocean’s allure being a farm-bred woman, had no opinion on the matter). As they entered the hall Sam noticed that the curtains were closed but since he and Laura had taken a short walk along a nearby beach before the show began he was not that bothered by the situation. (Later, as they were driving home, he laughed to himself that he was so transfixed by the performance that he hardly noticed the curtains were closed. Laughed too that old Taj had probably had the damn things closed because he intended some serious business not to be distracted by some silly ocean waves crashing tepidly to shore that day.)
This Shalin Liu hall has many virtues beside the ocean view, small (about 300 seats), good views from all around, very good acoustics and lighting, and seats on the second floor that overlook the stage. For this concert Sam and Laura were seated in that overlook area and the first thing Sam noticed after sitting down was the bright shiny National Steel guitar, shades of old preacher/devil man Son House and his flailing away on Death Letter Blues and Bukka White, sweat pouring from every pore be-bopping away on Aberdeen, Mississippi Blues and Panama, Limited. He also noticed a slide guitar but did not remember that Taj played the slide as he racked his brain to try to remember any Taj songs he knew that included the slide. Noticed to that there was a banjo, piano, a couple of non-descript guitars, and a ukulele. Taj had come, armed and dangerous, a good sign.
As the lights dimmed and the crowd hushed for the performance to start out came Taj, along with his drummer and lead guitarist, looking for all the world like the ghost of every bluesman than anybody could imagine coming out of Highway 61 in the Delta ready to make his bargain with the devil in order to be able to hit that high white note once in a while, anybody who took his or her blues seriously. A big burly man (looking back at photographs from old albums at home later on the Internet Sam noticed that Taj, like a lot of us, had moved from the slender side to more robust as he aged), soft felt hat like a lot of Chicago blues guys wore, indoors or out, a big old blue flowered shirt and dangling from one ear the now obligatory pierced earring. Sam closed his eyes thinking about guys that had that same look, no, the ghost of guys now, guys like Little Walter, Magic, Slim, James Cotten, Sunnyland Slim, Big Joe Williams, legends all and maybe Taj by his appearance was putting in his application to join the guys.
And for the next almost two hours without the usual intermission to disturb the flow of the music Taj made good on two things, yeah, as you probably already figured, the brother still had it, and, yes, he was making serious application to the pantheon, move over guys. Right out of the block came the National Steel and Sam whispered to Laura that this was going to be serious stuff as he covered Henry Thomas’ classic Fishing Blues, Good Morning Miss Brown, Corina, Going Up To The Country and Paint My Mailbox Blue, and John Henry. Later Taj worked on the piano, the uke, the non-descript guitars, and the banjo before coming back to the encore with the National Steel on his signature Lovin’ In My Baby’s Arms. The treat for Sam though was when Taj strapped that big old slide guitar on and covered the legendary slide guitar man Elmore James’s Television Mama. Whoa!
But the songs were just filler really once it was clear from the very first song that Taj was on fire that late afternoon, once he knew that they were going to take the ticket, and take ride. It was more the mood that Taj put Sam in, put him into that swaying, foot-tapping, finger-snapping feeling when he and the music mesh and the outside world for that duration fades. The mood too that hit Laura as he would watch her, a very prim lady most of the time, swaying dreamily with the beat, tapping the bannister in front of her, tapping those feet just like him. Oh, very heaven.
Later as they walked down the stairs after the performance was over the both automatically stated the obvious in their understated way-“yeah, old Taj still has it.” Case closed. Oh well, almost closed because as they were driving back to Boston Sam mentioned that that concert was one of the top ten they had ever seen. Laura agreed.
It Does Not Mean A Thing If You Ain’t Got That Swing-With Swing-Master Benny Goodman In Mind
By Zack James
“Jesus, now that you mentioned Mr. Lawrence, our seventh grade music teacher, I am starting to remember some other stuff about the guy, about what a creep he was trying to break us from our unbreakable bond with rock and roll,” Seth Garth said to Jack Callahan as they both hoisted their third, or was it fourth, double scotch with water chaser, an old habit for both of them since the chaser made the drink last longer in the old days when they were short of dough and were sipping their drinks to stretch out the evening. The gist of what Seth had told Jack was in response to Jack’s remembering the very first time that they had heard Woody Guthrie and what song they had learned first. That gist of talk was based on Seth, an old time folk music critic, mainly for The Eye out on the West Coast having recently seen in a folk magazine the announcement that the Smithsonian /Folkway operation was finally putting out a treasure trove in four CDs of some Woody Guthrie songs recorded by Moses Asch during World War II. Seth for the life of him could not remember what song he had heard and when of Guthrie’s and so he had called upon Jack to meet him at their favorite watering hole the Erie Grille in Riverdale where they both were now residing (and after varying absences had grown up in the town). Jack had answered that it had been in Mr. Lawrence’s seventh grade music class and the song had been the alternative national anthem-This Land Is Your Land.
The method to Mr. Lawrence’s madness, to ween the kids off of rock and roll, had gone beyond trying to foist silly folk music off on them since that was an exotic plant at the time and shortly before the big break-out folk minute of the early 1960sbut to drown them in any other kind of music he could think to distract, or attempt to distract them with, especially during lunch when they played their transistor radios and drove him crazy with their rock and roll. [As a younger teaching staff member, hire Seth found out later because he was younger and perhaps could “relate” to the kids and their weird music more than the old fogies who were hanging around waiting for their pension or the principal who had no “cred” on the subject of rock and roll at all, he drew the onerous lunch room duty task reflecting his junior status.] A few times, if you could believe this he tried to get them interested in jazz, in swing music, what each and every one of them considered the music that their parents listened to and which had driven them to the transistors in the first place.
Seth recalled that in his own household his mother, the usually complaint and complacent Delores, refused, utterly refused to have her housewifely duties disturbed by maddening rock and roll on the kitchen radio which she faithfully turned to WJDA which played Frank Sinatra, The Inkspots, Peggy Lee, the McGuire Sisters, the Andrews Sisters and all the rest which went wafting through the house and on more than one occasion drove him from the pre-transistor house. Of course the living room family radio which provided the Saturday night rest entertainment was totally off-limits to rock and roll, to the devil’s music, that term her exact expression which she had grabbed from Mr. Fleck, the Pentecostal minister where they worshipped.
Worse, worse of all Mr. Lawrence had tried to get his charges interested in the music of Benny Goodman, the so-called “king of swing.” That was all Seth needed to hear as he blurted out in front of the class “My mother and father dance to that pokey stuff on Saturday nights and they are barely moving when they dance. I am not going to listen to that here.” Needless to say Seth stayed after school a number of afternoons for his transgression. But he felt vindicated in what he had uttered and took the punishment like a soldier.
Still it did no good as Mr. Lawrence played something called Blue Skies which was his parents’ “their song.” Something else by a guy named Cole Porter that Benny Goodman made famous. It got no better when Mr. Lawrence played stuff with Peggy Lee because to his mother’s chagrin his father had a “crush” on old Peggy and Seth had admit to Jack that in those day he secretly thought she was kind of sexy looking at that.
But that was then. A few nights after Seth and Jack were cutting up old touches, after drinking themselves to melancholia, Seth went to the library and picked up an old Benny Goodman CD with plenty of American Songbook stuff on it. Guess what old Seth, old rock and roll devotee Seth with an overhang of folk, blues, and a little mountain music started to pop his fingers to the beat, started laughing to himself that he now knew what they meant when they said “it don’t mean a thing if you ain’t got that swing.” And they were right. Just ask Benny,
First came a statewide teachers' strike in West Virginia. When the teachers union leadership negotiated a weak compromise (which was tabled by the GOP-held state Senate anyway), the rank-and-file rebelled and started a wildcat (that is, not approved by leadership) strike that is still going. The strike has forced the closure of public schools in the state's 55 counties, leaving more than 275,000 students without classes to attend. Next, Oklahoma teachers, very clearly inspired by their West Virginia comrades, announced their ownstatewide strike on Monday. We may be at the beginning of a very important national labor push. It's time we all paid attention. More
“RUSSIAGATE” REVISITED
One of the most bizarre aspects of Russiagate is the magical transformation of intelligence agency heads into paragons of truth-telling – a trick performed not by reactionary apologists for domestic spying, as one would expect, but by people who consider themselves liberals. There is something genuinely absurd about a former director of the FBI – which along with the CIA and NSA has long been one of the gravest threats to democracy in America – solemnly warning of the threat to democracy posed by Russian meddling in the election… By focusing on the manufactured menace of Russiagate, the Democratic Party leadership can continue to ignore its own failures as well as the actual menace posed by Trump. And by fostering the fantasy of a vast Russian plot against America, the mainstream media can shut down reasonable foreign policy debate and promote a dangerous, unnecessary confrontation with a rival power. More
Home-Grown Reactionaries, Not Russians, are Greatest Threat to Our Elections
The foes of voting rights never gave up. They never stopped trying to turn back the clock. Now, their unrelenting campaign against voting rights is bearing fruit. In response, we need a new movement to protect and extend the right to vote. Strategic litigation is needed to counter the right’s legal maneuvers. Legislators should replace the new restrictions on voting with legislation that makes voting easier, not harder: Automatic and same day voter registration, extended periods for early voting, longer hours for polling booths to stay open for working people, an end to political gerrymandering, an end to felony disenfranchisement, curbs on big money in politics and more. We once more need reform to revive our democracy. That won’t happen without a modern day people’s movement as courageous and as relentless as that in Selma nearly half a century ago. More
Pentagon's new problem after years of crying poverty: Spending all the cash
Congress is still finalizing 2018 appropriations levels for the Pentagon, a delay that has generals and admirals worried about spending all the promised cash in the five months remaining before the end of the fiscal year. "We have a year's worth of money … and five months to spend it," Gen. Glenn Walters, assistant commandant of the Marine Corps, said at a Senate Armed Services Committee budget hearing.
Critics say that giving the military more money than it can absorb invites waste and abuse, noting that the Pentagon has a long history of overpayments, cost overruns and fiscal shenanigans. "They cried wolf and now they have more than they can possibly put to use," said Mandy Smithberger, director of the Center for Defense Information, a policy organization critical of Pentagon budget practices. "I think it's dangerous because you are going to see a use-it-or-lose-it kind of spending." More
Income Inequality in the U.S. Is Even Worse Than You've Been Led to Believe
The more the ultra-rich prosper, the less they're burdened with taxes, the greater the benefits for society as a whole. If you're familiar with Republican economic theory of the past 40 years, you've probably heard this line of reasoning. In fact, just the opposite is true.
Take it from the world's third richest man, Warren Buffett, who recently noted that between 1982 and 2017, "the wealth of the 400 [richest people in America] increased 29-fold—from $93 billion to $2.7 trillion—while many millions of hardworking citizens remained stuck on an economic treadmill. During this period, the tsunami of wealth didn’t trickle down. It surged upward.” The reality is the United States is now home to some of the worst income inequality in the developed world, and thanks to the recent passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, this wealth gap will grow exponentially wider. More
The Real Reason the Investor Class Hates Pensions
Advocates of pension “reform” — which really means cutting or eliminating traditional pension funds — will tell you that such funds are a big drain on state and local budgets, since, as defined-benefit programs, they are obligated to pay workers a defined amount in their retirement. But that’s largely a question of political priorities; underfunded pensions are the result of, well, decades of underfunding pensions. The real reason for the attack on pensions goes deeper, and exposes the great and growing rift between America’s economic elite and everyone else… If the Kochs and their allies succeed in smashing and scattering these last remaining pension funds into millions of 401(k)s, they will do more than just undermine the retirement security of millions of Americans. They will silence their economic voice. The pension reform drive should be understood, at least in part, as a campaign of economic voter suppression. And it is coming, soon, to a jurisdiction near you, if it isn’t there already. More
17 Democrats Send This Clear Message: "I Work for My Bank Donors, Not My Constituents'
Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) and sixteen Democrats joined with 50 Republicans in the U.S. Senate to advance a bill that critics say is just another handout for Wall Street banks—one that also sets the stage for the next major financial meltdown. "This bill wouldn't be on the path to becoming law without the support of these Democrats." —Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)With a vote of 67-32, including the 17 Democrats who voted yes, a "motion to proceed" received enough support to send the 'Bank Lobbyist Act'—technically the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, or S. 2155—to the floor for debate, possible amendments, and then a final vote later this week or next. More
OH CANADA!
Hundreds of Canadian doctors demand lower salaries
In a move that can only be described as utterly Canadian, hundreds of doctors in Quebec are protesting their pay raises, saying they already make too much money. As of Wednesday afternoon, more than 700 physicians, residents and medical students from the Canadian province had signed an online petition asking for their pay raises to be canceled. A group named Médecins Québécois Pour le Régime (MQRP), which represents Quebec doctors and advocates for public health, started the petition Feb. 25. “We, Quebec doctors who believe in a strong public system, oppose the recent salary increases negotiated by our medical federations,” the petition reads in French. The physicians group said it could not in good conscience accept pay raises when working conditions remained difficult for others in their profession — including nurses and clerks — and while patients “live with the lack of access to required services because of drastic cuts in recent years.” More
Support the momentum for Peace in Korea! Continue the Olympic Truce in Kore;a Take War off the Table; Cancel U.S. military exercises in Korea. The Olympic Truce (called by the U.N. to last from Feb. 2 to March 25) opened up the opportunity for future discussions that could eventually lead to peace. We must give this small opening toward peace the opportunity to grow and to prevent a catastrophic war Say YES to the ongoing efforts by South and North Korea to restore a peace process. Say NO to war with North Korea
South Korea Announces Trump Will Meet with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un
The White House says President Trump has accepted an invitation to meet directly with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un. South Korea’s National Security Adviser Chung Eui-yong spoke with reporters Thursday night outside the White House after briefing officials on the recent talks between Seoul and Pyongyang, and said the meeting would take place within two months. No sitting U.S. president has ever met with a North Korean leader; Kim Jong-un has never met another sitting head of state. More
Of all the facets of our cherished democracy that have begun to erode, few erosions are more horrifying than Congress’ abdication of its duty to debate and vote on whether or not we go to war. Of all the people that have suffered the consequences of this erosion, few have suffered them more acutely than the people of Yemen, residents of a country where unauthorized U.S. military action has helped give rise to the worst humanitarian disaster in the world. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) introduced legislation last week aimed at confronting this erosion and its consequences in Yemen—legislation to end the U.S. military’s role in Yemen’s civil war unless and until Congress authorizes it. More
The bill number is S.J.Res 54: Introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders [I-VT]; Cosponsors so farSen. Elizabeth Warren and now Ed Markey, [D-MA]; Sen. Lee, Mike [R-UT], Sen. Murphy, Christopher [D-CT]; Sen. Booker, Cory A. [D-NJ], Sen. Durbin, Richard J. [D-IL]; Sen. Leahy, Patrick J. [D-VT]; Sen. Feinstein, Dianne [D-CA]
Experts urge senators to back bill ending US involvement in Yemen war
A group of experts, advocates, former officials and others are urging senators to support a bipartisan effort to end U.S. involvement in Yemen’s civil war. “We strongly encourage you and your Senate colleagues to cosponsor and vote for S.J.Res 54, which defends the constitutional linchpin of Congress’s sole authority to declare war and promises to help end what aid groups consider the worst humanitarian crisis in the world,” the 37-person group wrote in a letter sent to every senator Thursday and obtained by The Hill… In Thursday’s letter, the experts highlighted the United Nation’s assessment that the war has left 8.4 million Yemenis on the verge of famine and that States Department’s assessment that the war has continued a security vacuum that allows for the growth of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Yemeni branch of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. U.S. involvement in war, the experts asserted, has not been authorized by either a war declaration or specific statutory authorization as required by the War Powers Act. More
Saudi Arabia’s Prince Mohammed Bin Salman is planning a visit to the United States early this year, in order to seek more US investment and military collaboration.
Bin Salman is scheduled to make a stop at MIT, an institution which has worked closely with Saudi Arabia on issues such as cybersecurity and higher education. We call on MIT to revoke its invitation to MBS, a power hungry autocrat who has made bloocy war in Yemen and provoked regional instability.
Massachusetts Peace Action and our allies are planning to protest MBS during his visit at MIT, expected in late March or early April. Please join us in order to show bin Salman that his violent actions in Yemen are not acceptable, and to show MIT and the US government that we will not accept their collaboration with the Saudi absolute monarchy. See more information here. Please sign this petition to protest MBS at MIT.
US SEEKS TO INTENTIONALLY PROLONG SYRIAN BLOODSHED
From the beginning of Syria’s conflict the United States presented to the world its unyielding ultimatum that the government in Damascus be deposed and replaced by a government headed by the armed militants the US cultivated before the conflict and has armed and funded throughout its now seven year course… The US intentionally backing an “opposition” that has no chance of overturning the Syrian government equates to intentionally and maliciously prolonging a deadly conflict and all the horrors that accompany it. The Brookings paper specifically suggesting the US “bleed” the Syrian government is done with full knowledge of the cost in human suffering that “bleeding” would undoubtedly incur. More
Media Erase US Role in Syria’s Misery, Call for US to Inflict More Misery
Anglo-American press coverage of the Syrian situation has grossly misled readers about their own governments’ role in the catastrophe, and has urged audiences to accept greater Western military intervention in the country without examining the implications of such a move… The argument that the US military should save Syria rests on the assumption that American militarism is benevolent, both in intent and outcome. Advancing this position depends on erasing the key contributions America and its partners have made to Syrians’ misery, not only through the above-mentioned support for sectarian armed groups but also through the US-led coalition bombing ostensibly aimed at ISIS that likely killed at least 3,500 to Syrian civilians, through derailing diplomatic efforts that might have ended the war years ago (London Review of Books, 7/16/15), and through carrying out a sanctions regime that has undermined Syrians’ access to clean water, medical equipment and food. More
U.S. SHOULD ACCEPT PUTIN'S OFFER TO NEGOTIATE ON NUKES
Russia’s new strategic weapons systems do not change the balance of power between the U.S. and Russia, though the U.S. may point to them in justifying its own plans to modernize every aspect of its nuclear arsenal at a cost of $1.7 trillion. Russia’s new offensive nuclear weapons will only bring the ongoing nuclear arms race to a position of strategic stability. The fuel for a new nuclear arms race was already on the fire, and a Russian strategic response was predictable, when the U.S. withdrew from the ABM Treaty and began developing and emplacing missile defense systems globally. The U.S. withdrawal and abrogation of the ABM Treaty may prove to be the greatest strategic blunder of the nuclear age. More
For NYT, a Trillion Dollars’ Worth of A-Bombs Is ‘Little’ Response to Russia
The front-page subhead warned, “Russia has ramped up its arsenal, US has done little in response.” So what does a “little” response look like? Since taking office, the Trump administration and Congress—citing the Russian challenge as one of their major rationales—have increased the military budget by about $80 billion, or roughly 13 percent, the largest increase since the aftermath of 9/11, and 70 percent greater than the entire Russian military budget of $47 billion… Additionally, Trump has reportedly asked for a “black budget” of over $80 billion for covert operations ($30 billion more than previous reports), and pledged more than $1.2 trillion to building up the United States’ nuclear arsenal over the next 30 years, $200 billion more than Obama asked Congress for when he announced the plan two years ago. More
GOD WILLS IT! The War on Terror as the Launching of an American Crusade
George W. Bush answered the criminal attacks of 9/11 not by calling oninternational law enforcement to bring the perpetrators to justice, but by a declaration of cosmic war aimed at nothing less than the elimination of Islamist evil. Labeling it a “crusade” only underscored the subliminal but potent message conveyed by television cameras that lingered on the cathedral’s multiple crucifixes and the bloodied figure of Jesus Christ. Held up for all to see, that sacred icon sent a signal that could not be missed. A self-avowed secular nation was now to be a crusader, ready to display the profoundly Christian character of a culture erected on triumphalist pieties from its Pilgrim roots to the nuclear apocalypticism of the Cold War… In fact, Bush’s use of that term wasn’t a stumble, however inadvertent, but a crystal-clear declaration of purpose that would soon be aided and abetted by a fervent evangelical cohort within the U.S. military, already primedfor holy war. With what Bush himself called “the distance of history,” it’s now possible to see the havoc his “crusade” is still wreaking across much of the globe. More
