Those brilliant sleuths at the FBI once concluded that John Lennon was “too stoned to be a [revolutionary] threat.” They might also have concluded that Real Revolutionaries do not tend to live at the Dakota.
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Wolcott would plotz if he heard you say that.
Hey, any one of us could have told them that, and it wouldn’t have cost them a cent!
Don’t bogart that joint, my friend…
Lots of revolutionaries live in luxury.
Erp:
True but real revolutionaries are puritanical. Long time CPUSA member Pete Seeger used to heap private abuse on his audiences because they were both stoned and libertine in their sexual behavior.
Roger:
I am a massive Beatle fan but the desire to make Lennon a sainted revolutionary hero has always cracked me up. He may have preached about the dream of “no possesions” in “Imagine” but if anyone examined the way he he lived his life the classic Beatle song “Taxman” was closer to his true spirit. If any budding rock star wants to find out the best way to invest and protect the vast sums of money that comes their way they would do better to hire Yoko then any investment expert. She is a brilliant buisness women and has more knowledge about tax shelters and property rights then many who make their living off that trade. I admire her acumen, it just doesn’t fit the myth of the non materialistic guru. As much as the image makers would prefer to paint a different picture John and Yoko are capitalists, in fact darn good ones! Light your bics and realize the estate may get 5 per cent of each one that is sold.
Kevin Peters
classic Beatle song “Taxman” was closer to his true spirit
Sure was, even though George Harrison, I think, wrote it.
I once read a quote of Paul McCartney saying “We literally used to say ‘Let’s write a new swimming pool.’”, referring to what they would do with the royalties.
As for capitalists, I’m to understand Mr. Jagger is even better than Yoko. And that’s saying something. Apparently most popsters who’ve been around a bit know how to invest … almost as well as they croon about socialist and “revolutionary” ideals …
I’m far more heartened than disillusioned. And for more Beatles cred after ‘Taxman,’ listen a little further on ‘Revolver’ and you’ll get to ‘Dr. Robert,’ a lovely blast at the NHS (in 1966!) …
Jerry:
Seeger is the perfect example of the myth making ability of the entertainment community. Ask most people who know who Seeger is and they will tell you that he is a happy protest singer who fights for the poor and oppressed. He was a dedicated Stalinist. During the Spanish Civil war he was at the forefront of the anti-fascist groups in America who convinced many that fighting against Franco would help defeat the real threat Hitler. Fighting fascism was a noble fight. But when Stalin signed the non agression pact with Hitler these anti fascist groups became peace groups who fought to keep America from fighting Hitler. Seeger was the leader of the folk group “The Almanac Singers” who wrote these lovely lyrics- the singers mockingly playing as FDR “I hate war, and so does Eleanor, and we won’t be safe till everyone’s dead” and “Franklin D., Franklin D. you ain’t gone send us across the sea”.
Seeger is lionized as a nice fuzzy old man and almost nobody who writes about him points out that he was a stooge of Stalin thru the CPUSA. He is not bad because he was a socialist or a communist. He is bad because he was in league and took his marching orders from one of the most evil man in the history of the world. Cloony is coming out with another film about the McCarthy era. McCarthy was a drunk and a demagouge. Some of his targets were stupid but innocent people. But the Hollywood Ten and many of their cohorts swore their loyalty to one of the greatest butchers in the history of the world. Point out McCarthy’s stupidity. But don’t make heroes out of these traitors.
Kevin:
Here I was waiting for someone to lambast me for engaging in McCarthyism for point out that Seeger was Commie. There you go citing the things I would have said in my defense. You are hired as my political defense attorney.
What? You mean speaking truth to power doesn’t guarantee you a view of Central Park West?
At the height of the ’60s “youth rebellion”, both the Beatles and Stones took pointed shots at the commies:
From “Revolution”:
“If you go carryin’ pictures of Chairman Mao you ain’t gonna make it with anyone anyhow”
From “Sympathy for the Devil”:
“I killed the Czar and his ministers, Anastasia screamed in vain”
This baseball season I have worked as an usher (technically, an access coordinator) for the Cincinnati Reds. My section was in premium seating, as in, $60 per butt. A couple nights ago I seated a young man and his date, and he was wearing a Che t-shirt. It killed me, as I watched him all evening buying $6 beers and other overpriced concessions in his overpriced seat, to not say something about the apparent irony I was witnessing, but it wouldn’t have been very good customer service. But, man, it was funny. WWCS (what would Che say) about watching overpriced ballplayers in an overpriced new stadium?
“McCarthy was a drunk and a demagouge.”
Kevin P. Do your own research and find out the truth about the so-called McCarthy era. A good place to start is Ann Coulter’s book, Traitor and here The HUAC.
The only people who suffered from a black list were those who cooperated with the HUAC. I googled to find an article about the tragedy of Larry Parks whose career was ruined after his testimony and came upon this astonishing profile which actually says, “Despite giving the names of other former members of the Communist Party, Parks was still blacklisted.
The author of the article actually says that a HUAC blacklist kept him from getting work. Nothing could be more absurd. It was the entertainment community who blackballed those who exposed them and their propaganda machine which sought to promote socialism and degrade capitalism in every movie produced in Hollywood.
I gather that Seeger was a supporter of the party in the thirties and early forties. The popular front era, when as this article in the City Journal points out, the party was quoting Lincoln and calling Communism “20th Century Americanism.”
http://www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_urbanities-communist.html
Then he was a member from 1942 to 1950. For those first four years of his membership, our alliance with Stalin had encouraged the U.S. military to accept thousands of Communists, some of whom, like Gus Hall, fought with distinction. So membership was not really a big deal.
Aside from those who engaged in treason, like the Rosenbergs, and who got their just deserts as a result IMO, Communists and Communist sympathizers and fellow travelers mostly played a positive role in a bunch of progressive movements. In contrast to Maoists, and much of the New Left, who often romanticized violence and disparaged working class values, Communists were much more supportive of reforming capitalism, rather than overthrowing it. They worked with liberals and did a lot of grass roots organizing on behalf of unions, civil rights. I’m not defending their motives, or their blindness to Soviet crimes, or their craven about-face on Hitler during the Nazi-Soviet pact, I’m just saying that in spite of these outrages, a lot of them managed to work hard for good causes. Many of them tended to be the sort of naive, earnest idealists who themselves would have been among the earlief victims of an actual communist dictatorships.
I think it is distinguish between the kind of radicals like Joan Baez, who denounced Vietnam when the boat people were trying to leave the country, and those like William Kunstler who refused to denounce it. Or Chomsky, who speciously defended the Vietnamese government. Seeger seems to be more like Baez, though I’m not sure were he was on that particular issue.
Also, ‘McCarthyism’ and McCarthy-era laws were an assault on the First Amendment, which guarantees the absolute right to engage in ALL political speech.
Markus:
Some communists were as you described. But the hard core CPUSA members took their marching orders from a foreign government. Many, like Hellmond, hid their membership on instruction from the party so they could hide their true alliagence. They not only worked with liberal groups, they used commintern approved method to take them over and control them. The victims of the black list were the joiners who were casual and not particulary active other then on a social level. Most of the Hollywood Ten were hard core party members, or on instruction were secret members, and they ran the party with strict discipline and anyone who tried to think for themselves were hounded in to renouncing their original ideas or banished. They were not reformists. They saw themselves as the vanguard of a Soviet led revolution. And they had no problem with the idea of using Stalin’s methods. Many of them had been to the Soviet Union, saw the repression, and still blindly defended Stalin and attacked anyone who tried to point out this monsters sins as a jackal attacks a rabbit. The reason seeger went from fascist fighter to Hitler appeaser in a heartbeat is because the party instucted him to and they got there instructions from Moscow. I do not defend McCarthy’s tactics. The fact that the Hollywood Community enforced the balcklists and not the government does not excuse his undemocratic tactics. Butn the fact that McCarthy was a jerk does not excuse the fact that many of the top “victims” were aligned closely with Stalin. If the pro Hitler americans had set up a free breakfast program for the poor it would not make their love of Hitler ok. Most of the Hollywood 10 defended and praised Stalin from the thirties to the 50′s until Krushchevs secret speech. And after that they were stillapologists for the Soviet Union. Should they have been denied their ability to work? No. Should they be admired and respected. No way.This propaganda that they were just trying to work within the system is crap. they wanted the system replaced with a Soviet style system. The recent film “Frida’ ignored the fact that this artist had Stalins picture put in her coffin. These were not American communist who loathed Stalin and just wanted a more equitable social justice program. They followed the commintern method of party leadership, they punished free thinkers in the moscow style, and they hid there identity long before the government investigations, not to hide from the government, but to decieve their liberal friends.
Markus,
Many, many members of the CPUSA were engaged in espionage against the US, even before WWII, as the recently declassified Venona project has confirmed.
That’s not exactly benign or honest.
McCarthy made a huge mistake in how he went about unearthing spies. He should have focused on activities done by people rather than guilt by association. He would have spared some innocent people some grief, and he would not have made himself so laughable.
But he did make himself laughable, and as a result, the CPUSA’s systematic and deep espionage has been whitewashed for decades, permitting a lot of very gullible people to kid themselves about Communism.