I'm always thrilled to hear that someone loved by the mainstream is a commie. People have no clue, at least down here, about "the Left" or anything like that, just assume we're a bunch of weirdos(they're perhaps right for all the wrong reasons), and I think it's great if you can name drop commies who are people they are familiar with, and consider, I don't know, normal maybe.
I know I have had some success bringing up the fact that Ralph Nader is left. Mainstream folks admire him, but only know him as a consumer advocate. They're always surprised that someone they admire is a damn fool, idealistic leftist.
Hey that was pretty funny about Ventura, and the Govs. Like maybe he's the front man. Awhile back I read that Jesse had vowed to immediately cut off funding for public tv and radio.
Rented me some of those ferin movies today.
smooches paula
Max. You are so buff.
At 02:40 PM 2/22/99 -0500, you wrote:
>[This bounced. Sam Pawlett's worm cure seems to have worked.]
>
>Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 11:29:34 -0800
>From: Sam Pawlett <epawlett at uniserve.com>
>X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; U)
>MIME-Version: 1.0
>To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Subject: Musical Activists
>References: <3.0.1.32.19990213030407.00752314 at pop.mindspring.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>
>
>Sam Pawlett (by way of pms ) wrote:
>
>> Wow, Sam. Is that really Cab Calloway? I had no idea. Was he politically
>> active, etc?
>> Others on the list would probably be interested, but I can feel an
>> overlimit day coming on, and I'm being conservative.
>>
>> Wow.
>> pms
>>
>
>err-a bit late here Paula but,yes, Cab Calloway was politically active in the
>late 30's and late 40's along with many other jazz musicians like Bird, Diz,
>Ellington and hosts of others. Cab played gigs to raise money for popular
front
>activities like the Spanish Republicans, anti-fascist exiles, victims of red
>squads, Scottsboro Nine etc. and the International Labor Defense ( a CPUSA
>legal
>support group for class-struggle prisoners.). During this period, Cab had
>in his
>band many CP fellow travellers like Frankie Newton and Dizzy Gillespie. If
you
>ever get the chance, check out the film of Diz's mid-seventies visit to
>Cuba (in
>defiance of the embargo) with his United Nations Orchestra. Diz brings a
>bunch of
>Cuban musicians on stage and says "Now the U.S. government says the people
>of the
>U.S. and the people of Cuba can't along. Well we'll show you how we can get
>along" he then launches into a killer Cuban rhumba. Really cool. A good
book on
>the popular front period is _The Cultural Front_ by Michael Denning.
>Denning says
>Cab was a big influence on Richard Wright too. Cab Calloway is back in vogue
>these days with the swing craze. Highly paid young people smoking $50 cuban
>cigars( they're legal up here) clad in leopard skin, drinking cognac and
single
>malt lounging in Art Deco furniture all while stumbling around on the dance
>floor to Cab Calloway and Count Basie.Odd. I wonder what the musicians
>would have
>thought of all this? I get a good snicker out of it all.
>
>Sam
>
>