Classical music is un-American, effete, elitist etc.
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
Brian Newhouse wrote:
And how do you fellow-Americans out there justify your affection for
such an un-American, effete, elitist enterprise as classical music? I
sure can't.
Brian Newhouse
newh...@mail.crisp.net
******************************************************************
Being non-American - as opposed to un-American - I hope I will not
incite any resentment by throwing my hat into the ring!
Firstly, it seems to me that the phrase 'un-American' may evoke some
very unpleasant memories of McCarthyism and J.Edgar Hoover in many
people. I take it that the only logical interpretation of it would be
that it refers to anything of an unconstitutional nature (not unlike
the above-mentioned persons themselves?!). Presumably, there is
nothing unconstitutional about classical music, either in America or
any other free countries (nor in many not-so-free countries). It also
seems to me that, when America declared independence in 1776,
'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
being elitist - although, of course, much of it is, even as far as
classical musicians are concerned - and quite why it should earn the
dubious distinction of being called un-American, or un-anyotherplace,
is a mystery. If anything, this concept would seem, in itself, to be
inherently un-American in that it appears to suggest an infringement
of liberty by trying to tell the citizens what is good for them and
what isn't (somewhat like the former Iron-Curtain countries?!). Then
there is the issue, touched upon by others, of whom or what may be
considered a model of Americanism. So, if you could isolate a
relatively small percentage of the US population (250,000,000 people
when I last heard), say 100,000, and found that they all ate the same
breakfast cereal, chances are that they wouldn't all drink the same
beverage with it. If you then throw in one or two other variables, it
is more than likely that 100,000 Americans (or Brits or Aussies etc.)
would, in fact, break up into endless different groups. This would
prove equally true of tastes in music. It could be argued that music
of 'quality' - be it classical OR popular - is elitist in the sense of
being less commonplace than bad or undistinguished music. In that
case, Gershwin, Kern, Porter and Bacharach - among many others - could
also be termed 'un-American' because their music was often highly
sophisticated and shared many qualities with the miniature masterpieces
of the classical composers.
I'm certainly no judge of what Americans consider to be un-American
but I'm willing to bet that, for every citizen, it means different
things, even where opinions overlap sometimes. I know that my own,
many, American cousins encompass a fairly wide range of tastes and
views, and why not?
Finally (for now, at least), I would offer the speculation that the
Gershwins' wonderful "The Man I Love" is somewhat more elitist than,
say, Beethoven's "Fur Elise" or Chopin's "Minute Waltz", so where does
that leave your initial contention?
All the best,
EDK
G. Brown
Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
communists..no Gallup poll of the period ever listed "McCarthyism" as a
problem...Sen. McCarthy was establishment enough to date one of the
Kennedy girls and play touch football with RFK & JFK & clan...sadly, the
revisionist liberal historians have done a number on both him and J.
Edgar Hoover,a great American public servant if there ever was one...
also,how you can include Bacharach in a list with those other composers
is beyond me...cheers,gb
G. Brown
Jeremy Berman wrote:
>
> In <34B419...@erols.com> "G. Brown"
> <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> writes:
> >
>
> >..my memories of "McCarthyism" aren't"unpleasant"....we were at war
> and
> >Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
> >communists..
>
> his "proof" was printed on the equivalent of blank pieces of paper. By
> the end of the fifties the FACT his reputation was blackened forever
> isn't the result of liberal revisionism. It was tarnished for good
> reason. The man almost got the country to turn against itself, alot of
> it based on lies. Thank God this man was stopped by forces of fairness.
> Maybe your memories might not have been as unpleasant if you were on
> his list.
>
> Jeremy
I don't think I would have qualified...people have said all kinds of
nasty things about me-but I don't think I have ever been suspected of
being a communist sympathizer....your response is high on hyperbole and
histrionics, but short on supportive facts...communist agents were at
work throughout the US and UK(England's record of traitors is
particularly appalling...and remember WE were perceived by the USSR as
it's primary threat)...the Rosenbergs,Hiss and their fellow treasonous
cronies were just the tip of the iceberg....if a few Hollywood pinkos
had to find honest employment as a result of Sen. McCarthy's hearings,
so be it....the problem with revisionist liberals of that period is that
they spew all their venom on"Joe" McCarthy while conveniently over-
looking the barbarous atrocities of "Joe" Stalin and his KGB henchmen.
a case of selective amnesia......cheers,gb
ps:may I suggest you subscribe to NATIONAL REVIEW for a year?..it might
just have a much-needed purgative effect on your politics...
Jeremy Berman
John S Mamoun
Edward Dimitri Kennaway (ken...@zetnet.co.uk) wrote:
: any other free countries (nor in many not-so-free countries). It also
: 'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
: music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
: it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
: was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
: time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
: probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
What do you mean by popular? In order to hear Mozart or Haydn's
music, people had to go to live concerts, and many didn't have the
money to do that. Outings to the concert were more the provinces
of the rich or elite. It also takes a certain level of sophistication
to care about such music, and the audiences then simply weren't
as sophisticated as they are now, so they had less of an inclination
to trudge out to concert halls to hear such music, save for an elite
percentage of the general population. In both absolute and
relative terms, far fewer people paid attention to Haydn or
Mozart's music then they do today, since audiences today are more
sophisticated and they have easier access to cheap music, via tapes,
CDs, etc. Then as now, most people listened to rustic or folkish
music, rather than music that expanded their thought processes.
Steve Wolk
G. Brown wrote:
>
> Edward Dimitri Kennaway wrote:
> >
> > Brian Newhouse wrote:
> >
> > And how do you fellow-Americans out there justify your affection for
> > such an un-American, effete, elitist enterprise as classical music? I
> > sure can't.
> >
> > Brian Newhouse
> > newh...@mail.crisp.net
> > ******************************************************************
> >
> > Being non-American - as opposed to un-American - I hope I will not
> > incite any resentment by throwing my hat into the ring!
> >
> > Firstly, it seems to me that the phrase 'un-American' may evoke some
> > very unpleasant memories of McCarthyism and J.Edgar Hoover in many
> > people. I take it that the only logical interpretation of it would be
> > that it refers to anything of an unconstitutional nature (not unlike
> > the above-mentioned persons themselves?!). Presumably, there is
> > nothing unconstitutional about classical music, either in America or
> > seems to me that, when America declared independence in 1776,
> > 'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
> > music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
> > it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
> > was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
> > time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
> > probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
> Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
> problem...Sen. McCarthy was establishment enough to date one of the
> Kennedy girls and play touch football with RFK & JFK & clan...sadly, the
> revisionist liberal historians have done a number on both him and J.
> Edgar Hoover,a great American public servant if there ever was one...
> also,how you can include Bacharach in a list with those other composers
> is beyond me...cheers,gb
gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
Steve
G. Brown
unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
Sorry it had to be you,SW....As to your other points,I DO think things
would improve in this country if only property owners were allowed the
vote....cheers,gb
Brendan R. Wehrung
John S Mamoun (js...@mail1.sas.upenn.edu) writes:
> Edward Dimitri Kennaway (ken...@zetnet.co.uk) wrote:
> : any other free countries (nor in many not-so-free countries). It also
> : seems to me that, when America declared independence in 1776,
> : 'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
> : music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
> : it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
> : was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
> : time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
> : probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
>
> What do you mean by popular? In order to hear Mozart or Haydn's
> music, people had to go to live concerts, and many didn't have the
> money to do that. Outings to the concert were more the provinces
> of the rich or elite. It also takes a certain level of sophistication
> to care about such music, and the audiences then simply weren't
> as sophisticated as they are now, so they had less of an inclination
> to trudge out to concert halls to hear such music, save for an elite
> percentage of the general population. In both absolute and
> relative terms, far fewer people paid attention to Haydn or
> Mozart's music then they do today, since audiences today are more
> sophisticated and they have easier access to cheap music, via tapes,
> CDs, etc. Then as now, most people listened to rustic or folkish
> music, rather than music that expanded their thought processes.
Talk about effete snobs! There were no concerts to speak of in Colonial
America, and music was the province of whomever could play it.
Proficiency on a musical instrument was a social asset. and while
possession of a harpsichord or that new device, the piano, may have been
restricted to the better-off, many a home's prized possession was their
scores of Handel or Mozart. It is our loss (probably aided by the
ubiquitous presence of recorded media) that the home-performance tradition
has been largely lost. The same goes for home singing, which required
only a sense of pitch and a little bit of musicality. A pity this guy
thinks so little of our ancestors. I wonder what they'd think of him?
Brendan
Eohmar
>What do you mean by popular? In order to hear Mozart or Haydn's
>music, people had to go to live concerts, and many didn't have the
>money to do that. Outings to the concert were more the provinces
>of the rich or elite.
In Britain, a Proms season ticket in 1915 cost 2 pounds 50 -- about five or six
pennies a concert. Even back then, this was CHEAP. The opera houses and
concert halls of Vienna and London were always filled with peasants, half-drunk
and shouting at the singers to repeat the good tune they just heard. I
imagine, in places like New York, Philadelphia, and Boston, things were pretty
much the same: sure, there were rich folks in boxes, but below them lurked a
large, fiesty crowd that just got off work.
Steve Wolk
G. Brown wrote:
> I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
> Sorry it had to be you,SW....As to your other points,I DO think things
> would improve in this country if only property owners were allowed the
> vote....cheers,gb
Since we are both men of property, you are no doubt right that things
would improve for YOU (and me, even though we would vote differently).
However, I doubt they would improve for the less fortunate of our
society, and they are the ones with whom my sympathies lie. GB, it is
my fervent desire to share the wealth AND the cd's, especially if it's
your wealth and your cd's. :)
Steve (an old, unreconstructed knee-jerk, bleeding heart liberal)
Steve Wolk
Yes, there were rich folks in boxes in Philadelphia, but the folks below
them were rich too. In the old days (and GB will back me up on this),
they didn't allow peasants into the Academy of Music.
Steve
Roger L. Lustig
G. Brown wrote:
>
> Jeremy Berman wrote:
> >
> > In <34B419...@erols.com> "G. Brown"
> > <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> writes:
> > >
> >
> > and
> > >Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
> >
> > Oh, puhleeze! The man ruined the lives of many innocent people. Much of
> > his "proof" was printed on the equivalent of blank pieces of paper. By
> > the end of the fifties the FACT his reputation was blackened forever
> > isn't the result of liberal revisionism. It was tarnished for good
> > reason. The man almost got the country to turn against itself, alot of
> > it based on lies. Thank God this man was stopped by forces of fairness.
> > Maybe your memories might not have been as unpleasant if you were on
> > his list.
> >
> > Jeremy
> nasty things about me-but I don't think I have ever been suspected of
> being a communist sympathizer....your response is high on hyperbole and
> histrionics, but short on supportive facts...
Look who's talking.
> communist agents were at
> work throughout the US
Name one that McCarthy uncovered.
> and UK(England's record of traitors is
> particularly appalling...and remember WE were perceived by the USSR as
> it's primary threat)...the Rosenbergs,Hiss and their fellow treasonous
> cronies were just the tip of the iceberg....
McCarthy had nothing to do with the Rosenbergs or with Hiss. Nor
was Hiss 'active' in the postwar era. Or do you have some evidence
that others do not?
> if a few Hollywood pinkos
> had to find honest employment as a result of Sen. McCarthy's hearings,
> so be it....
McCarthy had nothing to do with the Hollywood blacklists, either. Do
you know *anything* about the period? (He wasn't even in the House of
Representatives; how could he have had anything to do with HUAC?)
As for the Congress meddling in private companies, I don't think
you'd want to have to sign loyalty oaths in order to work, would you?
HUAC, etc. were *acting like Stalinists* in demanding loyalty,
self-incrimination, etc.
> the problem with revisionist liberals of that period
Look who's a revisionist! You're just making the stuff up.
>is that
> they spew all their venom on"Joe" McCarthy while conveniently over-
> looking the barbarous atrocities of "Joe" Stalin and his KGB henchmen.
A lie. Who does that?
Besides, Stalin wasn't elected to the US Senate. Tailgunner Joe
was. And he used his bully pulpit to destroy the lives of people
who had commited no wrongs.
> a case of selective amnesia......cheers,gb
Amnesia means you've forgotten something. You've never known this
stuff in the first place.
> ps:may I suggest you subscribe to NATIONAL REVIEW for a year?..it might
> just have a much-needed purgative effect on your politics...
It has a purgative effect on me whenever I read it. But I don't
generally need emetics. Tell me again about Joe Sobran...
Roger
Roger L. Lustig
G. Brown wrote:
>
> I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
No, it's been corroborated by dozens of others. And the evidence of his
criminal behavior as FBI chief is utterly beyond dispute. Bill Buckley
will tell you the same thing.
> Sorry it had to be you,SW....As to your other points,I DO think things
> would improve in this country if only property owners were allowed the
> vote...
Sure. We'd have class war. Unless, of course, you'd also ban the rest
of the people from owning firearms...
Roger
G. Brown
they can afford $80 a pop for a matinee orchestra seat.....gb
Roger L. Lustig
Eohmar wrote:
>
> >What do you mean by popular? In order to hear Mozart or Haydn's
> >music, people had to go to live concerts, and many didn't have the
> >money to do that. Outings to the concert were more the provinces
> >of the rich or elite.
>
> In Britain, a Proms season ticket in 1915 cost 2 pounds 50 -- about five or six
> pennies a concert. Even back then, this was CHEAP.
And how many people from the East End could afford even that? (Besides,
the Proms were a fairly special case.)
> The opera houses and
> concert halls of Vienna and London were always filled with peasants, half-drunk
> and shouting at the singers to repeat the good tune they just heard.
Huh? Where did you get that idea? The Hofoper filled with peasants? Covent
Garden? Drury Lane? When was this 'always'? I'd like to know.
> I
> imagine, in places like New York, Philadelphia, and Boston, things were pretty
> much the same: sure, there were rich folks in boxes, but below them lurked a
> large, fiesty crowd that just got off work.
No. The halls weren't that large, to begin with; and the tickets were
pretty expensive.
Roger
G. Brown
> would improve for YOU (and me, even though we would vote differently).
> However, I doubt they would improve for the less fortunate of our
> society, and they are the ones with whom my sympathies lie. GB, it is
> my fervent desire to share the wealth AND the cd's, especially if it's
> your wealth and your cd's. :)
>
> Steve (an old, unreconstructed knee-jerk, bleeding heart liberal)
giving away someone else'e money...SW,I am going to report you to my
friends at the tobacco companies...there is NO way they are going to let
you on any of the jurys in the upcoming "stick it to smokers" trials...
cheers,gb(only an occasional Habana when the market goes up...)
G. Brown
Roger L. Lustig wrote:
>
> G. Brown wrote:
> >
>
> > I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> > unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
>
> criminal behavior as FBI chief is utterly beyond dispute. Bill Buckley
> will tell you the same thing.
>
> > would improve in this country if only property owners were allowed the
>
> Sure. We'd have class war. Unless, of course, you'd also ban the rest
> of the people from owning firearms...
>
> Roger
have really lit your fuse....
..I do think it is a little extreme to say that HUAC was "acting like
Stalinists"...can you name anyone they had summarily executed?...and
in which state was the American Gulag?...I think I'll go there instead
of Disneyland on my next vacation....
...also isn't it amazing what people feel free to say about someone
AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
have wet their pants if he had given them a cross look while alive...I
stand by my "unsubstantiated slander" claim....don't think you can prove
otherwise...cheers,gb....
ps-oh,yes,in time of war(hot,cold or luke-warm)I would be most willing
to swear an oath of allegiance to my country....how about you?
Constantin Marcou
Roger L. Lustig wrote:
> [big snip]
>
> Besides, Stalin wasn't elected to the US Senate. Tailgunner Joe
> was.
That's precisely the problem. Stalin's acts can be characterized as those of
an unauthorized bully. McCarthy, on the other hand (like Hitler) was elected
by people who presumably felt he represented their political views or
mentality. So was it really him? Or was it the tenor of the times and the
majority's genuine fear of subversion?
There was an interesting interview with him in Esquire magazine many years ago,
by a very well-known writer (I forget who and when), in which it became
apparent that all McCarthy's campaign against Communists had been a matter of
posturing and grandstanding and jumping on a political bandwagon, and did not
reflect any of his personal convictions. After his downfall, he couldn't
understand people's animosity toward him; he had never meant any of it. To me,
this was the most disgusting aspect of the whole affair.
--
Best regards,
Con
*****************************************************************
"Mozart is too easy for beginners and too difficult for artists."
- Artur Schnabel
*****************************************************************
Please remove * from address to reply.
Gerrit Stolte
Constantin Marcou <conm...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Roger L. Lustig wrote:
>> [big snip]
>>
>> Besides, Stalin wasn't elected to the US Senate. Tailgunner Joe
>> was.
>That's precisely the problem. Stalin's acts can be characterized as those of
>an unauthorized bully. McCarthy, on the other hand (like Hitler) was elected
>by people who presumably felt he represented their political views or
>mentality. So was it really him? Or was it the tenor of the times and the
>majority's genuine fear of subversion?
I guess you have a point here, nonetheless it should be evident that
democracies shouldn't use an unelected dictator as a yardstick. If we
want freedom, democracy and human rights, we should make sure to clean
our own houses first.
>There was an interesting interview with him in Esquire magazine many years ago,
>by a very well-known writer (I forget who and when), in which it became
>apparent that all McCarthy's campaign against Communists had been a matter of
>posturing and grandstanding and jumping on a political bandwagon, and did not
>reflect any of his personal convictions. After his downfall, he couldn't
>understand people's animosity toward him; he had never meant any of it. To me,
>this was the most disgusting aspect of the whole affair.
Of course, those were different times, but we should remember that
McCarthy was just elected by the majority of voter in one state
(probably not even half of all eligeble voters). Hitler recieved
roughly a third of the votes cast. That he took over the executive had
more to do with backroom dealings among political parties.
Gerrit
To reply via e-mail, remove "nospam*" from my adress
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ...also isn't it amazing what people feel free to say about someone
> AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
> have wet their pants if he had given them a cross look while alive...
Hey, G.! I remember articles coming out against Hoover in 1968 in the
mainstream press. The typical response? One letter to the editor from
"one of the masses" sticks out in my memory: "You have shown your true
colors -- RED and YELLOW!" I assume that beside s the Communist
allusion, the writer was engaging in a bit of bigotry again the Chinese.
> I
> stand by my "unsubstantiated slander" claim....don't think you can prove
> otherwise...cheers,gb....
I've seen the picture of him in a dress. He looks like a typical
(steretype) dowdy Russian housewife!
> ps-oh,yes,in time of war(hot,cold or luke-warm)I would be most willing
> to swear an oath of allegiance to my country....how about you?
Sure -- against people like Ollie North, John Poindexter, John Singlaub,
etc. etc.
But only if the war was a legitimate one, in my mind -- not that Gulf
Farce started by George "Out-of-the-loop."
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> Now they put the peasants way,way,up in the nose-bleed section...unless
> they can afford $80 a pop for a matinee orchestra seat.....gb
When "Sweeny Todd" was playing in Los Angeles, we bought the cheapesyt
tickets available, because we were in on a well-known secret: The house
was so empty every night (a real shame!) that the house personnel would
direct us to seats three floors closer to the stage before curtain time.
DAMN, was that whistle loud!
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:...sadly, the
> revisionist liberal historians have done a number on both him and J.
> Edgar Hoover,a great American public servant if there ever was one...
<???> You mean, like, TIME Magazine, the organ of Henry Luce, who
directed their writers to to a "hatchet job" on Ralph Nader in the
'60s?? Now, I know a lot of people find TIME to be liberal because
their idea of "centrist" is US Snooze and Weird Report, but that's only
in their limited scope of thought. To them, The Nation is probably a
commie rag (even though CNN has finally started putting its contributors
on their pundit shows), and Insight magazine is a ray of golden sunshine
when all about is darkness (sort of like a stream of bat-piss in a
cave). Anyway, back on topic, TIME ran an expose` of Hoover soon after
his death in '72. Hardly wil accusations, and backed up with solid
research.
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
On 8 Jan 1998 04:13:56 , John S Mamoun wrote:
>Edward Dimitri Kennaway (ken...@zetnet.co.uk) wrote:
>: any other free countries (nor in many not-so-free countries). It also
>: seems to me that, when America declared independence in 1776,
>: 'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
>: music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
>: it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
>: was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
>: time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
>: probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
>
>music, people had to go to live concerts, and many didn't have the
>money to do that. Outings to the concert were more the provinces
>to care about such music, and the audiences then simply weren't
>as sophisticated as they are now, so they had less of an inclination
>to trudge out to concert halls to hear such music, save for an elite
>percentage of the general population. In both absolute and
>relative terms, far fewer people paid attention to Haydn or
>Mozart's music then they do today, since audiences today are more
>sophisticated and they have easier access to cheap music, via tapes,
>CDs, etc. Then as now, most people listened to rustic or folkish
>music, rather than music that expanded their thought processes.
More problems with my mailer, I think, so I'll try to remember my
reply to your comments above:
By 'popular' I mean music that was presented on a formal and regular
basis for public consumption, as opposed to the rustic or folkish
music you refer to, however widely performed or appreciated. I accept
that this may seem a personal and arbitrary definition but I consider
it relevant as it concerns music intended for the public arena, rather
than music in the home. It could equally be argued, however, that by
the end of the 19th century, a great deal of classical music was
performed and enjoyed in the home too, if not so much in Mozert's day.
(Hope I remembered correctly - it's substantially the same).
EDK
G. Brown
Ruskees and Red Chinese....when my pal Steve Wolk hears about this he is
going to want to organize other dyed -in-the-wool liberals to defend
JEH from such charges....
funny thing about pictures...they can be doctored quite easily...
..and about that "Gulf Farce"...just shows that you should respect other
peoples' customs(are you listening VPO bashers)...if GB(I am ashamed I
share his initials!)hadn't tried to make a point by sending a female to
be Iraq's ambassador the whole foolishness might have been avoided.....
apparently she was unable to get our determination on the issue across
...maybe because the Iraquis weren't used to listening to her kind....
chers,gb
G. Brown
D.G. Porter wrote:
>
> G. Brown wrote:
quickly at the intermission....cheers,gb
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
On 8 Jan 1998 00:12:40 , Steve Wolk wrote:
>G. Brown wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > Brian Newhouse wrote:
>> >
>> > And how do you fellow-Americans out there justify your affection for
>> > such an un-American, effete, elitist enterprise as classical music? I
>> > sure can't.
>> >
>> > Brian Newhouse
>> > newh...@mail.crisp.net
>> > ******************************************************************
>> >
>> > Being non-American - as opposed to un-American - I hope I will not
>> > incite any resentment by throwing my hat into the ring!
>> >
>> > Firstly, it seems to me that the phrase 'un-American' may evoke some
>> > very unpleasant memories of McCarthyism and J.Edgar Hoover in many
>> > people. I take it that the only logical interpretation of it would be
>> > that it refers to anything of an unconstitutional nature (not unlike
>> > the above-mentioned persons themselves?!). Presumably, there is
>> > nothing unconstitutional about classical music, either in America or
>> > seems to me that, when America declared independence in 1776,
>> > 'classical' music was actually current and that, apart from indigenous
>> > music of the American Indians and folk idioms brought by immigrants,
>> > it was the mainstream form (Haydn and Mozart were still alive and LvB
>> > was only six at the time!). It follows, obviously, that at any given
>> > time, classical music was current and, until the 20th century,
>> > probably the most 'popular' music. This would hardly qualify it as
>> Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
>> problem...Sen. McCarthy was establishment enough to date one of the
>> revisionist liberal historians have done a number on both him and J.
>> Edgar Hoover,a great American public servant if there ever was one...
>> is beyond me...cheers,gb
>
>gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
>outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
>there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
>Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
>dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
>the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
>able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
>
>Steve
Firstly, regarding Bacharach, I believe he found a genuinely personal
musical style, in which non-symmetrical rhythms played a vital and
unusual role, compared with 'pop' music more generally. He also had a
keen gift for melody and, I would say, was among the pre-eminent
songwriters of his generation and one of the rare originals in a
fairly cliche-ridden genre. By the way, his musical background is also
interesting in that he studied composition seriously (not a guarantee
of greatness, I realise), with a distinguished European composer who
taught in America (and whose name escapes me for now). By including
him in my shortlist, I offer no comparisons with the others mentioned
but simply wanted to incorporate a more recent reference.
As to McCarthy - and speaking as an outsider - the impression is one
of an insidious paranoia which often provided the means for people
with ulterior motives to rat on their fellow countrymen, even if their
were no basis for it. As to the matter of being at war and the issue of
the British traitors, mentioned elsewhere, it is quite true that we
had such problems, HOWEVER, I think it important to draw an essential
distinction between those guilty of treason and those who, quite
openly, espouse alternative political doctrines. Here in Britain, the
British Communist Party did not give rise to the kind of problems that
arose in America during the McCarthy era, largely because we trusted
the ballot box and, thus far, have been proved - in the main - to be
correct. During the post-War era, we have been a mainly two-party
country and Communism was, I believe, never regarded as much of a
threat, other than in the Iron-Curtain countries themsleves, of
course. However widely Communism may have been endorsed in America, it
seems to me altogether unlikely that it would ever have gained
ascendancy there and that 'witchhunts' were not the best way to deal
with the problem - real or imagined. I repeat, I am an outsider but it
seems that there are many Americans who share this view.
About JEH, he seems to have conducted a reign of terror not unlike
that of the former KJB - and I base this entirely on information
originating from within the States. Clearly, however, opinion is
divided which means, I guess, that not all Americans think the same
way about this, OR classical music ( - by George! I nearly forgot -
this is a classical music NG!).
All the best,
ED -'longwinded' -K
G. Brown
country...that could never have been achieved democratically;this was a
movement dedicated to the overthrow(violently if necessary)of the United
States govt.
remember, we were at war...there were nuclear secrets involved that
threatened the security of every living organism on this planet with the
possible exception of a few cockroaches...and the communists had
significant success in infiltrating the nuclear dis-armament movement,
and the anti-Viet Nam war movement which resulted in a great
POLITICAL(as opposed to military) defeat, that left thousands of
Vietnamese at the mercy of a butcherous, totalitarian regime(read up on
the suffering of the boat people)...to compare J. Edgar Hoover's FBI to
the KGB is so outrageous and obscene that I will pretend I didn't read
it....Bacharach certainly showed "promise"(no pun intended there)...but
then he seemed to drop off the face of the earth...what happened to
him?....cheers,gb
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
I do not deny for a moment that infiltration was a key part of the
Cold-War era as,indeed, it is in all wars. Nor do I deny that there is
a real need for democracies to defend their liberty. However, it seems
to me that things got pretty out of hand during the time in question
and I wonder seriously if all those with whom Communist doctrine found
favour were genuine activists and spies - after all, in an open,
democratic society freedom of thought is as vital as that of speech.
As far as JEH is concerned, my understanding is that he had secret
files on countless people, many of whom were highly-ranked government
officials. This would seem to me dangerous, since it means that an
appointed - as opposed to an elected - official could tamper with the
business of government as, I gather, was sometimes the case. No doubt.
somebody has to keep an eye on elected officials but I think that is
best left to the people who elect them. The idea that one unelected
official could conduct some kind of secretive, alternative government
by any means at his disposal - in this case very considerable means -
is surely a chilling thought and, moreover, I gather that Hoover was
able to maintain his position as Director of the FBI for such an
absurdly long time, precisely because of his 'power' over goverment
officials. Is it not reasonable to suggest that, if you have
Presidential elections every five years and the maximum period in
office is two terms for a President (I believe), then anyone occupying
a post as head of an intelligence agency should have similar
limitations imposed upon them. I believe this is valid, even if Hoover
had been a saint - it's a safety mechanism. So, I am not suggesting
that the avowed intention of the FBI is in any sense comparable with
the KGB - simply that one man was in control for too long and did not
always exploit his excessive powers to the good. Tell me I'm wrong
(which I expect you will!).
About Bacharach: yes his star did fade a long time ago but it would
seem that this is a problem for many popular composers - however
resourceful and gifted - owing to the constantly changing,
trend-oriented, nature of 'pop'. I suppose there is always a limit to
the amount of music in a given popular style, which can be supported
by such a commercial market. However, it would be nice if each new
generation produced something special but, I fear, this is not the
case any more. By the way, it seems that Bacharach's classic songs are
enjoying something of a renaissence just now.
All the best,
EDK
Roger L. Lustig
G. Brown wrote:
>
> Roger L. Lustig wrote:
> >
> > >
> >
> > > I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> > > unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
> >
> > criminal behavior as FBI chief is utterly beyond dispute. Bill Buckley
> > will tell you the same thing.
> >
> > > would improve in this country if only property owners were allowed the
> >
> > Sure. We'd have class war. Unless, of course, you'd also ban the rest
> > of the people from owning firearms...
> >
> > Roger
> Roger,calm down...I was just having a little fun with SW-but I seem to
> have really lit your fuse....
> ..I do think it is a little extreme to say that HUAC was "acting like
> Stalinists"...can you name anyone they had summarily executed?...and
> in which state was the American Gulag?...I think I'll go there instead
> of Disneyland on my next vacation....
Better go to school, or just a bookstore for a dictionary. One doesn't
need to execute people to be a Stalinist; we had Stalinists in this
country, too, at one time.
But these people put on show trials, demanded loyalty of thought,
demanded betrayal of others, ruined careers and lives of many who
had not even been *accused* of crimes. In short, HUAC was pretty
good at those un-American activities itself.
> ...also isn't it amazing what people feel free to say about someone
> AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
> have wet their pants if he had given them a cross look while alive...I
Speak for yourself. Plenty of people criticized him while he was alive.
But then, his stock in trade was blackmail and fear-mongering, so what's
your point?
> stand by my "unsubstantiated slander" claim....don't think you can prove
> otherwise...
Why not just let us know what you've read about Hoover?
Roger
Roger L. Lustig
G. Brown wrote:
>
> D.G. Porter wrote:
> >
> > G. Brown wrote:
> > > AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
> >
> > Hey, G.! I remember articles coming out against Hoover in 1968 in the
> > mainstream press. The typical response? One letter to the editor from
> > "one of the masses" sticks out in my memory: "You have shown your true
> > colors -- RED and YELLOW!" I assume that beside s the Communist
> > allusion, the writer was engaging in a bit of bigotry again the Chinese.
> >
> > > I
> >
> > I've seen the picture of him in a dress. He looks like a typical
> > (steretype) dowdy Russian housewife!
> >
> > > to swear an oath of allegiance to my country....how about you?
> >
> > etc. etc.
> > But only if the war was a legitimate one, in my mind -- not that Gulf
> > Farce started by George "Out-of-the-loop."
> Well,that is a new one!Hoover criticized for being soft on the
> Ruskees and Red Chinese....when my pal Steve Wolk hears about this he is
> going to want to organize other dyed -in-the-wool liberals to defend
> JEH from such charges....
Learn to read, bozo. The *responses* to the articles called the *writers*
that.
> funny thing about pictures...they can be doctored quite easily...
Sure! Hoover did a lot of that. So did McCarthy. And, yes, the
evidence is there.
> ..and about that "Gulf Farce"...just shows that you should respect other
> peoples' customs(are you listening VPO bashers)...if GB(I am ashamed I
> share his initials!)hadn't tried to make a point by sending a female to
> be Iraq's ambassador the whole foolishness might have been avoided.....
Um, no. If the State Department had bothered to *pay attention*
things might have gone a little better.
> apparently she was unable to get our determination on the issue across
> ...maybe because the Iraquis weren't used to listening to her kind....
So he failed to give her the proper support. Your point?
Roger
po...@hotmail.com
Incidentally, I did some research in school on HUAC and remember coming
across someone's graduate thesis that seemed to suggest that nailing
people as subversives for listening to classical music is not that far
out. HUAC, according to this fellow's research, would routinely compile
dossiers on people who were merely associated with the arts. One HUAC
document implicates an investigatee as a subversive because he was known
to own several pieces of abstract art. Oooo, them gad damn
inter-lecturals.
Michael Berlinner, the head, no less, of the supposedly freedom loving
Ayn Rand institute also has recently come out in staunch support of
McCarthyism and HUAC in an opinion piece in the LA Times. Apparently
it's becoming chic in conservative circles to bolster the memory of HUAC,
McCarthy and the sorry history of anti-communism in general.
Remember that the next time you hear one of these jerks whine about how
terrible political correctness is. You haven't experienced real
political correctness until you have had your name smeared, your career
ruined and been dragged before the committee to name names. And remember
this the next time you hear a Libertarian tell you that he doesn't want
to "initiate force" (aww, that's sweet).
ciao,
John
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
Roger L. Lustig
G. Brown wrote:
>
> it wasn't just a question of communism gaining ascendancy in this
> country...that could never have been achieved democratically;this was a
> movement dedicated to the overthrow(violently if necessary)of the United
> States govt.
Name some names, pal. McCarthy couldn't. Who was committed to
violent overthrow among those he smeared?
Then tell us which of the Hollywood Ten, etc. were committed to
violent overthrow. Tell us how you know.
> remember, we were at war...
No, we were at 'police action', and that only after 1950. HUAC
was doing its thing before then.
> there were nuclear secrets involved that
> threatened the security of every living organism on this planet with the
> possible exception of a few cockroaches...
....which had nothing to do with anything McCarthy was after, or HUAC.
> and the communists had
> significant success in infiltrating the nuclear dis-armament movement,
> and the anti-Viet Nam war movement which resulted in a great
> POLITICAL(as opposed to military) defeat, that left thousands of
> Vietnamese at the mercy of a butcherous, totalitarian regime(read up on
> the suffering of the boat people)...
Give it a rest. The antiwar movement didn't lose any war. We killed
a million of the enemy, dropped more bombs on Vietnam than we had on
Europe in WWII, and couldn't convince the people of Vietnam that the
government we were propping up had their interests at heart. The
antiwar movement didn't do a damn thing to that.
> to compare J. Edgar Hoover's FBI to
> the KGB is so outrageous and obscene that I will pretend I didn't read
> it....
He used many of the same immoral, illegal, un-American methods.
Roger Lustig
G. Brown
po...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> Incidentally, I did some research in school on HUAC and remember coming
> across someone's graduate thesis that seemed to suggest that nailing
> people as subversives for listening to classical music is not that far
> out. HUAC, according to this fellow's research, would routinely compile
> dossiers on people who were merely associated with the arts. One HUAC
> document implicates an investigatee as a subversive because he was known
> to own several pieces of abstract art. Oooo, them gad damn
> inter-lecturals.
Bork's family had rented in an effort to smear him....but Bork really
doesn't count,does he?...he's on the other side....
> Ayn Rand institute also has recently come out in staunch support of
> McCarthyism and HUAC in an opinion piece in the LA Times. Apparently
> it's becoming chic in conservative circles to bolster the memory of HUAC,
> McCarthy and the sorry history of anti-communism in general.
were you too busy putting down your government to notice......
> terrible political correctness is. You haven't experienced real
> political correctness until you have had your name smeared, your career
> ruined and been dragged before the committee to name names.
the back of the head....you think it was bad HERE in the 50s.....
cheers,gb
ps-tell your pal Roger I'll dispatch him after I've had a couple of
whiskys.
pps-have enjoyed listening to Ashkenazy's DSCH 9th tonight(an effort
to keep on topic)
G. Brown
Brian Newhouse wrote:
>
> In article <34B541...@erols.com>, sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com wrote:
>
> > D.G. Porter wrote:
> > >
> > > G. Brown wrote:
> > > > ...also isn't it amazing what people feel free to say about someone
> > > > AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
> > > > have wet their pants if he had given them a cross look while alive...
> > >
> > > Hey, G.! I remember articles coming out against Hoover in 1968 in the
> > > mainstream press. The typical response? One letter to the editor from
> > > "one of the masses" sticks out in my memory: "You have shown your true
> > > colors -- RED and YELLOW!" I assume that beside s the Communist
> > > allusion, the writer was engaging in a bit of bigotry again the Chinese.
>
>
> > Well,that is a new one!Hoover criticized for being soft on the
> > Ruskees and Red Chinese....when my pal Steve Wolk hears about this he is
> > going to want to organize other dyed -in-the-wool liberals to defend
> > JEH from such charges....
>
> against Hoover who were denounced as soft on the Russians and Red Chinese.
You are correct...I skipped over 'The typical response?"...mebbe I
should getta rebate from that speed-reading course I took?...
...calling reporters of the period soft on communism was just stating
the obvious.....
> Interesting how political disputes like these generally evoke far more
> passion and make for far longer threads than almost anything on music...
oh,I don't know...it seems like Roger and friends are capable of blowing
a gasket over any picayune thing...cheers,gb
ps-I'm off for some imbibing-if there are any conservative types out
there who want to take up the fight against some of these fruitcakes...
be my guest....
dtritter
Mr. Brown's neanderthal political views seem to animate his every
posting and hardly merit a response, save to note that if he regards J.
Edgar Hoover as a great American, he's welcome to that pernicious sexual
aberrant. I suppose he likewise reveres Roy Cohn and that worthy's
godfather, the unlamented Joseph R. McCarthy. If you lived through that
charnel house pantheon, as I did, then it's not easy to read Brown's
praise without a bedpan handy.
dft
This article was posted from <A HREF="http://www.slurp.net/">Slurp Net</A>.
Jeremy Cook
Jicotea wrote:
>
> G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote in article
> <34B57A...@erols.com>...
> > po...@hotmail.com wrote:
> <snip>
> <snip>
> <snip.snip.snip>
> <snip>
>
> "Ein ehrlicher Zank, da stelle ich meinen Mann! ....Doch dies Gemiaule
> macht mich ungesund."
>
> --Ferruccio Busoni, _Arlecchino_
Well, my German is a bit rusty, but here's my best attempt to translate:
"Though your opinion stinks, you still my main man! .... Ducks flying
south also make a mighty racket."
I'm sure my word order is a bit off, but you really need to hear it in
the original German to get the full impact, anyway.
Jeremy Cook - Newtown, CT
Constantin Marcou
G. Brown wrote:
> Steve Wolk wrote:
> >
> > gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
> > outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
> > there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
> > Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
> > dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
> > the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
> > able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
> >
> > Steve
> I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
[snip]
What about the photographs of the orgies with the naked little boys? Is she
responsible for those too?
Constantin Marcou
Constantin Marcou wrote:
> G. Brown wrote:
>
> > Steve Wolk wrote:
> > >
> > > gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
> > > outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
> > > there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
> > > Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
> > > dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
> > > the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
> > > able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
> > >
> > > Steve
> > I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> > unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
>
> [snip]
>
> What about the photographs of the orgies with the naked little boys? Is she
> responsible for those too?
>
P.S. And don't accuse me of defaming the defenseless dead. I made similar
cracks when he was very much alive, and they've never resulted in any visits
from the men in black.
Brian Newhouse
> D.G. Porter wrote:
> >
> > G. Brown wrote:
> > > ...also isn't it amazing what people feel free to say about someone
> > > AFTER he is dead ,and can't fire back...those same critics of JEH would
> > > have wet their pants if he had given them a cross look while alive...
> >
> > Hey, G.! I remember articles coming out against Hoover in 1968 in the
> > mainstream press. The typical response? One letter to the editor from
> > "one of the masses" sticks out in my memory: "You have shown your true
> > colors -- RED and YELLOW!" I assume that beside s the Communist
> > allusion, the writer was engaging in a bit of bigotry again the Chinese.
[snip! snip!]
> Well,that is a new one!Hoover criticized for being soft on the
> Ruskees and Red Chinese....when my pal Steve Wolk hears about this he is
> going to want to organize other dyed -in-the-wool liberals to defend
> JEH from such charges....
Er, I believe it was the reporters of the mainstream press coming out
against Hoover who were denounced as soft on the Russians and Red Chinese.
[snip!]
Interesting how political disputes like these generally evoke far more
passion and make for far longer threads than almost anything on music...
--
Brian Newhouse
newh...@mail.crisp.net
Brian Newhouse
In article <693f19$2m6$1...@irk.zetnet.co.uk>, ken...@zetnet.co.uk (Edward
Dimitri Kennaway) wrote:
>[snip]
>
> By 'popular' I mean music that was presented on a formal and regular
> basis for public consumption, as opposed to the rustic or folkish
> music you refer to, however widely performed or appreciated. I accept
> that this may seem a personal and arbitrary definition but I consider
> it relevant as it concerns music intended for the public arena, rather
> than music in the home. It could equally be argued, however, that by
> the end of the 19th century, a great deal of classical music was
> performed and enjoyed in the home too, if not so much in Mozert's day.
>
But a fair amount of "rustic or folkish" music was and is intended for
public consumption. Think of the various religious festivals and
processions. Think of wedding and funeral music--weddings and funerals
were if anything more part of the public sphere in pre-modern societies
than they are today. Think of court ceremonies. Think of bards
improvising their epics for an audience. You really should read a bit of
ethnomusicology.
--
Brian Newhouse
newh...@mail.crisp.net
Jicotea
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
Of course! It could be fairly argued that nearly all music is intended
for public consumption - a fact which is, at times, unfulfilled for the
composers, and sometimes, agonising for the public. However, I don't
follow your assertion about all the above arenas: a great deal of
music for weddings, funerals and, especially, court ceremonies was
classical. And what about the Church more generally - surely an
enormous amount of religious music falls into the category of
'classical' music ( both generically and chronologically speaking ).
As to reading up on ethnomusicology, if I ever get away from perusing
this NG again, I would be happy to brush up. However, I still do not
see that you have said anything to reinforce your argument that
classical music is 'un-American'! (That was you wasn't it? The thread
got somewhat buried underneath Hoover, McCarthy and HUAC - partly my
fault, I fear, but the connotations of 'un-American' were strongly
associated with such people and their times).
Cheerio, EDK
Matt
IN the words of Arnie Nath.... errrr N. Fritz, "GET THAT HOOK OUT OF
MY MOUTH!"
--
Matt Fields, A.Mus.D. http://www-personal.umich.edu/~fields/TTTB
Featured addresses: ra...@TYPEDLETTERS.COM birth...@INAME.COM us...@REPLAY.COM trav...@XS4ALL.NL gru...@NETROX.NET mra...@MAGG.NET
bdr...@PONYEXPRESS.NET ni...@cyberxpress.net, ro...@clever.net postm...@array.ca ME...@HOME.NET j...@pornlord.com
Matt
If you were looking for the American gulag you might go back a few
years to Manzanar.
G. Brown
Roger L. Lustig wrote:
>
> G. Brown wrote:
of whisky...so if I go easy on you-thank the higher sugar content of
Jamaica's third best export...(the dope and coffee probably rank #1 
respectively,dontcha think?)
> > it wasn't just a question of communism gaining ascendancy in this
> > country...that could never have been achieved democratically;this was a
> > movement dedicated to the overthrow(violently if necessary)of the United
> > States govt.
>
> violent overthrow among those he smeared?
>
> Then tell us which of the Hollywood Ten, etc. were committed to
> violent overthrow. Tell us how you know.
if necessary)of the govt....and the American Communist party was...they
were,after all, just stooges for the powers that were in the Kremlin;no
offense meant to any former members(I suspect there are a few)on this
NG....
I never said anybody who appeared before Sen. McCarthy conspired to do
anything...but there you go again setting up straw-men(you really are
rather good at it,you know)...you ask me to "name...names"and then you
go ahead and name them yourself..the "Hollywood Ten"....no,THEY didn't
pass nuclear secrets to our sworn enemies;they weren't privy to
them.....I suspect they were there because of the "show" business
connection....they were really pretty harmless despite any communist
sympathies they harbored...and it wasn't the good senator who
"blacklisted" them but their fellow weasels out in la-laland...
>
> No, we were at 'police action', and that only after 1950. HUAC
> was doing its thing before then.
> > threatened the security of every living organism on this planet with the
>
> ....which had nothing to do with anything McCarthy was after, or HUAC.
and widespread...ANY attempt to uproot it was also an attempt to
maintain national security in the face of a very viable threat of
nuclear holocaust
> > significant success in infiltrating the nuclear dis-armament movement,
> > and the anti-Viet Nam war movement which resulted in a great
> > POLITICAL(as opposed to military) defeat, that left thousands of
> > Vietnamese at the mercy of a butcherous, totalitarian regime(read up on
>
> Give it a rest. The antiwar movement didn't lose any war. We killed
> a million of the enemy, dropped more bombs on Vietnam than we had on
> Europe in WWII, and couldn't convince the people of Vietnam that the
> government we were propping up had their interests at heart. The
> antiwar movement didn't do a damn thing to that.
croak before you begin re-writng history in such a ludicrous manner...
the "Cleopatra was Black" crowd seem positively Thucydidesian compared
to your propaganda...the anti-war movement ended on college campuses the
day Richard Nixon ended the draft...so much for your vaunted altruism...
> > to compare J. Edgar Hoover's FBI to
> > the KGB is so outrageous and obscene that I will pretend I didn't read
>
> He used many of the same immoral, illegal, un-American methods.
women other than his wife is not QUITE the same thing as carting him &
his followers off to the wastelands of Siberia....your attempts to
portray America in the 1950s as some kind of Orwellian nightmare just
won't cut it,Roger....we are going to stand up to you and tell the truth
...political correctness be damned!cheers,gb
ps...you ask in another post to cite some sources on Hoover...how about
my NATIONAL REVIEW subscription?...I suggest you sign up too...
pps...is it just me or does Ofra Harnoy wear too much make-up?(attempt
to stay on topic)...I like her romantic spin on many pieces,btw
> Roger Lustig
G. Brown
Constantin Marcou wrote:
>
> Constantin Marcou wrote:
>
> > G. Brown wrote:
> >
> > > Steve Wolk wrote:
> > > >
> > > > gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
> > > > outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
> > > > there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
> > > > Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
> > > > dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
> > > > the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
> > > > able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
> > > >
> > > > Steve
> > > I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> > > unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
> >
> > [snip]
> >
> > What about the photographs of the orgies with the naked little boys? Is she
> > responsible for those too?
> >
>
> P.S. And don't accuse me of defaming the defenseless dead. I made similar
> cracks when he was very much alive, and they've never resulted in any visits
> from the men in black.
> Con
well,Con,I see you spent a lot of time in fantasy land on your last trip
to Anaheim...I am not interested in pictures of naked little boys...but
in THIS case I will make an exception....please post these purported
shots on the internet...or tell me where I can find them...cheers,gb
Opus47
I discovered Shostakovich in 1984. The Soviet Union still existed as a
communist state. My best friend was Polish-Ukrainian and his mother spoke
Polish and it was learned in their family especially to hate the Soviet Union.
The collapse of communism in the Soviet Union in 1991 was one of the greatest
liberating experiences for me to come out of the closet. And now my friend
can hate Shostakovich not because he was a product of the Soviet Union, but
because he hates the music.
Fred.....Citizen of the world residing in the United States.
G. Brown
dtritter wrote:
>
> Mr. Brown's neanderthal political views seem to animate his every
> posting and hardly merit a response, save to note that if he regards J.
> Edgar Hoover as a great American, he's welcome to that pernicious sexual
> aberrant. I suppose he likewise reveres Roy Cohn and that worthy's
> godfather, the unlamented Joseph R. McCarthy. If you lived through that
> charnel house pantheon, as I did, then it's not easy to read Brown's
> praise without a bedpan handy.
> dft
Roger L. Lustig seem................................balanced. cheers,gb
Steve Wolk
G. Brown wrote:
> " (snip)
> Well,that is a new one!Hoover criticized for being soft on the
> Ruskees and Red Chinese....when my pal Steve Wolk hears about this he is
> going to want to organize other dyed -in-the-wool liberals to defend
> JEH from such charges
Because I am so liberal, I would defend YOU, GB - but JEH? No way!
By the way, while all those commie types were infiltrating us, weren't
we doing the same thing to them? Sure, you can't compare Hoover to
Lavrenti Beria (sp?) but Hoover's idea of America was not the kind we
represent to the rest of the world.
By the way, nobody brought up the KGB until you did. I mentioned the
NKVD in my original post. As an old cold warrior, I'm sure you know the
difference. :)
Steve
G. Brown
make what came after(Kgb)seem like pusseycats....(no offense,Jaune Tom)
cheers,gb
Brian Newhouse
In article <6940t3$3g1$1...@irk.zetnet.co.uk>, ken...@zetnet.co.uk (Edward
Dimitri Kennaway) wrote:
[snip]
> >But a fair amount of "rustic or folkish" music was and is intended for
> >public consumption. Think of the various religious festivals and
> >processions. Think of wedding and funeral music--weddings and funerals
> >were if anything more part of the public sphere in pre-modern societies
> >than they are today. Think of court ceremonies. Think of bards
> >improvising their epics for an audience. You really should read a bit of
> >ethnomusicology.
> >
> >--
> >Brian Newhouse
> >newh...@mail.crisp.net
> >.
>
> Of course! It could be fairly argued that nearly all music is intended
> for public consumption - a fact which is, at times, unfulfilled for the
> composers, and sometimes, agonising for the public. However, I don't
> follow your assertion about all the above arenas: a great deal of
> music for weddings, funerals and, especially, court ceremonies was
> classical. And what about the Church more generally - surely an
> enormous amount of religious music falls into the category of
> 'classical' music ( both generically and chronologically speaking ).
Only in urban or otherwise affluent areas, and in the case of church music
only among certain liturgically elaborate denominations. When you are
talking about, for instance, the more remote regions of Sicily or
Transylvania or Ireland (not to mention most of the non-Western world!),
the music involved is likely to take the folk rather than the classical
music of its day as a point of departure.
> However, I still do not
> see that you have said anything to reinforce your argument that
> classical music is 'un-American'!
You know how those threads are. Somebody brings up one topic, which leads
to another, and next thing you know you have fifteen different unrelated
conversations all over cyberspace. I wasn't even addressing my original
argument.
--
Brian Newhouse
newh...@mail.crisp.net
Dudley Brooks
On Fri, 9 Jan 1998, G. Brown wrote:
> Roger L. Lustig wrote:
> >
> > G. Brown wrote:
> > >
> > > and the communists had
> > > significant success in infiltrating the nuclear dis-armament movement,
> > > and the anti-Viet Nam war movement which resulted in a great
> > > POLITICAL(as opposed to military) defeat, that left thousands of
> > > Vietnamese at the mercy of a butcherous, totalitarian regime(read up on
> > > the suffering of the boat people)...
> >
> > Give it a rest. The antiwar movement didn't lose any war. We killed
> > a million of the enemy, dropped more bombs on Vietnam than we had on
> > Europe in WWII, and couldn't convince the people of Vietnam that the
> > government we were propping up had their interests at heart. The
> > antiwar movement didn't do a damn thing to that.
>
> You really should wait till those of us who were alive at that time
> croak before you begin re-writng history in such a ludicrous manner...
I was alive at that time (and don't plan on croaking for quite a while),
and Mr. Lustig is correct.
> the anti-war movement ended on college campuses the
> day Richard Nixon ended the draft.
That would seem to be evidence for Mr. Lustig's position.
> we are going to stand up to you and tell the truth
Is that the editorial "we", the royal "we", or the megalomaniac "we"? It
certainly doesn't seem to be the *plural* pronoun, at least not in this
newsgroup.
-- Dudley Brooks
Run For Your Life!...
...it's a dance company!
San Francisco
http://www.best.com/~voices/
Per Erik Rønne
G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote:
[snip]
I'm just mystified by this debate on McCarthy in relation to serious
music.
When I first read the initial article, I considered the phrase
'un-American' something that alluded to the fact that the USA has always
been a cultural province of Europe. That the Americans eat roast pork
with ketchup [to a Dane it is the litmus test of Cultural Barbarity] and
have always had to import its greatest Artists and Scientists from
Europe:-).
And lots of people use this joke as the starting signal of a Joseph
McCarty debate - a man who lived in the middle of the last century [in
two years, that is :-)]
--
Per Erik Rønne
E-mail: xer...@diku.edu.dk
Homepage: http://www.diku.dk/students/xerxes
Remove '.edu' before e-mail [anti-spam]
Per Erik Rønne
D.G. Porter <dgpo...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> When "Sweeny Todd" was playing in Los Angeles, we bought the cheapesyt
> tickets available, because we were in on a well-known secret: The house
> was so empty every night (a real shame!) that the house personnel would
> direct us to seats three floors closer to the stage before curtain time.
Oh, and in Copenhagen, Denmark, you cannot even get a ticket for the
Royal Opera, unless you are a subscriber. Everything is sold out before
the begining of the season. Always full house ...
Fortunately, I'm a subscriber ...
Clovis Lark
In article <1d2lcnu.1l8...@ppp69.alb.tele.dk>,
=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Per_Erik_R=F8nne?= <xer...@diku.edu.dk> wrote:
>G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote:
>
>[snip]
>
>I'm just mystified by this debate on McCarthy in relation to serious
>music.
>
>When I first read the initial article, I considered the phrase
>'un-American' something that alluded to the fact that the USA has always
>been a cultural province of Europe. That the Americans eat roast pork
>with ketchup [to a Dane it is the litmus test of Cultural Barbarity] and
>have always had to import its greatest Artists and Scientists from
>Europe:-).
Let us not forget that mitochondrial DNA testing shows that Europe
imported all the stock that became the basis for its culture from
Africa. Let us also not forget that the US immigrants who left europe
were, for the most part, deemed not worthy of European residency.
>
>And lots of people use this joke as the starting signal of a Joseph
>McCarty debate - a man who lived in the middle of the last century [in
>two years, that is :-)]
>
G. Brown
Clovis Lark wrote:
>
> In article <1d2lcnu.1l8...@ppp69.alb.tele.dk>,
> =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Per_Erik_R=F8nne?= <xer...@diku.edu.dk> wrote:
> >G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote:
> >
> >[snip]
> >
> >I'm just mystified by this debate on McCarthy in relation to serious
> >music.
> >
> >When I first read the initial article, I considered the phrase
> >'un-American' something that alluded to the fact that the USA has always
> >been a cultural province of Europe. That the Americans eat roast pork
> >with ketchup [to a Dane it is the litmus test of Cultural Barbarity] and
> >have always had to import its greatest Artists and Scientists from
> >Europe:-).
>
> Let us not forget that mitochondrial DNA testing shows that Europe
> imported all the stock that became the basis for its culture from
> Africa. Let us also not forget that the US immigrants who left europe
> were, for the most part, deemed not worthy of European residency.
& the dregs of African "society"...we all know who founded Australia!..
....California was settled by low-lifes from the east who couldn't cut
it in New Yawk...the American Indians weren't hardy enough for Siberia
and had to head "south" to North Dakota...
...hey,Clovis!...this is a fun game....your turn now....gb
Gabriel Kuper
xer...@diku.edu.dk (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Per_Erik_R=F8nne?=) writes:
> Oh, and in Copenhagen, Denmark, you cannot even get a ticket for the
> Royal Opera, unless you are a subscriber. Everything is sold out before
> the begining of the season. Always full house ...
>
> Fortunately, I'm a subscriber ...
Really? When I was there (last September, for Maskerade, in between 2
of the Ring operas in Aarhus) I had no problem getting in: just show
up at the box office a few hours before, wait in line, and get a
reasonably priced ticket: there aren't very many tickets for sale on
the day, but there are usually some.
Copenhagen does have an amusing system for running the queue for
tickets. There is a machine that issues numbers automatically, and
the box office calls people by number. Problem is, the machine is only
turned on a few minutes before the box office opens. So instead of
lining up for the box office, there is a line of people waiting for
the machine....
Gabriel Kuper
Jicotea
G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote in article
<34B5BE...@erols.com>...
dtritter wrote:
<black hole of a snip>
Have you people no jobs to go to?
John Wiser
po...@hotmail.com
In article <01bd1d68$6eabd080$ad8f82d1@candacew>,
"Jicotea" <jic...@frontiernet.com> wrote:
> "Ein ehrlicher Zank, da stelle ich meinen Mann! ....Doch dies Gemiaule
> macht mich ungesund."
I resent that. I've never been more gesund in my life. I'm the most
gesund man in all the Russias.
:)ciao,
John
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
po...@hotmail.com
In article <newhouse-080...@t1-48.crisp.net>,
newh...@mail.crisp.net (Brian Newhouse) wrote:
> Interesting how political disputes like these generally evoke far more
> passion and make for far longer threads than almost anything on music...
Not surprising. Music was meant to be listened to, not debated. Politics
is all debate, no listening.
ciao,
J
po...@hotmail.com
In article <1d2ldev.ls...@ppp69.alb.tele.dk>,
xer...@diku.edu.dk (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Per_Erik_R=F8nne?=) wrote:
>
> D.G. Porter <dgpo...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
> > When "Sweeny Todd" was playing in Los Angeles, we bought the cheapesyt
> > tickets available, because we were in on a well-known secret: The house
> > was so empty every night (a real shame!) that the house personnel would
> > direct us to seats three floors closer to the stage before curtain time.
>
> Royal Opera, unless you are a subscriber. Everything is sold out before
> the begining of the season. Always full house ...
>
> Fortunately, I'm a subscriber ...
What a stark, sad commentary on the difference between a culture that
invests in art and art education and one which leaves art to flounder on
the high seas of the "free" market.
po...@hotmail.com
In article <34B5BE...@erols.com>,
Actually he seems to have a shread of decency about him.
Lustig, OTOH, has blown you clean out of the water. I'm not surprised
you've avoided giving any of his posts an honest answer.
All bark, no bite, apparently.
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
>
> Roger L. Lustig wrote:
> >
> > G. Brown wrote:
> > > and the communists had
> > > significant success in infiltrating the nuclear dis-armament movement,
> > > and the anti-Viet Nam war movement which resulted in a great
> > > POLITICAL(as opposed to military) defeat,
> > a million of the enemy, dropped more bombs on Vietnam than we had on
> > Europe in WWII, and couldn't convince the people of Vietnam that the
> > government we were propping up had their interests at heart. The
> > antiwar movement didn't do a damn thing to that.
> You really should wait till those of us who were alive at that time
> day Richard Nixon ended the draft...so much for your vaunted altruism...
First, GB, read MacNamara's book and learn from an insider why the war
was not winnable. The Saigon government was a fraud and most Vietnamese
knew it. Eisenhower started the mess when he cancelled elections in
Vietnam inthe '50s because he knew Ho Chi Minh would be elected. And
that is what drove Ho into the camp of the Chinese.
Also, you're going to have to wait until I'm dead because I too was
alive at the time, and YOUR rewriting of history, the kind mouthed for
20 years by that blathering Reagan, is not going to last long once you
apologists have passed on. Then the records will speak for hemselves
and yopur viewoint will be condemned to the ashcan of history...
And as to the anti-war movement, 4 dead guys in Ohio and our own
troops firing on us did have something to do with it too -- not that I
fault people for wanting to protectheir own skins from our own troops,
but that was abig disappointment to me when everyone went home and
became yuppies.
> > >...how about
> my NATIONAL REVIEW subscription?...I suggest you sign up too...
Yeah, another great mag up there with Insight, Human Events, The Weakly
Standard, the Washingmachine Times....
William Fbuckley (AKA Buckley Southland) sez, "YOU TOO can become a
RIGHTER!"
D.G. Porter
> macht mich ungesund."
>
He doesn't know much --
But he thinks he knows a lot.
O, DOESN'T he think he knows an awufl lot!
But what he knows, everybody knows.
And what he doesn't know, everybody knows too.
And when it comes to talkin',
He's there with both his jaws.
And the sounds you hear are the sound you hear
When the crows get going their "caws"...
--Chas. Ives
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ...calling reporters of the period soft on communism was just stating
> the obvious.....
Oh, ChristFuckPiss, are we going to have to lissen to a "liberal media
bias" line in this thread too?????
Reed Irvine, this guy needs your salve and balm! He's hurtin'!
D.G. Porter
Matt wrote:
>
> If you were looking for the American gulag you might go back a few
> years to Manzanar.
> --
Good one, Matt!
My father's uncle Will supervised the building of the camp in Idaho, and
to him it was just another job...
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
>
> po...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >
> > Incidentally, I did some research in school on HUAC and remember coming
> > across someone's graduate thesis that seemed to suggest that nailing
> > people as subversives for listening to classical music is not that far
> > out. Oooo, them gad damn
> > inter-lecturals.
> Golly,what a dirty trick...kind of like checking up on what videos Judge
> Bork's family had rented in an effort to smear him....but Bork really
> doesn't count,does he?...he's on the other side....
Oh PissChristFuckeroo, the Bork simile heads its ugly rear...
I don't remember that Bork was smeared for his video list (they just
noted the ubermenschian trend towards titles with "MEN" in them, big
strong burly Rambo types), but it was his legal decisions that sank him
like a standing stone...
> "sorry history of anti-communism"...hey,Pooh,WE WON THE COLD WAR...or
> were you too busy putting down your government to notice......
No, I was too busy tryiong to keep my lunch down every time the news ran
a gee-gosh down-homespun homily by that airhead Ronzo, who "won" the
cold war by running us up $4 trillion in a spending spree to bankrupt
the great satan. (BTW, howcum the GOP won't talk about making a payment
on that debt? All they want to do is cut taxes and keep up the $300
million yearly in interest...)
> > You haven't experienced real
> > political correctness until you have had your name smeared, your career
> > ruined and been dragged before the committee to name names.
> or been dragged from your home in the middle of the night and shot in
> the back of the head....you think it was bad HERE in the 50s.....
> cheers,gb
Oh, izzat what happened to you? No wonder you stopped thinking 47 years
ago!!! You need to have that plug removed! Try some Drano or a Roto
Rooter man!
D.G. Porter
Brian Newhouse wrote:
> Interesting how political disputes like these generally evoke far more
> passion and make for far longer threads than almost anything on music...
I AM the only one who's read that book!!
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ..and about that "Gulf Farce"...just shows that you should respect other
> peoples' customs(are you listening VPO bashers)...if GB(I am ashamed I
> share his initials!)hadn't tried to make a point by sending a female to
> be Iraq's ambassador the whole foolishness might have been avoided.....
> apparently she was unable to get our determination on the issue across
> ...maybe because the Iraquis weren't used to listening to her kind....
> chers,gb
April Glaspie said that we had no interest in anything he did to Kuwait.
She also was the person responsible for sending our trops into Somalia
(on Bush's watch) where they got killed.
Talk about revisionism...
Steven Correll
In article <34B419...@erols.com>,
G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote:
>..my memories of "McCarthyism" aren't"unpleasant"....we were at war and
>Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
>communists..
"We were at war" is the same excuse that Stalin (and Western apologists
like Lillian Hellman) offered for the Soviet purges: foreigners had sought
to overthow the People's Republic ever since 1917.
Perhaps unwittingly, you've implied elsewhere that the moral distinction
between the Soviets and us is that they killed their dissidents outright
whereas we merely deprived ours of their livelihood. I prefer to believe the
important distinction is that they believed in suppressing dissent, whereas
we believe in tolerating it; thus I prefer to regard the McCarthy period as a
tragic exception where our actions betrayed our beliefs. When one resists
evil, there is always a tendency to become like the very evil one resists.
As for loyalty oaths, there's a fine saying among US dissenter churches:
"Always love your country, but never trust its government." Make sure you
realize which one the oath is about.
--
Steven Correll == PO Box 66625, Scotts Valley, CA 95067 == s...@netcom.com
Mike Painter
Amen!
Mike Painter
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
Bearing in mind some of the above comments, I imagine I am preaching
to the converted but I'd still like to know if anyone agrees with me
about Hoover having been an unelected official who occupied a position
of almost unrivalled (sorry about the double 'l' - I'm a Limey) power,
for a ridiculously long period of time, without being accountable to
the people. That seems to me to be a kind of 'dictatorship'
situation, even though Hoover was, in theory, a servant of government
and, through it, of the people. As a matter of personal curiosity, has
any mandatory time-limit been set for directorship of the intelligence
community organisations (sorry about the 's' but......). I believe
this should be the case in all countries, including mine ( and I
confess that, like many here, I am unclear on the position).
By the way, can anyone recall which American (I think) who said
something to the effect that a true patriot is always ready to take up
arms against his government?
EDK
Constantin Marcou
G. Brown wrote:
> Constantin Marcou wrote:
> >
> > Constantin Marcou wrote:
> >
> > > G. Brown wrote:
> > >
> > > > Steve Wolk wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > gb, you never cease to entertain us. I love it when you say such
> > > > > outrageous things, even if I disagree with 99% of it. But don't forget,
> > > > > there are many in the former USSR today who feel about the NKVD and
> > > > > Joe Stalin just as you do about Tail-Gunner Joe and the Hoover in a blue
> > > > > dress. So, while you're at it, how about eliminating child-labor laws,
> > > > > the EPA, the FDA and universal suffrage? Who knows, you might even be
> > > > > able to bring back sweatshops, Pinkertons and segregated lunch-counters.
> > > > >
> > > > > Steve
> > > > I knew SOMEBODY would bring up the libel about the dress...an
> > > > unsubstantiated slander by a woman with many reasons to hate JEH's guts.
> > >
> > > [snip]
> > >
> > > What about the photographs of the orgies with the naked little boys? Is she
> > > responsible for those too?
> > >
> >
> > P.S. And don't accuse me of defaming the defenseless dead. I made similar
> > cracks when he was very much alive, and they've never resulted in any visits
> > from the men in black.
> > Best regards,
> > Con
> well,Con,I see you spent a lot of time in fantasy land on your last trip
> to Anaheim...I am not interested in pictures of naked little boys...but
> in THIS case I will make an exception....please post these purported
> shots on the internet...or tell me where I can find them...cheers,gb
You'll have to look up some old queens in San Diego (whose names I don't recall and
who might even be dead by now -- old friends of Clyde Tolsen's, you know.) It's not
difficult: just go to a likely gathering place and express an interest in the
photos. Actually, you could just do a search on the net for "Clyde Tolsen" and see
what turns up. And when you track the photos down, please make some reprints for
me, too.
By the way, I don't understand why the anti-spammers aren't having apoplectic fits
about this thread and how ridiculously off-topic it has become.
--
Best regards,
Con
*****************************************************************
"Mozart is too easy for beginners and too difficult for artists."
- Artur Schnabel
*****************************************************************
Please remove * from address to reply.
Constantin Marcou
D.G. Porter wrote:
Manzanar=Gulag? Much as I am amused by GB's rants, I can't swallow the
opposition whole, either. How many people did your uncle torture to death?
How many of those charged to his custody dropped dead in their tracks of
malnutrition and overwork? Did he treat his charges in a civil
busdinesslike manner, or did he snarl at them and treat them as subhumans?
Much as the Manzanar episode is (in my opinion) a regrettable episode in our
history (and the Supreme Court has repeatedly disagreed with me), I think
your father's uncle Will can sleep with a clear conscience on those counts.
Constantin Marcou
What a wonderful apologia! I love it (especially the part about the leisure suits.)
Jeremy Cook wrote:
> Constantin Marcou wrote:
> [snip]
> > By the way, I don't understand why the anti-spammers aren't having apoplectic fits
> > about this thread and how ridiculously off-topic it has become.
>
> Well, it's different in a few important ways:
>
> 1) It started out on-topic.
>
> 2) The posters all make regular meaningful contributions to the ng.
>
> 3) It has reached such sublime heights of insult, accusation, and
> ranting on matters utterly non-musical that it has become a veritable
> caricature of an off-topic thread. Thus it is becoming part of our
> common consciousness in the newsgroup, part of the folklore, the
> zeitgeist, of rmc. Today, one need only mention "Lebrecht's Shocking
> Allegations!" or, "Was Beethoven Black?" to trigger a flood of memories
> in the mind of the reader. Future posters will glibly include
> references to the current thread as a gentle "touche," e.g., "How could
> any keep Shostakovich off their top ten composers list? Did JEH have
> photos of HIM, too?" Veterans of this era will chuckle knowingly, while
> the newbies will post "Who is JEH?" and "What is HUAC?" questions, and
> will be flamed without mercy and consigned to DejaNews. These epic
> struggles are to rmc today what leisure suits were to the 70's. No one
> will ever forget them, and how you'll feel about them in the future will
> depend on how often you were actually in one of them. :-D
>
> Well, there's the bell for round eight! Please continue, gentlemen!
>
> Jeremy Cook - Newtown, CT
Alan Swindells
In article <newhouse-080...@t1-48.crisp.net>,
newh...@mail.crisp.net (Brian Newhouse) wrote:
>
> Interesting how political disputes like these generally evoke far more
> passion and make for far longer threads than almost anything on music...
>
Yes, fun isn't it.
It is also amusing to note just how unified a nation the US is!
:-g
--
Regards: Alan * alan...@argonet.co.uk *
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds...
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Eric Schissel
Roger L. Lustig (juli...@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
>Give it a rest. The antiwar movement didn't lose any war. We killed
According to the Pentagon Papers, the reason given for denying one of the
(IIRC) last major requests for troops in Vietnam was that they might be
needed to counter unrest at home. So as a belated opponent of that "war"
I'm glad to be able to suggest there's room for disagreement on this one
point.
-Eric Schissel
>> to compare J. Edgar Hoover's FBI to
>> the KGB is so outrageous and obscene that I will pretend I didn't read
>> it....
Makes me wonder if G.Brown has read the Cointelpro Papers.
-Eric Schissel
>He used many of the same immoral, illegal, un-American methods.
>Roger Lustig
G. Brown
your mewling minions(Winnie-the-"Pooh",and my main man :"DoppelGanger"
Porter)...sorry I wasn't around for your little hissy-fit,DG(7 venomous
messages in 21 minutes...a new record)..but there are more consequential
things in life than suffering fools:in your case,though,I do it gladly..
...(BTW,Roger,what kind of a leash do you keep these cretins on?...you
don't by any chance pay them off with copies of cds that you've written
liner notes for,do you?-fess up,now...if so put me down for a copy of
"Music To Make-Out By"...your notes were great!...you should have signed
them)...
..it must be hard for you people(shocking,even!)to realize that the
insular little world you have created for yourselves with your Liberal
mythology is just a house of cards that already has come tumbling
down...I pity you ,really...I mean,you finally sneak in a liberal chief
executive and what does he do?...becomes a neo-conservative!Hell,I would
probably vote for Clinton if he could run again!...people are running
from your positions like....what were those little furry critters that
were first off the "Titanic"?...I can forgive you many things out of my
naturally compassionate Republican heart...but I can NEVER forgive your
disgraceful slanders on President Reagan and Mr. Buckley...talk about
Lilliputian hearts and minds trying to take on their betters......
(I will except Steve Correll from criticism-he had an intelligent
posting which I'd like to reply to later...and Herr Schissel as well-
thanks for brightening my evening,Eric,by reminding me of the Cointelpro
infiltrations)...cheers,gb
ps-tomorrow,if I am feeling really chipper, I am contemplating posting
a celebration of George Armstrong Custer on the NG...I hope that doesn't
send Clovis over the edge....
pps-listening to Serkin/Szell K.466.....WOW!(attempt to stay on-topic)
Jeremy Cook
G. Brown
ps-beautifully phrased post...but haven't you realized yet that humor
flies right over the heads of these Jacobins?
G. Brown
> about this thread and how ridiculously off-topic it has become.
>
> Best regards,
> Con
...well,Con,before I take time out from my Saturday morning schnapps to
go searching for "Clyde" may I ask you just two teeny-weeny questions?
Accepting the premise that JEH was...ah,just a tad kinky...tell me
1)why,with his numerous enemies in the media, these photos haven't
made it beyond a small circle of queens in San Diego?
2)acknowledging that JEH was something of an expert on filming people
surreptitiously...and that he didn't lack for taxpayer -funded personal
security arrangements...how could he allow himself to ever be in a
position to be photographed in such a compromising position...?...just
wondering...prost!...gb
Jeremy Cook
G. Brown wrote:
>
> Jeremy Cook wrote:
> >
> > Constantin Marcou wrote:
> > [snip]
> > > about this thread and how ridiculously off-topic it has become.
> >
> >
> > 1) It started out on-topic.
> >
> > 2) The posters all make regular meaningful contributions to the ng.
> >
> > 3) It has reached such sublime heights of insult, accusation, and
> > ranting on matters utterly non-musical that it has become a veritable
> > caricature of an off-topic thread. Thus it is becoming part of our
> > common consciousness in the newsgroup, part of the folklore, the
> > zeitgeist, of rmc. Today, one need only mention "Lebrecht's Shocking
> > Allegations!" or, "Was Beethoven Black?" to trigger a flood of memories
> > in the mind of the reader. Future posters will glibly include
> > references to the current thread as a gentle "touche," e.g., "How could
> > any keep Shostakovich off their top ten composers list? Did JEH have
> > photos of HIM, too?" Veterans of this era will chuckle knowingly, while
> > the newbies will post "Who is JEH?" and "What is HUAC?" questions, and
> > will be flamed without mercy and consigned to DejaNews. These epic
> > struggles are to rmc today what leisure suits were to the 70's. No one
> > will ever forget them, and how you'll feel about them in the future will
> > depend on how often you were actually in one of them. :-D
> >
> > Well, there's the bell for round eight! Please continue, gentlemen!
> >
> > Jeremy Cook - Newtown, CT
> "gentlemen"?....well,thanks for that!...cheers,gb
> ps-beautifully phrased post...but haven't you realized yet that humor
> flies right over the heads of these Jacobins?
Well, as I explained to someone else on rmcr just yesterday, I feel I've
done a good deed for the day if a bring a smile to just one person's
face. That person, of course, is me. Anyone else who gets a chuckle is
on the bonus plan. :-D
G. Brown
Steven Correll wrote:
>
> In article <34B419...@erols.com>,
> G. Brown <sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com> wrote:
> >..my memories of "McCarthyism" aren't"unpleasant"....we were at war and
> >Sen. McCarthy helped root out a legitimate subversive threat by the
> >communists..
>
> "We were at war" is the same excuse that Stalin (and Western apologists
> like Lillian Hellman) offered for the Soviet purges: foreigners had sought
> to overthow the People's Republic ever since 1917.
>
> Perhaps unwittingly, you've implied elsewhere that the moral distinction
> between the Soviets and us is that they killed their dissidents outright
> whereas we merely deprived ours of their livelihood. I prefer to believe the
> important distinction is that they believed in suppressing dissent, whereas
> we believe in tolerating it; thus I prefer to regard the McCarthy period as a
> tragic exception where our actions betrayed our beliefs. When one resists
> evil, there is always a tendency to become like the very evil one resists.
>
> As for loyalty oaths, there's a fine saying among US dissenter churches:
> "Always love your country, but never trust its government." Make sure you
> realize which one the oath is about.
> --
> Steven Correll == PO Box 66625, Scotts Valley, CA 95067 == s...@netcom.com
depriving people of 'their livelihood".....nobody ever stopped Joe
Screenwriter from picking up a lunch pail and joining Joe Blow on the
assembly line(might even be good research to see how the non-Hollywood
proles live)...the entertainment biz was/is in the business of exporting
culture and ,thus,is/was an important propaganda tool in the cold war-
the outcome of which threatened the freedom/safety/"livelihood" of
every man,woman and child in this country...not to mention the free
world...it is a privilege to be allowed to work in such a field..and I
can think of no country this century(or ever)that has knowingly allowed
sympathizers with a hostile foreign power to occupy a position of power
in the dissemination of information about itself...the weaknesses of a
Democratic society to maintain security are frequently exploited by
non-Democratic countries hiding behind the skirts of civil libertarians.
...but when the stakes are OUR VERY SURVIVAL...niceties go out the
window for me...you might want to check up on the actions of a certain
A.Lincoln in time of war..if you think Eisenhower and the gang were
repressive! CHEERS,GB
ps:what was it that Mary McCarthy said about Lilliam Hellman?something
like:"Every word she ever wrote was a lie-including "the","and" &
"but"."
pps:boy,Jimmy Levine has a way with the "Organ" symphony!(attempt to
stay on topic)
D.G. Porter
G. Brown [who obviously doesn't know shit about SNIPPING to SAVE
> ...well,Con,before I take time out from my Saturday morning schnapps to
> go searching for "Clyde" may I ask you just two teeny-weeny questions?
> Accepting the premise that JEH was...ah,just a tad kinky...tell me
> 1)why,with his numerous enemies in the media, these photos haven't
> made it beyond a small circle of queens in San Diego?
> 2)acknowledging that JEH was something of an expert on filming people
> surreptitiously...and that he didn't lack for taxpayer -funded personal
> security arrangements...how could he allow himself to ever be in a
> position to be photographed in such a compromising position...?...just
> wondering...prost!...gb
The photos have been published. You just won't see them in the LA Times
or the SD Union-Tribune or the OC Register because those are "family"
papers and the editors are a bunch of wussies.
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ...I can forgive you many things out of my
> naturally compassionate Republican heart...
That's an oxymoron, like "military intelligence" or "jumbo shrimp."
> but I can NEVER forgive your
> disgraceful slanders on President Reagan and Mr. Buckley...
Poor boy. We offended your icons. Your golden idols turned your finger
green.
Remind me to lose some sleep over your offense. In triplicate.
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ...respectfully,I must disagree with you on a crucial point...that of
> depriving people of 'their livelihood".....nobody ever stopped Joe
> Screenwriter from picking up a lunch pail and joining Joe Blow on the
> assembly line(might even be good research to see how the non-Hollywood
> proles live)...
Yeah, fella, get out there and get a REAL job!!!!
Your tell 'em, "G"!
> the entertainment biz was/is in the business of exporting
> culture and ,thus,is/was an important propaganda tool in the cold war-
> the outcome of which threatened the freedom/safety/"livelihood" of
> every man,woman and child in this country...not to mention the free
> world...
Spoken like a true-believer in "Soviet-style social-realism" in art....
> it is a privilege to be allowed to work in such a field....the weaknesses of a
> Democratic society to maintain security are frequently exploited by
> non-Democratic countries hiding behind the skirts of civil libertarians.
> ...but when the stakes are OUR VERY SURVIVAL...niceties go out the
> window for me...
And based on the above, I hope you never EVER get into a positon of
power, as you seem to enjoy the idea of doing that kind of work WAY TOO
MUCH. You show the classic signs of a potential despot by these
disparaging remarks:
"weaknesses of a democratic society"
"hiding behind the skirts of civil libertarians"
"niceties go out the window for me"
You forgot to include the classic one, "Honest people don't need civil
rights!"
"OUR VERY SURVIVAL," huh? You mean threats like Arbenz in Guatemala,
the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, Allende in Chile, the dicktasters in
Argentina, Mossadeq in Iran, and the hits just keep on coming!!! I'm
jest shakin' in my boots!
> you might want to check up on the actions of a certain
> A.Lincoln in time of war..if you think Eisenhower and the gang were
> repressive! CHEERS,GB
Two wrongs don't make a right, pal.
Now class, raise your right hand in a proper salute to UNITY! Il Duce
has spoken.
G. Brown
exclusive photos of the last alien space abduction....hey,there'sa good
after-school project for you D.G.....cheers,gb
D.G. Porter
G. Brown wrote:
> ....I betcha you can find them in the same newspaper that published
> exclusive photos of the last alien space abduction....hey,there'sa good
> after-school project for you D.G.....cheers,gb
"Shut up, Butt-head, you're making fun of those COOL newspapers in the
MaxiMart with those pictures of that FAT DUDE who died on the toilet!"
G. Brown
Edward Dimitri Kennaway wrote:
>
> On 11 Jan 1998 00:28:30, Brian Newhouse wrote:
> >I never thought I'd actually be participating in this political debate...but:
> >In article <34B7BB...@erols.com>, sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com wrote:
> >
> >[snip]
> >> ...respectfully,I must disagree with you on a crucial point...that of
> >> depriving people of 'their livelihood".....nobody ever stopped Joe
> >> Screenwriter from picking up a lunch pail and joining Joe Blow on the
> >> assembly line(might even be good research to see how the non-Hollywood
> >> proles live)
> >
> >industry of the early 1950s would have been any more hospitable to known
> >Communists than the entertainment industry? Probably Joe Screenwriter
> >couldn't get a job either way.
> >
> >> ...the entertainment biz was/is in the business of exporting
> >> culture and ,thus,is/was an important propaganda tool in the cold war-
> >> the outcome of which threatened the freedom/safety/"livelihood" of
> >> every man,woman and child in this country...not to mention the free
> >> can think of no country this century(or ever)that has knowingly allowed
> >> sympathizers with a hostile foreign power to occupy a position of power
> >> in the dissemination of information about itself...
> >
> >--culture = dissemination of info about a country = propaganda. What do
> >you do with culture that is frankly escapist, then? Can, say, *Kiss me,
> >Kate*, *Bringing up Baby*, or the *Superman* comics really be considered
> >reliable sources of information about American life? (Not to mention Duke
> >Ellington.)
> >--Communist screenwriters could control the way their work was received.
> >In fact, screenwriters were (still are) the low men of the Hollywood
> >hierarchy. Many producers would (and still do) bring in so many rewrite
> >men on a script as to make it almost unrecognizable. If a screenwriter
> >were to smuggle in Communist propaganda--and some did--it's likely that
> >the Communist propaganda would be written right out in the process of
> >filmmaking, or at least be watered down to the centrist-liberal point that
> >only a hard-line reactionary like Mrs. Lela Rogers would sense anything
> >Communist about it at all. And if an audience can't perceive the
> >Communist propaganda, how can they be influenced by it? Subliminal
> >seduction?
> >
> >If you're going to try to convince me that Communist or
> >anti-anti-Communist screenwriters presented a security risk anthing close
> >to that presented by, say, the atomic spies, you'll have to show that: (a)
> >movies with Communist screenwriters tend to present inarguably Communist
> >propaganda; (b) that such propaganda is clearly distinguishable from the
> >common-garden liberalism of the day; and (c) that such propaganda is meant
> >to activate pro-Russian sympathies rather than, say, to call attention to
> >problems on the home front. (Perhaps we should post this debate to
> >rec.arts.movies.past-films?) Nothing I've read or viewed so far--and I've
> >read and viewed a lot--has convinced me.
> >
> >And would you consider what we call "high culture"--including classical
> >music--also to be "in the business of exporting culture, and _thus_ is an
> >important propaganda tool"? Does that mean that we should evaluate works
> >of art--including pieces of music--on their value as a "propaganda tool"?
> >Sounds like rampant political correctness to me...
> >
> >So where does classical music, new or old, fit into this--if it ever did?
> >
> >[snip!]
> >
> >--
> >Brian Newhouse
> >newh...@mail.crisp.net
> >.
> As far as I can tell, my latest posting on this 'thread' has gone into
> the ether and has since been erased from my computer! Roughly, I think
> I said:
> It's the Brit again - just as you though it was safe to go
> back in the newsgroup! The irony is that I, who take little
> interest in domestic (i.e. UK politics) am busily engaging in
> this discussion about U.S. politics - and here, we have to PAY
> for our local rate calls (I gather you don't). I'm still
> waiting for GB to shoot down my comments about JEH having been
> an unelected official in a position of unrivalled power for an
> absurdly long period of time etc. etc. For now, it would seem
> that nobody is going to take up this point. However, Brian, I
> was going to throw in a little crumb and suggest a thread that
> runs:American music is un-classical (not, I hasten to point
> out, a criticism, nor necessarily any more valid than your own
> original proposition, but, at least, a variation on the
> theme). Any thoughts?
>
> EDK
...well,Mrs.Clinton(unelected) is in a position of"unrivalled power" and
has been for an absurdly long time(at least in Republican eyes)....JEH
served by appointment at the discretion of the chief executive...the
fact that he lasted so long is partly due to his popularity(before the
liberal media slander campaign began JEH was a national icon...the
subject of numerous laudatory films and television programs)and the fact
that he was working for an unbroken line of scoundrels who had a lot to
fear if certain files were leaked to the press...it is all part of the
inevitable corruption of a would-be Democratic society....at least JEH
ended up with a huge government building in central DC named after
him...though they will probably change the name to honor someone of the
ilk of the "Reverend" Jesse Jackson-when he croaks...
God save The Queen!...GB
Steve Wolk
And who can ever forget "Wanker Search"?
Steve Wolk
D.G. Porter wrote:
>
> G. Brown [who obviously doesn't know shit about SNIPPING to SAVE
> BANDWIDTH] wrote:
> > ...well,Con,before I take time out from my Saturday morning schnapps to
> > go searching for "Clyde" may I ask you just two teeny-weeny questions?
> > Accepting the premise that JEH was...ah,just a tad kinky...tell me
> > 1)why,with his numerous enemies in the media, these photos haven't
> > made it beyond a small circle of queens in San Diego?
> > 2)acknowledging that JEH was something of an expert on filming people
> > surreptitiously...and that he didn't lack for taxpayer -funded personal
> > security arrangements...how could he allow himself to ever be in a
> > position to be photographed in such a compromising position...?...just
> > wondering...prost!...gb
>
> The photos have been published. You just won't see them in the LA Times
> or the SD Union-Tribune or the OC Register because those are "family"
> papers and the editors are a bunch of wussies.
Actually, it is a little known fact that Hoover denied that it was his
dress. This was what led, years later, to the OJ defense "I'd never
wear those ugly-ass shoes".
Steve
Steve Wolk
G. Brown wrote:
(snip)
pps:boy,Jimmy Levine has a way with the "Organ" symphony!(attempt to
stay on topic)
With J. Edgar on the organ?
Steve
Steve Wolk
>Constantin Marcou wrote:
(snip)
>By the way, I don't understand why the anti-spammers aren't having >apoplectic fits
>about this thread and how ridiculously off-topic it has become.
Because it's such good fun! :)
Steve
Steve Wolk
G. Brown wrote
(snip)
...well,Mrs.Clinton(unelected) is in a position of"unrivalled power" and
has been for an absurdly long time(at least in Republican eyes).
Come on, GB, you're just jealous because all those Republican first hags
wound up at the Betty Ford Clinic.
Steve
Brian Newhouse
In article <34B7BD...@pacbell.net>, "D.G. Porter"
<dgpo...@pacbell.net> wrote:
How DARE we peons question the supreme greatness of William F. Buckley, Jr!
Dear, dear, next we'll be hinting that Leo Strauss was not
infallible!...or that Christopher Lasch wasn't the greatest thing since
sliced bread!...or that Norman Podhoretz isn't exactly Yahweh
Incarnate!...FOR SHAME!!! BLASPHEMY!!!
Even Leonard Bernstein never caused half so much passion in this newsgroup.
And compared to what's been hinted about James Levine in this newsgroup,
Messrs. Porter's, Marcou's and Lustig's animadversions on Buckley, Reagan
and other conservative demigods is about as slanderous as a negative
review in the American Record Guide.
Tells you something about how much we educated Americans are expected to
care about political opinion even about things that don't concern us
directly and how little we're expected to care about music, even our own.
Now you see why I worry about classical music being "un-American"?
--
Brian Newhouse
newh...@mail.crisp.net
Brian Newhouse
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
On 11 Jan 1998 00:28:30, Brian Newhouse wrote:
Paul Kintzele
Brian Newhouse (newh...@mail.crisp.net) wrote:
: Now you see why I worry about classical music being "un-American"?
Actually, no.
But please, don't feel like you have to elaborate.
Paul K.
Edward Dimitri Kennaway
On 10 Jan 1998 21:15:48, "G. Brown" wrote:
>Reply-To: sibe...@die-spammer.pig.erols.com
>NNTP-Posting-Host: spg-tnt22s219.erols.com
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
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>X-Complaints-To: ab...@erols.com
>X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01C-KIT (Win95; I)
>Xref: znews.zetnet.co.uk rec.music.classical:230785
>has been for an absurdly long time(at least in Republican eyes)
I'm not sure what you're driving at here. Presumably, you refer to her
influence as First Lady - which could be equally well applied to any
President's wife. In that case, when Bill Clinton's term of office
ends (I believe two terms are now the maximum?), then so will Mrs
Clinton's...unless she divorces her husband and marries the next
President...if the next one isn't already married and isn't a woman
(will this ever come to pass?). If you refer to her current official
position - which escapes me for now - I imagine that her tenure will
also have its limitations.
>....JEH
>served by appointment at the discretion of the chief executive...the
>fact that he lasted so long is partly due to his popularity(before the
>liberal media slander campaign began JEH was a national icon...the
>subject of numerous laudatory films and television programs)
Aha! I guess this proves he was OK after all - if only you'd mentioned
this sooner!
> and the fact
>that he was working for an unbroken line of scoundrels who had a lot to
>fear if certain files were leaked to the press...
Hang on a mo! I understood that successive administrations wanted to
retire Hoover and were prevented from doing so precisely because of
his secret files. Would you care to list the "unbroken line of
scoundrels" for whom he worked? (Surely they weren't ALL 'scoundrels').
> it is all part of the
>inevitable corruption of a would-be Democratic society....at least JEH
>ended up with a huge government building in central DC named after
>him...though they will probably change the name to honor someone of the
>ilk of the "Reverend" Jesse Jackson-when he croaks...
But Stalin had an entire city named after him! So what does this
prove?
>God save The Queen!...GB
>.
I'll pass this on next time H.M. invites me to a Garden Party...but I
thought you were a Republican!?
EDK
Caius Marcius
In <34B7A2...@erols.com> "G. Brown"
For the benefit of certain fans and critics of Sen. McCarthy, J. Edgar
Hoover, the anti-Vietnam war movement, usw., who may be posting to RMC
because they are unaware that there are other newsgroups in existence,
the following list of political NGs is offered. Discussions of
Reagan's perfidy, Clinton's shortcomings, the insolence of office, the
law's delay, etc., which are slightly off-topic when posted upon RMC
(which was organized for the express purpose of discussing David
Helfgott, the evils of atonality, and the Diamond Commercial), are
expressly welcome upon the groups listed below. Rest assured, the
exchange upon all of these groups is characterized by that same
elevated and Olympian level of discourse that can currently be
experienced over the "Classical Music is Un-American" thread, as seen
above (well, in truth, I can't promise that all of it will be *that*
sublime)
alt.conspiracy.jfk (noted for its Eternal Flame - great Hoover-bashing
site!)
alt.current-events.clinton.whitewater
alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
alt.fan.unabomber
alt.politics.clinton
alt.politics.elections
alt.politics.libertarian
alt.politics.libertarian.gay
alt.politics.socialism.trotsky
alt.politics.socialism.mao
alt.politics.usa
alt.politics.usa.congress
alt.politics.usa.constitition
alt.politics.usa.democrat
alt.politics.usa.misc
alt.politics.usa.newt-gingrich
alt.politics.usa.republican
soc.history.war.vietnam
talk.politics.guns
Happy hunting, gentlemen, and don't forget to write!
- CMC