Posted on 11/05/2004 6:15:17 AM PST by conelrad
Charlottesville, VA—America's "culture war" was on full display last night at the Joan Baez concert. Tickets to the concert were a present to my mother-in-law for her 69th birthday. My mother-in-law certainly fit the demographic of the audience, or as she described it, "All the old hippies are out tonight." Let's just say that by attending, my wife and I dropped the average age of the audience by several months.
Sixty-three year old Baez came out on stage and asked how the audience felt about the election? Of course the audience groaned and moaned—after all, this IS a Joan Baez concert. For her part, Joan said that she felt like she had been run over by a truck. One audience member yelled, "You give us hope." Now I like a good rendition of "Joe Hill" or "Diamonds and Rust," as well as the next person and I do recognize her talent as a singer. And Baez has a perfect right to dedicate a song, as she did, to that insufferable, lying self-promoter Michael Moore, whom she praised for doing his best to save the country. Later Baez announced that she was going to sing a song that she sang only in countries that were undergoing extreme political strife. In fact, she hadn't sung it in the United States in the last 20 years. The song? "We Shall Overcome."
However, the most remarkable and disturbing episode occurred halfway through the concert when Joan stopped singing and announced that she had "multiple personalities." One of her multiple personalities is that of a fifteen year old poor black girl named Alice from Turkey Scratch, Arkansas. Baez decided to share with us Alice's views on the election. Amazed and horrified I watched a rich, famous, extremely white folksinger perform what can only be described as bit of minstrelsy—only the painted on blackface was missing. Alice, the black teenager from Arkansas Baez was pretending to be, spoke in a dialect so broad and thick that it would put Uncle Remus and Amos and Andy to shame. Baez' monologue was filled with phrases like, "I'se g'win ta" to do this that or the other and dropping all final "g's." Baez as Alice made statements like, "de prezident, he be a racist," and "de prezident, he got a bug fer killin'." Finally, since Bush won the election with 58.7 million votes to Kerry's 55.1 million, Alice observed, "Seems lak haf' de country be plumb crazy." Since Baez was reading Alice's notes, it is evident that she thinks that Arkansas' public schools don't teach black children to write standard English.
Once Joan finished her minstrelsy riff, the audience, in which I did not see a single black person, went wild with applause and hoots and hollers. I have never felt so embarrassed for a bunch of "liberals" in my life. I wonder where Baez got her notions of how poor black country folk talk—she couldn't be stereotyping, could she?
Does Joan (or Alice) know Suzanne Sugarbaker?
Any time now ...
[crickets]
... any ...
...... time ...
.........now ...
Phony Joany. Gad, how I wish Al Capp could have lived to see this.
The Bellamy Brothers. They also do a great song called Kids of the Baby Boom, about the spoiled children of the 60's.
Joanie should have sung "Drug Store Truck Driving Man'... Her version is pretty good.
Remember, the creator of "Li'll Abner," Al Capp, called Joan Baez "Joanie Phony." LOL
She hasn't changed. The last time I and most freepers saw her was in Stolen Honor. She was serenading "war criminals" at an upscale people's hotel.
Sure would be nice to get a video of this "performance" from her next gig. Concert appearances, even by this goof, are fully scripted and never off-the-cuff.
Ping
Lol ... ditto!
My youngest daughter (13 years old)who is more conservative than I am always wanted to go to W&M said she would rather work at McDonalds her whole life than attend there now.
My daughter is only 19-months right now, but I hope that when she's 13 she's as cool as yours. That is one cool kid! Well Done!!
I hope this doesn't get me banned, but to quote the Great Noddy Holder and Slade from the 70's. Alice,Alice? Who the Fuck is Alice?
I don't understand. UVA is in Charlottesville, William and Mary is in Williamsburg. Different parts of the state.
LOL Thank you. She is our little Ann Culter.
I have 4 daughters 13-16. My oldest was a Nader fan the other 2 like Bush or were too afraid to tell me they didn't ( I can't figure out which).
But one thing I can tell you is that the youth couldn't stand with Kerry because he kept changing positions. Teens have to "stand" for something even if it is not good for them.
"I don't understand. UVA is in Charlottesville, William and Mary is in Williamsburg. Different parts of the state."
Sorry. She wants to go to med school at UVA undergrad W&M. I had it backwards.
She had it all planned out.
Only the "The Band" can so that.
I ended up at a Baez concert in Germany in '78 (don't ask, 'cause I'm not even sure how) when I was in the Army in Germany.
When she started telling all of the patchoulli reeking Euro-hippies about how wonderful her latest trip to Russia was, and how much the US could learn from them, my Army buddies and I started heckling her.
We had to fight our way out of the concert gounds, but since they were German, euro-trash, and hippies to boot, it really wasn't all that difficult.
No-talent hack.
BTW, Joe Hill was an original American Communist, so who cares that they shot him anyway?
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