We Baby Boomers suffer from an ideological nearsightedness born out of our counter-culture awakenings, exemplified by the music of a bygone era that just won’t go away. Witness 60 and 70 year-old rockers preening and posturing on stage, attempting to belt out the high notes of their youth while cranking up their pacemakers into overdrive to finish a two hour set. Consider that the collective WE gladly lay out hundreds of dollars each for tickets to these fiascoes — feeding like vampires on the energy, letting our inner adolescents out to play, waving our open cell phones to simulate the glows from the Bic lighters of our distant past. More than kinda pathetic, huh?

What’s even more pathetic is that WE seem to hang on every word uttered by these aged minstrels — as well as the actors and actresses from our other entertainments — as if the ability to screw up one’s hand to form chords on a six-string or read lines of dialog written by someone else has bestowed upon them great wisdom of the ages. Basically, WE are so enthralled by our long-gone youth, or at least by those misty, romantic remembrances that our music, TV and movies feed to us as our history, that WE plain refuse to let it go. When faced with actually growing up, accepting the responsibilities that our fathers and grandfathers had no choice but to do, we answered in mass, “Hell NO — WE won’t go!”

I mean, really . . . WE’ve got better things to do, don’t ya know?

Case in point can be found in today’s Examiner editorial which takes a look at Bruce Springsteen’s little tirade on last night’s 60 Minutes.

Rocker Bruce Springsteen has been writing and selling songs for more than two decades, several of which are recognized as classics of the genre. In the process, the Boss has become rich, famous and — not to put too fine a point on it — politically naïve.

That naivety was on vivid display Sunday when the fawning Scott Pelley of “60 Minutes” gave Springsteen a broadcast platform to preen his knee-jerk assertions about the bungled war in Iraq, political oppression by Bush, evil Republicans who steal elections, the suppression of civil liberties and other Looney Left horrors about modern American life. Rock ’n’ roll is supposed to be about independent thinking and rebellion against the establishment, yet there was the aging star lecturing in the spotlight like a liberal Massachusetts congressman.

The editorial goes on to suggest to the ‘Boss’ that, instead of channeling his inner John Kerry, maybe he should look into the lives of Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Fleming Rose, two individuals that are currently being oppressed by the forces of radical Islam, even to the point of facing very real death threats. If anyone truly thinks that Springsteen and others like him have anything remotely close to that to fear from our own government, they need to add another couple layers of foil to their fedoras.

The creative work and expression of artists like Springsteen would be quickly and brutally suppressed in any country controlled by the likes of Osama bin Laden, the Wahhabist fanatics of Saudi Arabia or the Iranian mullahs. Springsteen should walk a mile in the shoes of Ali or Rose to learn how genuine oppression feels. Maybe then he could even write a song about it.

As the rest of America waits for us Boomers to die off — ’cause evidently WE aren’t gonna go quietly into that good night — hopefully more than a few of us will eventually get a clue. For the rest, at least the Alzheimer’s will finally take them back to where they continually wish they could have stayed . . . for a final-ephemeral moment or two.

Technorati Tags: Baby Boomers, Bruce Springsteen, 60 Minutes

This entry was posted on Monday, October 8th, 2007 at 2:53 pm and is filed under A Post 9/11 World, Fever Swamp Madness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.  |   Print This Post  |   Email This Post

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