More evil than Communism?

I’ve already said something about Michael Moore’s latest outraged assertion, that Capitalism is evil. One bit of confusion that many people, including George Bush, seem to have, is equating Capitalism with Democracy. China is proof that the former does not imply the latter.

The shout-downs against health care regulation at the so-called town hall meetings reminded me of Moore’s ambush tactics, except a lot less clever than driving an armored car to AIG and demanding the bailout money be given back to the American taxpayers. Moore was on The Colbert Report last night. Regardless of his politics, the man simply has to drop a hundred pounds.

The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Capitalism’s Enemy – Michael Moore
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Protests

John, Paul, George, Ringo, Peter, Paul, Mary… and Ed

My sister Jean pointed out a photograph I didn’t recall seeing before, of Peter, Paul, and (the recently departed) Mary with the Beatles. The date was April 17, 1964, and the place was a posh club in London called Les Ambassadeurs, where some scenes in “A Hard Day’s Night” were filmed.

It must have been a brief meeting, because the shooting schedule was so hectic that even Ed Sullivan was given the bum’s rush. An interview in the club’s garden that he filmed for his variety show lasted only a minute and a half. But for his trouble Sullivan was sent an exclusive preview clip of the movie, that didn’t make the final cut, of the Beatles performing “You Can’t Do That.” I posted it over a year ago, at this link.

Classical oldies in Boston

For all of my emphasis on Pop music, half of my CD collection is Classical. A few years ago, Boston’s commercial radio station with Classical music, WCRB, switched frequencies to a weaker signal to make way for a Country music station. Today there’s the news that the other Boston radio station with Classical music, non-commercial WGBH, is buying WCRB.

I don’t know what to make of this move. There’s no obvious logic behind it, except perhaps a strategy to consolidate Classical music on Boston’s airwaves to ensure its survival. It’s estimated that a successful Classical CD sells only about 5,000 copies. (The same is supposedly true of Blues and Jazz recordings.)

WGBH, which is one of the country’s premiere PBS TV stations, has been mismanaged for some years. It built an obnoxiously luxurious new studio with an ill-advised, and unreliable, giant TV that faces the Mass Pike. And now the overhead of financing and operating the new facility is dragging down WGBH. The radio station is the much smaller part of the organization, and it’s always had a mixed format that switches to Jazz in the evening, through the night.

If ‘GBH uses ‘CRB as its Classical music outlet, I’m not sure what it can do with its frequency, other than to try to expand its news offerings. But another public radio station, WBUR, which itself was mismanaged in the past, already has that covered.

With the underground station WBCN now gone, Boston radio is really in turmoil. Through all of this, the only station that I listen regularly, that keeps on keeping on, is WBZ-AM. And earlier this year ‘BZ made the huge mistake of letting go of overnight talk show host Steve LeVeille, then having to reverse that decision thanks to listener outrage.

Mono-a-mono


Geoff Emerick with his Grammy for engineering “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”

Why all the talk these many years about “Sgt. Pepper” in mono? Here’s an A/B comparison. Both of these 90-second excerpts from “She’s Leaving Home” are in mono, but one of them is the original 1967 monaural mix from the new CD set, and the other has been folded into mono from the 1987 stereo CD.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/SEP/ShesLeavingHome_SMAS.mp3]
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/SEP/ShesLeavingHome_MAS.mp3]

1965 comic book predicted the iPhone

Denro visited today, which is always fun, bringing with him the new mono Beatles CD set. We listened to “Sgt. Pepper’s” and realized that mono is indeed the best way to hear the Lonely Heart’s Club Band. The experience really was as if we were hearing it almost for the first time.

I always expect Dennis to bring a stack of old comic books, and he didn’t disappoint. One story in particular caught my eye. Take a look at this drawing.

Gil Kane drew this picture of a smartphone in 1965! He really nailed it in every way. Very impressive.

Dick Armey’s Army

Like a lot of people, I’m still bothered by South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson’s “YOU LIE!” outburst. Bush had a couple of shoes thrown at him by an Iraqi journalist who was imprisoned for his action (although I suspect the actual crime was his embarrassing of al Maliki), but what Wilson did speaks to something deep and dark going on in the fringes of American politics. I worry that there might be another Timothy McVey out there, plotting against a government that he feels needs to be “taken back” from those he believes would destroy the country from within.

But it’s not just Wilson’s outburst that bugs me, it’s the fact that he’s wrong. Obama wasn’t lying. The health care legislation doesn’t give free health care to illegal immigrants. Even if there were any real truth in the assertion, it’s just another diversionary tactic. The Right is, I have to acknowledge, excellent at rallying the troops and making diversions seem like the core of an issue.

But let me tell you, the problem of immigrants in emergency rooms is a very real one, even if nothing about health care coverage changes. My wife worked at Waltham (MA) Hospital, and the place shut down — closed forever — due at least in part to uninsured immigrants. But they certainly were not the only uninsured patients who were treating the emergency room as a primary care facility.

Bill Moyers has a feature on Dick Armey, about the hypocrisy of a wealthy man who has benefited from government health care coverage most of his life, while telling people they shouldn’t have the same benefit. Why hang onto the delusional rants of a totally irrational loon like Glenn Beck, and refuse to listen to a calm, reasonable and thoughtful analysis by Bill Moyers?

[flv:http://www.dograt.com/Video/2009/SEP/BillMoyers.flv 440 330]

The real issue underlying all of this protesting is the fact that Obama is half black and his father was Muslim. This scares the hell out of a lot of people of a certain mindset, who are outraged that a young white girl let herself be seduced by an African man, and from that union came a President. These people are being used by Dick Armey and his ilk. They listen to the rhetoric and the talking points that get hammered out over and over again. They don’t think things through for themselves and see what makes sense, because nothing these people are saying about Obama having a private army, and wanting to destroy America, makes any sense.

But I must say that the Acorn people deserved what happened to them with the outrageous pimp sting. It’s the sort of thing the late radical Abbie Hoffman would have loved. It’s also a distraction from the much more serious issue of Wall Street returning to business as usual, without a return to Glass-Steagal and the separation of the investment banking, commercial banking, and insurance industries.