Racing In The Street

The 30th Anniversary of Born To Run. 2 DVD, 1 CD Box Set Due November 15th

"Hammersmith Odeon, London '75" an astonishing film of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's legendary November 18 concert. The first and only full-length concert film ever released of Bruce and the E Street Band's first 25 years.

"Wings For Wheels: The Making of Born To Run" 90-minute documentary chronicling the definitive story of the creation of the album. Wings for Wheels boasts archival film never shown publicly, including substantial footage of Springsteen and the E Street Band recording the album, 1975 concert film and other footage shot between 1973 and 1975.
The DVD ends with stunning bonus footage of three songs recorded live at Los Angeles' Ahmanson Theater in 1973: "Spirit in The Night," "Wild Billy's Circus Story" and "Thundercrack."

Born To Run album This is the first time Springsteen has allowed any of his catalogue to be fully remastered and the CD presents the masterpiece with striking clarity and presence.

Several rock bands are attempting to put their bands back together, even after the departure of key bandmembers. The New York Times teased this article with a subtitle: "Do fans still care who the lead vocalist is? Do they even notice?"

The results are different depending on the band and the depth of their commitment to the music, rather than to the economic viability of the enterprise. The Dead has attempted to continue after the death of Jerry Garcia and the quality of their summer tours was quite high. Joan Osborne was the first person with the band that could actually sing and the other musicians respected the history of the Dead without being held hostage to it. However, disagreements between some of the survivors kept them off the road this year.

One of my favorite bands of all time was Little Feat. After losing main songwriter, guitarist and singer Lowell George, the band went on hiatus for several years. Little Feat did come back and is a very good rock/boogie band. However, it is no longer the kind of band that led Bonnie Raitt to say " I miss Little Feat more than I miss being seven years old." The oddly off-kilter (and generally sweet) worldview died with Lowell George. No one recites fragments of lyrics from Let It Roll and the other post-Lowell albums. No melodies like Dixie Chicken become mini-anthems, able to unite fans at the first chord. The band is well-meaning, but not the same.

What is most upsetting about the article, is the mention of bands that now clearly seem to have been in it only for the money. Is there anything more infuriating for a KISS fan than to read this comment:

"Doc McGhee, who represents the rockers KISS, has another twist on the idea altogether: he has been toying with the idea of recruiting an entire band to replace the original KISS and don the band's famous makeup. 'KISS is more like Doritos or Pepsi, as far as a brand name is concerned," he said. "They're more characters than the individual person. I think they have a legitimate chance to carry the franchise.' "

Yes, rock 'n' roll can be silly, immature and ephemeral. Sometimes that's the sole point about rock. Those characteristics can still be fondly remembered (see the Ramones) or they can be cheapened when we see that the whole point was just a marketing tool.

Sent by e-mail to the WFP today:

To Whom It May Concern:

I am a registered Democrat living in the city of Syracuse. I noticed that you endorsed a Republican, Ryan McMahon, for the Common Council in the 3rd District where I live. I was a supporter of Homer Davis, Jr. who ran unsuccessfully in the Democratic primary for that same seat.

The winner of the Democratic primary was Patricia Maxwell, a Democratic Party insider who received the designation largely because she has helped out in the Democratic Party office opening mail and answering phones.

I was interested in learning why the WFP did not endorse Mr. Davis, who works for the local bus company and is a member of the Amalgamated Transit Union. As I understand the WFP, one of its goals is to push the Democrats into promoting candidates who support issues of importance to working families. An endorsement of Mr. Davis would have seemed to be the perfect way to do this. A progressive newcomer needs support when fighting the entrenched party bosses.

I admire your work to date and find your endorsement of a conservative Republican over a Democratic union member puzzling and logically inconsistent with your mission, as I understand it.

Any explanation you could give on this situation would be helpful in helping me sort out this situation.

Thank you.

The Wake County, North Carolina school system (which includes all of Raleigh, N.C.) decided that it wanted to make sure that none of the schools in its system had a poverty rate of more than 40%. Extensive busing of up to 4% of the district's kids (as well as attractive magnet schools to lure suburbanites to the city) has allowed the city to come very close to their goal.

The results?

1) Students have increased their academic performance--91% of students in grades 3 through 8 scored at grade level on state tests, an increase of 12% in the past decade.

2) Property values in both the city and suburbs have maintained or increased their value.

3) Most students that are forced to bus long distances to school are from low-income families. These parents hate the busing, but believe in the quality of their children's new schools.

4) Most parents complaining about a lack of choice are white and suspicious of the districts attempts at what they refer to as social engineering.

The problem with replicating this here--no Onondaga County-wide school system. Most families moved out to the suburbs to get away from the city school district and its kids. How do you replicate the sense of academic promise and achievement of a suburban school in a city where up to 50% of the kids drop out, parents do not have the skills or dedication to help their children succeed academically and schools are starved for the talented teachers, supplies and infrastructure that the city can no longer afford?

The losing candidates in the 4th Common Council District are trying to develop a political organization that they hope will increase the influence of Southside residents in city elections. According to the Post-Standard: "The candidates, Steven Coker and Khalid Bey, said Thursday they are forming the group to convince South Side residents there is power in their votes, to organize them as a force that can influence elections, and to hold community leaders accountable."

Older residents of the Southside already understand the power of their votes and their ability to influence elections. They flexed their muscles by electing Tom Seals twice--over the objections of the local Democratic machine. Older folks express their discontent by voting, young folks by dropping out. A larger percentage of senior citizens are registered and vote than do young working families. Older Southside residents respect and identify with Tom Seals--not with a rather aloof lawyer moonlighting as a contractor or an aspiring rapper.

Bey and Coker now understand that they have to run long-term registration campaign, THEN get out their vote.

Why did Tom Seals get 71% of the vote this election? Coker and Bey point to the machine politics of the Working Families party and the disproportionate impact of the more affluent eastside neighborhoods on total voter turnout. While both of these factors played a part, there were other equally important factors:

1) You can't beat a somebody with a nobody. Tom Seals is well-known and well-liked in the community. He was one of the first African-Americans on the police force and retired after a long career. His son Ray played in the N.F.L. He is the incumbent in the district. He is active in the American Legion and worked after his retirement in the school district.
Neither of his opponents have that kind of profile in the community.

2) You can't rely on the local Democratic Party to win your election. The party can barely get enough signatures for its candidates, much less withstand an intense door-to-door campaign like Seals'. The party is resting on its laurels, its 3 to 1 enrollment edge over the Republicans.

3) Stand for something. Seals campaigned on his record of supporting living wage legislation and fighting for more state funding for education. People need to identify you with an issue or two, as well as believe that you can deliver on your promises. Coker and Bey never created a clear message, never giving voters a reason to support their candidacies.

The events in New Orleans have brought to the fore many of the thoughts about poverty, urban governance and the inhumanity of modern Republicanism that have pre-occupied my political musings for some time.

1) Do something to help someone in this mess. You can surely find on the internet one or more solid charities that are pitching in to help.

2) George Bush and the modern Republican Party have been exposed for the evil monsters that we always suspected them to be in our darkest and most cynical moments. Was there any more of a "let them eat cake" moment than Air Force One tilting a little to the left so W. could look down on his struggling subjects? Republicans campaign on a platform of "Big Government Doesn't Work", get elected and then prove themselves correct.

3) Kanye West has my vote for Time's Man of The Year award. George W. Bush doesn't like black people, indeed. My question, is it intentional or clueless racism? Bill Maher said that George Bush doesn't understand why people from New Orleans didn't grab a case of Poland Spring from the garage, pack up the Range Rover and drive to the summer home.

4) Educate yourself on the damage to FEMA, the Army Corps of Engineers and the S.E. Louisiana pumping/levee projects done by the Bush Administration. Here's a start from David Remnick, the editor of The New Yorker. The Bush Administration has been gutting support for essential government services in order to fund the Iraq War and to further its agenda of enriching corporate interests. This bullshit must stop here.

5) Democrats haven't covered themselves in glory either. Get your own ass out of Dodge isn't an effective emergency response strategy. I have developed a grudging respect for Rudy Guiliani and George Pataki after watching the mayor of New Orleans go around blaming everyone else for the city's lack of emergency planning and the Louisiana governor crying and asking everyone to pray. On Sept. 11th, 2001 Rudy Guiliani sped to the World Trade Towers, after Katrina, the New Orleans government moved to Baton Rouge. At least they had a plan to get some people out of town--bureaucrats and politicians.

6) After the 2000 Presidential election was stolen in the state of Florida, the New York Times ran an article by John Tierney--The Big City: Bad Balloting. Poor Services. What's New? (http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/12/nyregion/12BIG.html) that pointed out the Democrats had shot themselves in the ass. The voting machines that didn't work were largely in Democrat strongholds--poor and African-American communities. But Democrats never fought for upgrades to shitty machines because poor people don't count. Poor people didn't fight for better services because they have given up and come to expect crappy public services--voting machines, schools, streets, trash pick-up--you name it, it sucks. New Orleans is this situation writ large.

7) The Kerner Commision report studying the racial riots in the late 1960's concluded that blacks and whites in America were becoming two nations, "one black, one white -- separate and unequal." We're way beyond that stage. We've segregated ourselves in our housing, public education and most needed public services. Not generally by race, but by class. African-Americans like Condoleezza Rice and Bill Cosby and hundreds of thousands of ordinary African-American families move freely in the privileged amorphous middle class where most Americans claim membership. But poor folks of all colors are in deep shit (or flood waters, if you will.)

8) Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton and Bush 2 have all presided over this segregated America--rich folks leave for the suburbs, battering the tax base in the inner cities. The rich folks bitch and moan about the taxes they do have to pay, state and federal, so politicians campaign on tax cuts. America is a complex society with systems that demand cooperation--health care, transportation, education, communications--but we can't get together and make sure that all the basic services we need are available to everyone. The rich hide from the poor in segregated communities where they pay for private services. The poor are left to fester in crumbling inner-city hellholes. The rich pat themselves on the back for their initiative (the Protestant ethic don't you know) while the poor are demonized for falling prey to numerous social pathologies--hints being not so subtlely left that their predicament is all their fault.

9) Did I mention that George W. Bush doesn't like black people? He does like greedy corporate executives and blood-thirsty, neo-conservative chicken-hawks. George Bush is an uneducated, shallow, selfish bastard with the stains of so many people's blood on his hands that he will forever be caught fucking up our nation REDHANDED!

10) FIGHT THE POWER!

"What we need is awareness, we can't get careless
You say what is this?
My beloved lets get down to business
Mental self defensive fitness
(Yo) bum rush the show
You gotta go for what you know
Make everybody see, in order to fight the powers that be
Lemme hear you say...
Fight the Power"

--Public Enemy