The Linear Canvas

I wrote this song on November 22, 1993. The thirtieth anniversary of the murder of President John F. Kennedy and the coup d’état that resulted in a dozen more years of corporatist war profiteering in southeast Asia.

I seemed angry that day.

“JFK 11/22/63 (Civil War)”

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No doubt there were many people and organizations that had a motive to murder President Kennedy. But I believe that the Corporatist and Congressional  Military Industrial Complex, and the C.I.A. assisted by elements of organized crime (Is that statement redundant?), had the greatest need to eliminate their biggest obstacle in the path to war profiteering in Vietnam and gambling profits in Cuba. Like 9/11, it would take several suspicious security lapses to allow this to occur.

The Civil War that rages between the classes and in American politics, is the genesis of all that is wrong in  America right now. It is truly the battle between the have and have nots. It is  not a culture war that is commonly defined as religion, homosexuality, or abortion by the propagandist corporate media. (Fox News, mainly) It is a true class war pitting the affluent against the middle class and the poor.

With the assistance of the corporate media, the rich have shifted this war so that their opponents make war on each other.

No “Preventive War” will ever defeat a tactic like terrorism. The only cure for terror attacks by small groups is “Preventive Democracy”. Empowering the middle class and the poor in foreign nations will defeat the conditions that breed terrorism. All of the remaining terror attacks could be eliminated by arresting several hundred Saudi Arabian citizens and government officials. Probably a few in the U.S . as well.

In 1961,  then Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was also Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe during World War Two, gave President Kennedy and the world this advice.

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the (congressional) military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

Had President Kennedy heeded those warnings, he may have lived a bit longer.

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The analog tracks were originally recorded on a Yamaha MT-100 II 4 track cassette recorder in late 1993 using high speed (3.75 IPS) and dbx noise reduction . I recently transferred the recordings to my Fostex VF-16 digital multi-track. I used an Iomega Jaz drive to transition them to computer format. I used Cakewalk Sonar v8.5 Producer and Sony Sound Forge to mix, edit, and master the recording.

I surprised myself on how quickly this came together. I hadn’t done any music recording work in about a month. I was afraid I’d forgotten how. I loaded and synchronized these older tracks very quickly. I started on Saturday night and was done programming the drums by late Sunday.

The drum tracks that I recorded in 1993 were pretty lame. I used Session Drummer 3 and programmed the drums using MIDI patches and some manual editing. I only had issue with the bass part and did some auto-sync and some manual editing to tighten it up to the new drum track.

I played electric guitar on a Fender Stratocaster and probably an Ibanez Les Paul. The bass was a Rickenbacker 4001.  The keyboard part was played on a Casio CZ-101 FM synthesizer.

Responding to a Tea Bagger letter writer in Rolling Stone, writer Matt Taibbi said, "So a movement that purports to be driven by anger against both parties, revolts by…voting for the Republican Party. The same Republican Party that just a few years ago was greenlighting trillion-dollar bailouts and presiding over a record expansion of the federal government. When they screw you again, what’s your next act of rebellion – voting in another batch of Republicans?"

Exactly.

I personally would never call “I Don’t Know (09/12/2001)” the blues. All I’m going to say is that it has a bluesy sound and I had the blues when I wrote and recorded it.

By definition I guess it is then…

“I Don’t Know (09/12/2001)”

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When I wrote this song on September 12th, 2001. I didn’t know as much about the events of the previous day as I do now. I must say that my internal skeptic was in full gear though. I, like every one else that day, was too shocked by the events to do any real critical thinking. Like how did they know so much about the hijackers so quickly when none of their names appeared on any of the flight manifests?

The reports started coming in about the incidents of that day as I was nearing Cincinnati, Ohio on I-75 listening to the radio. I was on my way to the town of Amelia to work on a TV distribution system there. I worked eight straight hours on the distribution network and did a good job fixing the problems. But I had some TV channels off most all day. People were probably trying to watch the events unfold on TV like I was doing, but their favorite channels were probably going on and off. Lucky for me, I knew what channel to watch.

I didn’t think of that until days later. I probably should have come back the next week. But not knowing the scope of the situation, I just kept working.

Not suspecting any conspiracy yet, I knew that whatever the Bush administration did next would be wrong just based on their performance to that date. They certainly didn’t take long to prove me right. The whole war thing has been a bungled disaster that will have cost the suckers, er, I mean the taxpayers two trillion dollars and the lives of countless thousands of poor innocent people.

I don’t know what really happened that day. But volumes of evidence and common sense should tell us that there is more going on here than we’re being told. They want me to believe that nineteen men, mostly Saudi Arabian’s, defeated the trillion dollar defense I and many others have been paying for since World War Two? Then, a) I want my money back and/or b) I want a new investigation into what happened on September 11th, 2001.

Any national defense and airline employee that dropped the ball that day, should be at least fired because they failed their duties to protect America.

If someone were found responsible for the act itself in some way, life in prison or the death penalty. Either will do. I don’t even care if they are an Arab, Israeli, Asian, European, African or American. Osama Bin Laden even. As long as we have the evidence. I think there is most likely plenty of it.

To this date, no one has been fired or criminally charged for the attack.

Will Someone Ever Pay For This Crime?

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I was in my basement in Swanton, Ohio at the time and sat down at the drums. I started playing this beat. I thought it was cool so I recorded it with one microphone and built the rest of the song around it. It was the first time I had ever done this. Use one microphone that is. I love overkill.

These tracks were originally recorded on a Fostex VF-16 digital multi-track recorder. I played electric guitar on a Fender Stratocaster. The bass was a Rickenbacker 4001. I played drums on my Ludwig’s. I digitally processed the instrument and vocal tracks using Cakewalk Sonar 8.5 Producer DAW and Sony Sound Forge 9 audio editor.

I wrote Hard Change about the influence of corporatist power over government in America. In our case the corporatists have seized the power of religion and the media to keep the fear of fear in the weakest among us. Always keeping us fearful of all the Emmanuel Goldstein’s out there. Real or imagined.

The truth is it will never change. There’s something about being mega-rich and powerful that makes men want more riches and more power. Some would say communism would be the answer, but the truth is men are men and behave the same no matter the style of government. The common citizen is always left holding the check at the end.

“Hard Change”

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“When fascism (corporatism) comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” 
–Sinclair Lewis, in 1935

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military (and congressional) industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."
-President Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) in 1961

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”
-President Franklin D. Roosevelt (D) in 1932

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The analog tracks were originally recorded in about 1994 (?) on a Yamaha MT-100 II 4 track cassette recorder using high speed (3.75 IPS) and dbx noise reduction.

I think the acoustic guitar I played was a Takamine. I played electric guitar on a Fender Stratocaster and maybe an Ibanez Les Paul (?). The bass was a Rickenbacker 4001. I recorded the percussion more recently using my Paiste and Zildjian cymbals and because of my ankle injury, I had to add the drum parts using a Yamaha MIDI drum pad and Session Drummer 3.  I also added some cow bell.

It always has really bothered me when someone would say they hated history in school. The nicest thing I can say is, that’s dumb. The other is that because so many people feel that way, we are doomed to repeat the lessons America has already learned, but also lessons that other nations have learned and sometimes had to re-learn.

Yesterday my wife called me with a question about which U.S. president signed the Declaration of Independence first. Her company was having a contest featuring Independence Day trivia. The choices were George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, or John Adams. Only two future presidents signed the document, Jefferson and Adams. So that would eliminate George Washington from consideration entirely.

There were two procedures in place for the signing of the Declaration of Independence:

1. The colonies’ (states) delegates signed first in the order of north to south.
2. The signers signed the document from right to left.

The only exception was John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, who signed first.

The only reason I can think of for this procedure was a possible compromise to allow the northern states the honor of actually signing the document first, but it would appear to the British or any other interested party at the time, that the southern states had that honor. It probably was to keep everybody happy at the meeting. If you didn’t like history in the 21st century, It certainly would appear that the answer to the question, reading left to right, was Thomas Jefferson.

Knowing the procedure in place, at the time, would not allow you to come to that conclusion though. As John Adams was from Massachusetts and Thomas Jefferson from Virginia, looking at a map would show Massachusetts north of Virginia and looking at the document will show John Adams’ signature on the upper right at the bottom of the page.

Therefore the answer is John Adams.

When my wife returned home, she told me that the “official” answer she was given was Thomas Jefferson. I suppose someone just looked at the document and figured that it was signed left to right and John Adams must have arrived late to the meeting.

The world will not end because of that error. But it saddens me that July 4th in America is more about contests and mattress sales than remembering our country’s independence from the distant rule of kings, queens, and the Church of England. Many love the fireworks just to see something get blown up more than the symbol of our Independence they are.

I only expect the situation to get worse in the future.

"Rich People pay Fox (News) People to make Middle Class People hate Poor People."
–John Fugelsang (comedian)

After the healthcare bill was signed into law on March 23, 2010, there were a number of acts of violence and vandalism involving those that were aligned with corporate interests in preserving the status quo in healthcare. These persons resorted to violence and intimidation mainly because they just didn’t get their way on this. (childish?) In addition, the political representatives of this group were in charge for the last ten years and ran the country into the ditch, that it is still in.

I must say that those politicians did this with the help of the same lunatic fringe that is now threatening our democracy with violence, unless they get their way. (treason?) Most of these same political “leaders” have never responsibly denounced this violent behavior, only excused it. This is of course how they governed as well, irresponsibly.

For a few years after September 11, 2001, I rarely would talk about, and often hid my political and religious views from strangers, family, and co-workers. After I "exposed" myself as a Democrat in 2004, I was confronted by co-worker’s twice. Both were near physical confrontations about me being pro-abortion, although I am anti-abortion. But these individuals were convinced that "Libruls" were all the same.

The intimidation by the right wing is only ratcheting up, it has been fomenting since the Reagan days. As long as they have a cable channel and an overly compliant mass media to disseminate their corporate propaganda to their minions, this will only get worse. And I’m sure it will.

I don’t have any issue with gun owners or gun ownership. During the cold war, I used to fantasize that if the Russians ever attacked us, the NRA members would be an asset. Now I think if we were attacked, by one of their corporatist allies (Saudi Arabia?), the right wing propaganda machine, and the NRA, would be aligned with the attackers, against the “Libruls”.

My impression is that some of these people committing violent acts feel empowered and dominate as long as they are armed, and that a weapon gives the armed citizen one more vote than the unarmed. If they’d gone to government class in high school instead of skipping out, they’d realize that’s exactly what can kill a democracy, not save it.

No matter what you think about the current administration or the previous one, the problem with our government has always been the level of corporatist influence in it and the corruption that it has caused. But I just don’t believe that it has ever been this bad and out in the open. The last thirty years has been a real bonanza for the well connected corporatist

The end of the broadcast fairness doctrine and relaxing media ownership concentration rules certainly played a part in this, as the watchdog of investigative journalism was finally under the control of the corporate owned media conglomerates with no equal time for dissenting opinions and any real fact checking. Other factors are the uncontrollable propaganda that 500 different cable channels could broadcast, again without any requirements any of it be true, or fair. The fairness doctrine never covered cable, so that was never an issue anyway. Another is that corporations have long been about controlling whatever government agencies and branches they could, to extinguish labor and safety regulations and their resulting law suits and other responsibilities. Corporations know that it’s hard to market a defective product when people know the truth about it and them.
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One of my favorite entertainers is radio host Stephanie Miller. I have pretty regularly listened to her radio show since its beginning in 2004. She is witty and very funny. I am the “Official Cable Guy” of The Stephanie Miller Show. Here is the best of Stephanie Miller from 2009 (so far) from her many TV talk show appearances.

 

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If the video player does not appear or work, click here (part 2)

Wanda Sykes generally gets it just about right while still making it funny. How she got a job on Fox Network mystifies me. Rupert Murdoch is rolling in his grave, even though he isn’t dead yet.

 

 

 

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I’ve always liked Al Franken, No matter what Fox Network (they’re not news) says about him, he’s funny and smart. More so than any of the Fox-licans that hate him. I used to listen to his Air America radio show because it was informative and funny. I quit listening in it’s last year because he started running for the US Senate and the funny suffered. I can get informative from anywhere.

Here are a couple of cool videos taken recently at the Minnesota State Fair, of Senator Al Franken. The first one, he talks down a Tea Bagger mob with logic, reason, and knowledge. The second he draws a USA map from memory. I’d like to see Bill O’Reilly do either.

 

Senator Al Franken calms down health insurance reform opponents

 

Senator Al Franken draws a map of the USA from memory