email at 47west63rd@gmail.com

Saturday, January 28, 2006


rolling stones first live album got live i you want it.. pretty poor quality recording... too much loud screaming! the difference between this and get yer ya yas out which came out only a few years later is huge..(pardon glare from shrink on my german reissue)

and this was the set list...

i did not remember they played little queenie...and let it bleed....i do remember it was freezing and we had the worse seats in the stadium... we were so far away it took three seconds for the sound to get to us! did not enjoy this one which is why i am very excited to see them again under far different circumstances... indoors in a relatively small arena

Date: October 23rd, 1997 Venue: Washington D.C., JACK KENT COOKE STADIUM

Setlist:

Satisfaction
It's Only Rock'n Roll
Let's Spend The Night Together
Flip the Switch
Gimme Shelter
Sister Morphine
Anybody Seen My Baby
Bitch
Out Of Control
Star Star
Miss You
All About You
I Wanna Hold You
Little Queenie
Let It Bleed
You Got Me Rocking
Sympathy For The Devil
Tumbling Dice
Honky Tonk Women
Start Me Up
Jumping Jack Flash
Brown Sugar *encore*

last rolling stones show i caught..october 1997- here's a review...

Rolling Stones - satisfaction guaranteed
BYLINE: Joseph Szadkowski; THE WASHINGTON TIMES

When Rolling Stones' guitarist Keith Richards opened Thursdaynight's show with a game of "Name That Tune," it only took five notes for the 55,000 fans to collectively scream"Satisfaction."The Rolling Stones, stopping by Jack Kent Cooke Stadium in support of theirTop 20 album "Bridges to Babylon," revisited their '60s and '70s hits in a 140-minute, 22-songextravaganza that quickly thawed out a frozencrowd.Gutsy opening act Sheryl Crow did her best to warm up the crowd, bravingtemperatures that threatened to sink to 40 degrees. The fans, however, didn't come to life until Mr. Richard'sopening riff. Mick Jagger took the stage in a black leather trench coat and looking fit -and nowhere near his 54 years. After belting out the group's 1965 anthem , he followed with karaoke standards"It's Only Rock and Roll" and "Let's Spend the Night Together."Mr. Richards, sporting a spotted faux-fur, full-length coat, looked likeCruella DeVil, complete with a pair of henchmen: chain-smoking guitarist Ron Wood and sweatered drummer CharlieWatts. Rounding out the crew was burly bassist Darryl Jones.The group's original fans, well represented in the crowd, seemed eager topass the musical torch to the next generation. "It's pretty cool to be here with Mom and Dad," said JustinSchweiger, 8, of Cheverly. "We like to listen to Stones' music together."Throughout the show, band members interacted with the crowd - prancing downthe runways on either side of the stage - and one another. Mr. Richards and Mr. Wood played dueling riffs allevening and regularly visited Mr. Watts.Three selections from the "Bridges to Babylon" album were mixed in with theclassics "Flip the Switch," "Anybody Seen My Baby" and, the best offering, "Out of Control."For the "Babylon" tour, the stage was a Byzantine fantasy complete withmassive torches and a cast of Macy's parade-sized statues, including two inflatable golden goddesses.Hung from the center was an enormous circular screen that used every videotrick in the book, from grainy live footage to Web-site interaction. Mr. Wood even had a camera attached to hisguitar, Letterman-like, which gave the audience a new perspective during "Tumbling Dice."But the highlight of the evening came midway through the show, when thestage came to life and belched out a bridge that allowed the band to saunter to the center of the arena.Reminiscent of the band's "Gimme Shelter" documentary days, the crowdsurrounded the band as it whipped through the R&B-rooted "Let It Bleed," "You Got Me Rocking" and ChuckBerry's "Little Queenie." This gimmick lent the show intimacy, hard to come by in a cavernous arena.Lisa Fisher, one of three back-up singers, provided an over-the-top visualand vocal performance during numbers such as the Vietnam-era "Gimme Shelter" and "Miss You," which is from the1978 "Some Girls" album. She actually upstaged Mr. Jagger during portions of the show.Capping the show was a fireworks display complementing a scorching versionof "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and the single mini-encore of "Brown Sugar."It was an evening of excess and energy. Maybe the next time the boys comethrough town, the temperature will be closer to their ages.

Friday, January 27, 2006

Breaking news: Going to see the Rolling Stones February 1 Baltimore Mariner Arena!

(reproduced from email sent to friend who found me a ticket to the show)

i thought i remembered something interesting about the rolling stones and baltimore..

my favorite live album of all time is the 1970 rolling stones release "get yer ya yas out" (yeah the one with the great cover with charlie watts and a donkey)... stellar stuff....it probably helps that 2 of the 10 songs are chuck berry covers..wonderful versions of "carol" and of course "little queenie"..... mick taylor was on the guitar starting that year and lasted until ron wood replaced him around 74.. in any case.. the dueling guitars of keith and mick taylor were the best...if you listen to get yer yayas out mick taylor's guitar comes in on one speaker and keith's on the other..and its like they are both guitar solo and rhythmn players.. really embodies keith richards view on guitars which is there should be no division between lead and rhythm... of course they play with contrasting styles....keith is a far "dirtier" player.. to this day mick taylor, who now makes a living playing bars, is remembered very fondly by rolling stones fans and how could he not having played on let it bleed, get yer ya yas out, sticky fingers and exile on main street.. whooooaaahhh nelly!..

well get yer ya yas out was always advertised as having been recorded over two days in late november 1969 at madison square garden... and most of it was...but..but...and here is were it gets interesting..

love in vain definetly was recorded in baltimore and at the same venue (mariner which used to be called civic center or civic arena)...the stones played this venue in 65, 66 , 69 and are of course scheduled to play it wednesday!.. they have not been back to baltimore since 1969! as you can see baltimore mayor o'malley is getting down to whats important!

though the mick jagger "thank you" before stray cat blues was recorded in the garden the actual song music is from baltimore with an overdubbed vocal... (overdubbing was a common accepted practice then...probably because recording technology was so primitive which meant overdubbing invariably was necessary....regardless of the ocassional overdub and the splicing of mick jaggers comments throoughout, such as his classic line "you wouldn't want me to drop my trousers now would you...", get yer ya yas out is the best official live recording of the stones

and on the 2000 remaster of get yer yas out street fightin man which closes the record is credited on the back cover as "probably baltimore"...it is still not known if this is the case (see below)

1969 was the last time the stones played baltimore of course and that was the same tour they played altamont which as you probably know is generally agreed to represent the end of the "60s" (hells angels concert security stabs fan while rolling stones play show..)..altamont happened december 6, 1969 or 10 days after the last baltimore show...

so some history there fyi

i attach below the best summary of what i'm talking about from
www.rollingstonesnet.com/yaya.htm

leyter
serge

A Summary of Sources and Overdubs on "Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!"
Opening words - Sam Cutler: MSG 11/27/69, 11/28/69 1st, and ?
- Opening words - Jagger: "watch it", overdubbed.
1. Jumpin' Jack Flash: Music MSG 11/27/69, vocal overdubbed.
- Spoken Words: MSG 11/27/69, edited.
2. Carol: MSG 11/28/69 1st, Mick Taylor's guitar piece is possibly overdubbed.
- Spoken Words: "Thank You" from MSG 11/27/69.
3. Stray Cat Blues: Music Baltimore 11/26/69, vocals overdubbed. Two musical "markers" were identified. Missing Turnaround Verse #4 ("It's no hangin' mat-tar..."). A lessor possibility: 11/28/69 1st. This is noted due to the "Champaign Variation", which is a close approximation to "Ya-Ya's" lyrics, and therefore a possibility in a live '69 performance.
Spoken Words: Possibly MSG 11/28/69 2nd.
4. Love In Vain: Baltimore 11/26/69, no overdubs.
Spoken Words: MSG 11/28/69 2nd, edited.
5. Midnight Rambler: MSG 11/28/69 2nd, no overdubs.
Spoken Words (Background): - MSG 11/28/69 2nd.
6. Sympathy for the Devil: MSG 11/28/69 1st. Verse #4 is edited out.
Spoken Words: 11/28/69 1st or 2nd possibly before Satisfaction.
7. Live With Me: Music MSG 11/28/69 2nd, vocals overdubbed.
Spoken Words: MSG 11/28/69 1st "Aw New York City..." also in the "Gimme Shelter" movie before Jumpin' Jack Flash.
8. Little Queenie: Music MSG 11/28/69 1st, vocals overdubbed.
Spoken Words: MSG 11/28/69 1st or 2nd. "Well all rights..." also in the "Gimme Shelter" movie after Jumpin' Jack Flash.
9. Honky Tonk Women: Music MSG 11/27/69, vocals overdubbed. Missing the "New York Verse", which would have been Verse #3 in a "Paris Verse" version of the song. Also missing the added chorus that would have separated the two verses.
Spoken Words: Overdubbed (Note the "electronic noise" that is present). A lessor possibility: 11/28/69 1st or 2nd, or Baltimore 11/26/69.
10. Street Fighting Man: Music MSG 11/28/69 1st, vocals overdubbed. A lessor possibility: Music Baltimore 11/26/69, vocals overdubbed.

Thursday, January 26, 2006

Nedra Pickler: the worst "journalist" in America

this personage is a living disgrace to the journalism profession....why doesn't the Associated Press (AP) fire her?....i've had my eye on her since her pity inspiring coverage during the democratic presidential primary (iowa caucus)... her latest story buffs up the idea that bush is a "fun guy" when all he is doing is dissembling and failing to answer the questions that we the american people deserve to have answered when he deigns to hold one of his two or three annual press conferences..is that what nedra pickler was hired by the AP to do? analyze the president's laughable attempt at stand-up??!?

Bush Uses Humor to Deflect the Heat

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press WriterThu Jan 26, 4:15 PM ET

President Bush's first news conference of the year was just a camera strap away from becoming hazardous to reporters.

As the president began his opening statement, a camera that the news service AFP had hung from the ceiling dropped and nearly fell on the heads below. It was caught by its strap, and Bush stopped and looked at it dangling precariously.

"Are you wearing your helmets?" he joked to reporters sitting in the White House briefing room.
Bush was full of quips during the 45-minute news conference, poking fun at the media and deflecting some of the heat when questioning got intense.

Yes, Bush acknowledged, he had his picture taken with admitted criminal Jack Abramoff.
"Having my picture taken with someone doesn't mean that I'm a friend with him or know him very well," he said. "I've had my picture taken with you at holiday parties."

Another reporter pointed out that allegations of Abramoff's influence went beyond the photographs to questions of why he met with the president's top aides. The White House has refused to disclose just how often or why Abramoff was there, and Bush wasn't about to, either. He returned to jokes about the pictures.

"I mean, people, it's part of the job of the president to shake hands with people and smile," he said. He said he'd turn over records about Abramoff's meetings at the White House only to federal prosecutors if they suspected something inappropriate.

When a radio reporter asked the president again to never mind the photographs, just talk about lobbyists' influence on the White House, Bush interrupted: "Easy for a radio guy to say."

this is too good to ignore even if its from the sludge report!

BUSH SNUBS HELEN THOMAS [AGAIN]

Thu Jan 26 2006 15:42:32 2006

President Bush today again avoided taking a question from White House doyenne Helen Thomas during his 45-minute press conference, even though he took questions from every reporter around her front-row, center seat.

"He's a coward," Thomas said afterward. "He's supposed to be this macho guy. He'll take on Osama bin Laden, but he won't take me on."

Thomas, who worked as the UPI White House reporter for 57 years and is now a columnist, raised her hand every time the president was concluding an answer to a reporter's question, but he never called on her.

She had a few questions in mind, though. "I wanted to ask about Iraq: 'You said you didn't go in for oil or for Israel or for WMDs. so why did you go in?' "

She also had another question at the ready, just in case, this one about the president's contention that a 28-year-old wiretapping law known as FISA is out of date, which prompted him to order the National Security Agency to conduct a secret electronic surveillance program that Democrats contend is illegal. "You keep saying it's a 1978 law, but the Constitution 200 years old. Is that out of date, too?"

Afterward, Thomas sat sullenly in her chair in the White House press work area, huddled in her leopard-print winter coat. But as she left, she made a prediction: "He came on to my turf. I'll bet the next press conference will be in Room 450 of the EEOB," a theater-style room in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, where she would not be in the front row.Developing...
i can't believe nalbandian lost... what a jip! :(

Tuesday, January 24, 2006


Argentina's David Nalbandian hits a pretty acrobatic shot in his Australian Open quaterfinal match against France's Santoro.... on to the semi's for Nalbandian!

Saturday, January 21, 2006

Jerry Lee Lewis Last night at Strathmore, Bethesda

taken from www.jerryleelewis.nl

First characteristics of last night's show in North Bethesda, Maryland

Edmund sent in the following report. Thanks Edmund!

The band did:
1) Slippin' And Slidin'
2) Lonely Weekends
3) Johnny B. Goode
4) [Some blues song but I forgot the name]

Jerry came out and did the following:

1) Roll Over Beethoven
2) Over The Rainbow
3) Drinkin' Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee
4) Georgia On My Mind (made some nice comments about Ray, saying how he enjoyed his movie)
5) Before The NIght Is Over
6) Mexicali Rose
7) You Win Again
8) Crazy Arms (by request)
9) Chantilly Lace
10 Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On
11) Great Balls Of Fire ((extented piano solo, like movie soundtrack. Was great.)

Sorry, I don't remember the direct order in which he did the songs. He did say before he did Before The Night Is Over that his album was being released this month. He added that he has heard this month after month, but they promised him it's coming out this month.Jerry was in perfect form, although he walked out very slowy and left slowy, and you could hear his age when he spoke. However, when he played the piano and sang he was in perfect form. I couldn't believe how great he sounded. I give this show 5 stars all the way. I wasn't disappointed, if there was ever a disappointment it was only in the fact I wanted him to play all night long. The whole show counting his band's number lasted 75 minutes, so I don't htink anyone got cheated. And Jerry was out there most of the time! so I would say Jerry's was between 45 - 60 min's long, so I thought he did well.


Wolff addition:

the unidentified song by the band was "Big Boss Man"! and the band's "johnny b goode" was more like a chuck berry medley which included "sweet little rock'n'roller"
Also jerry lee lewis played "Sweet Little Sixteen" after "roll over betthoven"

and he played "trouble in mind"

back cover of "she still comes around" lp features this classic shot of the killer...

Jerry Lee Lewis album "she still comes around (to love what's left of me"... great cover shot! this lp was probably considered the high point of his reinvented career as a country musician in the late 1960s...

Jerry Lee Lewis album from the very early 70s...

Jerry Lee Lewis takes a bow at the conclusion of last night's concert.. notice where the stool ended up..when he kicked it back at the end of the show the crowd hoped he was about to go wild on the piano....alas those days are long gone but it still managed to take you back...(as always click on picture to get it as big as possible!)

Jerry Lee Lewis last night at the Strathmore immediately after sitting down at the piano..second from the right side of picture is Kenny Lovelace who has backed Jerry Lee for 39 years and according to bassist (far right) "..deserves a medal" ..probably for putting up with the Killer who had a reputation for being a difficult guy.....(as always click on picture to get it as big as possible)

ticket to last night's show..thats right.. JERRY LEE LEWIS at the Strathmore Center in Bethesda.....not cheap but absolutely worth it.... he's still got the piano chops though he can't climb on top of the piano and maul it as he was wont to do fifty years ago when he was recording for Sam Phillip's Sun Records in Memphis...at the time he was a member of the so called "Million Dollar Quartet" with Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, and Carl Perkins.. he's the lone survivor now.....in any case he started the show with a fitting Chuck Berry cover - "Roll Over Betthoven"- which somehow seemed to fit Jerry Lee Lewis more than Chuck.. immediately I got gooesebumps as his pianoplaying included those fancy piano rolls and the put one hand over the other and the have the right hand all the way to the right end of piano and the left hand all the way to the left and make tap those keys from on high moves..all moves burned in anyone's mind from those highlight films of jerry lee lewis pretty much inventing the rockabilly/rock and roll piano just about 50 years ago....some other songs he played including chantilly lace, you win again (he talked almost embarassed about how this was a hank williams song but "we had a pretty good version"), crazy arms (seemingly responding to a shout out from audience.. after finishing the performance he guffawed about forgetting the last verse and having to end it early), spoono wine or some such.... georgia on my mind which he said a cousin had taught him and he auditioned for a tv show when he was 10..this again made him laugh and add "how about that".....he kept joking about his sprite which he drank from after most songs..ocasionally taking a swig and saying "mercy!!!!!!" before going into his next song.. he closed the show with just great versions of "whole lotta shaking on" and then with a preface of "if you liked that one you'll love this one" played "great balls of fire".. all in all fabulous.. sure he was a bit stiff getting to and from the piano but once sitting there and playing/singing he sounded great.. indeed he sounded far better singing than when he talked to the crowd....it really felt amazing to see one of the first legends of rock'n'roll in person....i'm still pinching myself!

Friday, January 20, 2006


spinning tonight in memory of the great wilson pickett..his second LP on atlantic mono 8129....1966's The Exciting Wilson Pickett

Play Ball!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cuba is "...to be allowed" by the US Dept of Treasury to participate in the World Baseball Classic (the real World Series) .. this event is going to be great.. i can't wait...

http://sports.yahoo.com/top/news;_ylt=Alsbgiiy4hpVJfsz5j_TfDURvLYF?slug=ap-classic-cuba&prov=ap&type=lgns

Thursday, January 19, 2006

oh man not wilson pickett

oh man.. the wicked pickett's gone... bummerino

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060119/ap_en_mu/obit_wilson_pickett

Harry Belafonte's "Calypso" LP on RCA LPM-1248.. by all accounts the first million selling LP... includes a number of tracks written by Lord Burgess which became classics... "Day O" of course!.....this LP was released in 1956.... my copy based on the RCA matrix lettering system seems to be from 1957....nearly 50 years old. its interesting to note that Elvis Presley's first LP came out almost at the same time as LPM 1254..."Calypso" is a fabulous beach record.. nothing like it in the world....

Harry Belafonte

boy, harry belafonte is really letting the bush administration have it.... i largely agree..how it is possible to NOT view US actions in irak as constituting anything other than state terror?

is our government and are we the governed not responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of iraquis that meant us no harm? bush himself has admitted to a lowball estimate of 30,000 dead iraquis (other analysts put the painful number at 100,000+)... most of them civilians...is their killing any less reprehensible or immoral than the death of americans on september 11th? when we drop a bomb, based on our "intelligence", purportedly targetting a terrorist or insurgent and an entire family of innocent iraqui civilians is killed why is that not terror? because we say we are freeing them from a brutal dictator?

sorry if i cannot endorse the proposition that the end justifies the means... what end?.. who are we to determine the ends and means for another people in their own land? is this not something the american people ought to think about? we read on a daily basis that an american or two or three died in irak.. an american soldier of WAR that is...but what of the 13 year old CIVILIAN girl that died because of US bomb falling on her house? what do you tell her father? "she died for a good end"? or "she died for your freedom"? or "she died to protect americans from terrorism"?...... its discomforting to think about stuff like this -i just can't help it- and when one does its easy to come off sounding a little bitter or kooky as belafonte -a renown humanitarian (see his UNICEF page at: http://www.unicef.org/people/people_harry_belafonte.html- is wont to do...but he's no senile old man..he's being a HUMAN being.... he knows exactly what he's talking about and its a shame more people don't..

here is harry belafonte's money quote from his speech delivered at duke university on MLK day:


"Killing is our easiest tool. When you look at the president who has led us into a dishonorable war that has caused the deaths of tens of thousands of people, many our own sons and daughters, I ask myself what Dr. King would have asked...
"It is an act that has driven fear and terror into the hearts of the American people. What is the essential difference in quality of our humanity for those who would do the cruel and tragic deed of flying an airplane into a building and killing 3,000 innocent Americans and those who would lie and lead the nation into a war that has killed hundreds of thousands?
"Excuse me, fellow citizens, if the line for me becomes a little blurred."

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Happy Birthday To Me

I was having a good sleep in my car.
In the parking lot of the Showboat Casino Hotel.
I said I remember you, you drove like a PTA mother.
You brought me draft beer in a plastic cup.
I'm feeling thankful for the small things today.
I'm feeling thankful for the small things today.

CHORUS:
Happy
Happy birthday to me.
Happy birthday to me.
And to you.
Happy
Happy birthday to me.
Happy birthday to me.
And to you.
I'm feeling thankful for the small things today.
I'm feeling thankful for the small things today.

I said I remember you, I crashed your wedding.
With some orange crepe paper and some Halloween candy.
Sometimes I wish I were Catholic--I don't know why.
I guess I'm happy to see your face at a time like this

CHORUS
Happy birthday baby, to me.
Happy birthday baby, to me.

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

Happy 300th Ben Franklin!

thats right.. benjamin franklin was born 300 years ago today!.. its nice to remember a man who had it going on in all the senses of the word!...

for more info check out wikipedia's entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_franklin

Monday, January 16, 2006

Al Gore speaks and 47west63rd was there!

thats right! former vice president al gore (and by all common sense should be President now) delivered an address earlier today at DAR Constitution Hall .. the event was sponsored by the American Constitutional Society and focused on the ongoing threat to our constitution under the Bush administration..thats right "threat to our constitution" aka WAY OF LIFE..... Al Gore delivered an impassioned spirited address.. i agree with its sentiments wholeheartedly and urge americans to read the speech and take the actions they are able to take in order to help restore the values that make the United States of America the nation it is... let me be clear: our constitution is under threat.. consequently we are all under threat...(on a personal note: i was thrilled to be in attendance.. al! you have my full support whatever you decide to do!)


by Al GoreRemarks as prepared Congressman Barr and I have disagreed many times over the years, but we have joined together today with thousands of our fellow citizens-Democrats and Republicans alike-to express our shared concern that America's Constitution is in grave danger. In spite of our differences over ideology and politics, we are in strong agreement that the American values we hold most dear have been placed at serious risk by the unprecedented claims of the Administration to a truly breathtaking expansion of executive power. As we begin this new year, the Executive Branch of our government has been caught eavesdropping on huge numbers of American citizens and has brazenly declared that it has the unilateral right to continue without regard to the established law enacted by Congress to prevent such abuses. It is imperative that respect for the rule of law be restored. So, many of us have come here to Constitution Hall to sound an alarm and call upon our fellow citizens to put aside partisan differences and join with us in demanding that our Constitution be defended and preserved. It is appropriate that we make this appeal on the day our nation has set aside to honor the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who challenged America to breathe new life into our oldest values by extending its promise to all our people. On this particular Martin Luther King Day, it is especially important to recall that for the last several years of his life, Dr. King was illegally wiretapped-one of hundreds of thousands of Americans whose private communications were intercepted by the U.S. government during this period. The FBI privately called King the "most dangerous and effective negro leader in the country" and vowed to "take him off his pedestal." The government even attempted to destroy his marriage and blackmail him into committing suicide. This campaign continued until Dr. King's murder. The discovery that the FBI conducted a long-running and extensive campaign of secret electronic surveillance designed to infiltrate the inner workings of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and to learn the most intimate details of Dr. King's life, helped to convince Congress to enact restrictions on wiretapping. The result was the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA), which was enacted expressly to ensure that foreign intelligence surveillance would be presented to an impartial judge to verify that there is a sufficient cause for the surveillance. I voted for that law during my first term in Congress and for almost thirty years the system has proven a workable and valued means of according a level of protection for private citizens, while permitting foreign surveillance to continue. Yet, just one month ago, Americans awoke to the shocking news that in spite of this long settled law, the Executive Branch has been secretly spying on large numbers of Americans for the last four years and eavesdropping on "large volumes of telephone calls, e-mail messages, and other Internet traffic inside the United States." The New York Times reported that the President decided to launch this massive eavesdropping program "without search warrants or any new laws that would permit such domestic intelligence collection." During the period when this eavesdropping was still secret, the President went out of his way to reassure the American people on more than one occasion that, of course, judicial permission is required for any government spying on American citizens and that, of course, these constitutional safeguards were still in place. But surprisingly, the President's soothing statements turned out to be false. Moreover, as soon as this massive domestic spying program was uncovered by the press, the President not only confirmed that the story was true, but also declared that he has no intention of bringing these wholesale invasions of privacy to an end. At present, we still have much to learn about the NSA's domestic surveillance. What we do know about this pervasive wiretapping virtually compels the conclusion that the President of the United States has been breaking the law repeatedly and persistently. A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government. Our Founding Fathers were adamant that they had established a government of laws and not men. Indeed, they recognized that the structure of government they had enshrined in our Constitution - our system of checks and balances - was designed with a central purpose of ensuring that it would govern through the rule of law. As John Adams said: "The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them, to the end that it may be a government of laws and not of men." An executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution - an all-powerful executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free. In the words of James Madison, "the accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." Thomas Paine, whose pamphlet, "On Common Sense" ignited the American Revolution, succinctly described America's alternative. Here, he said, we intended to make certain that "the law is king." Vigilant adherence to the rule of law strengthens our democracy and strengthens America. It ensures that those who govern us operate within our constitutional structure, which means that our democratic institutions play their indispensable role in shaping policy and determining the direction of our nation. It means that the people of this nation ultimately determine its course and not executive officials operating in secret without constraint. The rule of law makes us stronger by ensuring that decisions will be tested, studied, reviewed and examined through the processes of government that are designed to improve policy. And the knowledge that they will be reviewed prevents over-reaching and checks the accretion of power. A commitment to openness, truthfulness and accountability also helps our country avoid many serious mistakes. Recently, for example, we learned from recently classified declassified documents that the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which authorized the tragic Vietnam war, was actually based on false information. We now know that the decision by Congress to authorize the Iraq War, 38 years later, was also based on false information. America would have been better off knowing the truth and avoiding both of these colossal mistakes in our history. Following the rule of law makes us safer, not more vulnerable. The President and I agree on one thing. The threat from terrorism is all too real. There is simply no question that we continue to face new challenges in the wake of the attack on September 11th and that we must be ever-vigilant in protecting our citizens from harm. Where we disagree is that we have to break the law or sacrifice our system of government to protect Americans from terrorism. In fact, doing so makes us weaker and more vulnerable. Once violated, the rule of law is in danger. Unless stopped, lawlessness grows. The greater the power of the executive grows, the more difficult it becomes for the other branches to perform their constitutional roles. As the executive acts outside its constitutionally prescribed role and is able to control access to information that would expose its actions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the other branches to police it. Once that ability is lost, democracy itself is threatened and we become a government of men and not laws. The President's men have minced words about America's laws. The Attorney General openly conceded that the "kind of surveillance" we now know they have been conducting requires a court order unless authorized by statute. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act self-evidently does not authorize what the NSA has been doing, and no one inside or outside the Administration claims that it does. Incredibly, the Administration claims instead that the surveillance was implicitly authorized when Congress voted to use force against those who attacked us on September 11th. This argument just does not hold any water. Without getting into the legal intricacies, it faces a number of embarrassing facts. First, another admission by the Attorney General: he concedes that the Administration knew that the NSA project was prohibited by existing law and that they consulted with some members of Congress about changing the statute. Gonzalez says that they were told this probably would not be possible. So how can they now argue that the Authorization for the Use of Military Force somehow implicitly authorized it all along? Second, when the Authorization was being debated, the Administration did in fact seek to have language inserted in it that would have authorized them to use military force domestically - and the Congress did not agree. Senator Ted Stevens and Representative Jim McGovern, among others, made statements during the Authorization debate clearly restating that that Authorization did not operate domestically. When President Bush failed to convince Congress to give him all the power he wanted when they passed the AUMF, he secretly assumed that power anyway, as if congressional authorization was a useless bother. But as Justice Frankfurter once wrote: "To find authority so explicitly withheld is not merely to disregard in a particular instance the clear will of Congress. It is to disrespect the whole legislative process and the constitutional division of authority between President and Congress." This is precisely the "disrespect" for the law that the Supreme Court struck down in the steel seizure case. It is this same disrespect for America's Constitution which has now brought our republic to the brink of a dangerous breach in the fabric of the Constitution. And the disrespect embodied in these apparent mass violations of the law is part of a larger pattern of seeming indifference to the Constitution that is deeply troubling to millions of Americans in both political parties. For example, the President has also declared that he has a heretofore unrecognized inherent power to seize and imprison any American citizen that he alone determines to be a threat to our nation, and that, notwithstanding his American citizenship, the person imprisoned has no right to talk with a lawyer-even to argue that the President or his appointees have made a mistake and imprisoned the wrong person. The President claims that he can imprison American citizens indefinitely for the rest of their lives without an arrest warrant, without notifying them about what charges have been filed against them, and without informing their families that they have been imprisoned. At the same time, the Executive Branch has claimed a previously unrecognized authority to mistreat prisoners in its custody in ways that plainly constitute torture in a pattern that has now been documented in U.S. facilities located in several countries around the world. Over 100 of these captives have reportedly died while being tortured by Executive Branch interrogators and many more have been broken and humiliated. In the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, investigators who documented the pattern of torture estimated that more than 90 percent of the victims were innocent of any charges. This shameful exercise of power overturns a set of principles that our nation has observed since General Washington first enunciated them during our Revolutionary War and has been observed by every president since then - until now. These practices violate the Geneva Conventions and the International Convention Against Torture, not to mention our own laws against torture. The President has also claimed that he has the authority to kidnap individuals in foreign countries and deliver them for imprisonment and interrogation on our behalf by autocratic regimes in nations that are infamous for the cruelty of their techniques for torture. Some of our traditional allies have been shocked by these new practices on the part of our nation. The British Ambassador to Uzbekistan - one of those nations with the worst reputations for torture in its prisons - registered a complaint to his home office about the senselessness and cruelty of the new U.S. practice: "This material is useless - we are selling our souls for dross. It is in fact positively harmful." Can it be true that any president really has such powers under our Constitution? If the answer is "yes" then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited? If the President has the inherent authority to eavesdrop, imprison citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can't he do? The Dean of Yale Law School, Harold Koh, said after analyzing the Executive Branch's claims of these previously unrecognized powers: "If the President has commander-in-chief power to commit torture, he has the power to commit genocide, to sanction slavery, to promote apartheid, to license summary execution." The fact that our normal safeguards have thus far failed to contain this unprecedented expansion of executive power is deeply troubling. This failure is due in part to the fact that the Executive Branch has followed a determined strategy of obfuscating, delaying, withholding information, appearing to yield but then refusing to do so and dissembling in order to frustrate the efforts of the legislative and judicial branches to restore our constitutional balance. For example, after appearing to support legislation sponsored by John McCain to stop the continuation of torture, the President declared in the act of signing the bill that he reserved the right not to comply with it. Similarly, the Executive Branch claimed that it could unilaterally imprison American citizens without giving them access to review by any tribunal. The Supreme Court disagreed, but the President engaged in legal maneuvers designed to prevent the Court from providing meaningful content to the rights of its citizens. A conservative jurist on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote that the Executive Branch's handling of one such case seemed to involve the sudden abandonment of principle "at substantial cost to the government's credibility before the courts." As a result of its unprecedented claim of new unilateral power, the Executive Branch has now put our constitutional design at grave risk. The stakes for America's representative democracy are far higher than has been generally recognized. These claims must be rejected and a healthy balance of power restored to our Republic. Otherwise, the fundamental nature of our democracy may well undergo a radical transformation. For more than two centuries, America's freedoms have been preserved in part by our founders' wise decision to separate the aggregate power of our government into three co-equal branches, each of which serves to check and balance the power of the other two. On more than a few occasions, the dynamic interaction among all three branches has resulted in collisions and temporary impasses that create what are invariably labeled "constitutional crises." These crises have often been dangerous and uncertain times for our Republic. But in each such case so far, we have found a resolution of the crisis by renewing our common agreement to live under the rule of law. The principle alternative to democracy throughout history has been the consolidation of virtually all state power in the hands of a single strongman or small group who together exercise that power without the informed consent of the governed. It was in revolt against just such a regime, after all, that America was founded. When Lincoln declared at the time of our greatest crisis that the ultimate question being decided in the Civil War was "whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure," he was not only saving our union but also was recognizing the fact that democracies are rare in history. And when they fail, as did Athens and the Roman Republic upon whose designs our founders drew heavily, what emerges in their place is another strongman regime. There have of course been other periods of American history when the Executive Branch claimed new powers that were later seen as excessive and mistaken. Our second president, John Adams, passed the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts and sought to silence and imprison critics and political opponents. When his successor, Thomas Jefferson, eliminated the abuses he said: "[The essential principles of our Government] form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation... [S]hould we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty and safety." Our greatest President, Abraham Lincoln, suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Some of the worst abuses prior to those of the current administration were committed by President Wilson during and after WWI with the notorious Red Scare and Palmer Raids. The internment of Japanese Americans during WWII marked a low point for the respect of individual rights at the hands of the executive. And, during the Vietnam War, the notorious COINTELPRO program was part and parcel of the abuses experienced by Dr. King and thousands of others. But in each of these cases, when the conflict and turmoil subsided, the country recovered its equilibrium and absorbed the lessons learned in a recurring cycle of excess and regret. There are reasons for concern this time around that conditions may be changing and that the cycle may not repeat itself. For one thing, we have for decades been witnessing the slow and steady accumulation of presidential power. In a global environment of nuclear weapons and cold war tensions, Congress and the American people accepted ever enlarging spheres of presidential initiative to conduct intelligence and counter intelligence activities and to allocate our military forces on the global stage. When military force has been used as an instrument of foreign policy or in response to humanitarian demands, it has almost always been as the result of presidential initiative and leadership. As Justice Frankfurter wrote in the Steel Seizure Case, "The accretion of dangerous power does not come in a day. It does come, however slowly, from the generative force of unchecked disregard of the restrictions that fence in even the most disinterested assertion of authority." A second reason to believe we may be experiencing something new is that we are told by the Administration that the war footing upon which he has tried to place the country is going to "last for the rest of our lives." So we are told that the conditions of national threat that have been used by other Presidents to justify arrogations of power will persist in near perpetuity. Third, we need to be aware of the advances in eavesdropping and surveillance technologies with their capacity to sweep up and analyze enormous quantities of information and to mine it for intelligence. This adds significant vulnerability to the privacy and freedom of enormous numbers of innocent people at the same time as the potential power of those technologies. These techologies have the potential for shifting the balance of power between the apparatus of the state and the freedom of the individual in ways both subtle and profound. Don't misunderstand me: the threat of additional terror strikes is all too real and their concerted efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction does create a real imperative to exercise the powers of the Executive Branch with swiftness and agility. Moreover, there is in fact an inherent power that is conferred by the Constitution to the President to take unilateral action to protect the nation from a sudden and immediate threat, but it is simply not possible to precisely define in legalistic terms exactly when that power is appropriate and when it is not. But the existence of that inherent power cannot be used to justify a gross and excessive power grab lasting for years that produces a serious imbalance in the relationship between the executive and the other two branches of government. There is a final reason to worry that we may be experiencing something more than just another cycle of overreach and regret. This Administration has come to power in the thrall of a legal theory that aims to convince us that this excessive concentration of presidential authority is exactly what our Constitution intended. This legal theory, which its proponents call the theory of the unitary executive but which is more accurately described as the unilateral executive, threatens to expand the president's powers until the contours of the constitution that the Framers actually gave us become obliterated beyond all recognition. Under this theory, the President's authority when acting as Commander-in-Chief or when making foreign policy cannot be reviewed by the judiciary or checked by Congress. President Bush has pushed the implications of this idea to its maximum by continually stressing his role as Commander-in-Chief, invoking it has frequently as he can, conflating it with his other roles, domestic and foreign. When added to the idea that we have entered a perpetual state of war, the implications of this theory stretch quite literally as far into the future as we can imagine. This effort to rework America's carefully balanced constitutional design into a lopsided structure dominated by an all powerful Executive Branch with a subservient Congress and judiciary is-ironically-accompanied by an effort by the same administration to rework America's foreign policy from one that is based primarily on U.S. moral authority into one that is based on a misguided and self-defeating effort to establish dominance in the world. The common denominator seems to be based on an instinct to intimidate and control. This same pattern has characterized the effort to silence dissenting views within the Executive Branch, to censor information that may be inconsistent with its stated ideological goals, and to demand conformity from all Executive Branch employees. For example, CIA analysts who strongly disagreed with the White House assertion that Osama bin Laden was linked to Saddam Hussein found themselves under pressure at work and became fearful of losing promotions and salary increases. Ironically, that is exactly what happened to FBI officials in the 1960s who disagreed with J. Edgar Hoover's view that Dr. King was closely connected to Communists. The head of the FBI's domestic intelligence division said that his effort to tell the truth about King's innocence of the charge resulted in he and his colleagues becoming isolated and pressured. "It was evident that we had to change our ways or we would all be out on the street.... The men and I discussed how to get out of trouble. To be in trouble with Mr. Hoover was a serious matter. These men were trying to buy homes, mortgages on homes, children in school. They lived in fear of getting transferred, losing money on their homes, as they usually did. ... so they wanted another memorandum written to get us out of the trouble that we were in." The Constitution's framers understood this dilemma as well, as Alexander Hamilton put it, "a power over a man's support is a power over his will." (Federalist No. 73) Soon, there was no more difference of opinion within the FBI. The false accusation became the unanimous view. In exactly the same way, George Tenet's CIA eventually joined in endorsing a manifestly false view that there was a linkage between al Qaeda and the government of Iraq. In the words of George Orwell: "We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." Whenever power is unchecked and unaccountable it almost inevitably leads to mistakes and abuses. In the absence of rigorous accountability, incompetence flourishes. Dishonesty is encouraged and rewarded. Last week, for example, Vice President Cheney attempted to defend the Administration's eavesdropping on American citizens by saying that if it had conducted this program prior to 9/11, they would have found out the names of some of the hijackers. Tragically, he apparently still doesn't know that the Administration did in fact have the names of at least 2 of the hijackers well before 9/11 and had available to them information that could have easily led to the identification of most of the other hijackers. And yet, because of incompetence in the handling of this information, it was never used to protect the American people. It is often the case that an Executive Branch beguiled by the pursuit of unchecked power responds to its own mistakes by reflexively proposing that it be given still more power. Often, the request itself it used to mask accountability for mistakes in the use of power it already has. Moreover, if the pattern of practice begun by this Administration is not challenged, it may well become a permanent part of the American system. Many conservatives have pointed out that granting unchecked power to this President means that the next President will have unchecked power as well. And the next President may be someone whose values and belief you do not trust. And this is why Republicans as well as Democrats should be concerned with what this President has done. If this President's attempt to dramatically expand executive power goes unquestioned, our constitutional design of checks and balances will be lost. And the next President or some future President will be able, in the name of national security, to restrict our liberties in a way the framers never would have thought possible. The same instinct to expand its power and to establish dominance characterizes the relationship between this Administration and the courts and the Congress. In a properly functioning system, the Judicial Branch would serve as the constitutional umpire to ensure that the branches of government observed their proper spheres of authority, observed civil liberties and adhered to the rule of law. Unfortunately, the unilateral executive has tried hard to thwart the ability of the judiciary to call balls and strikes by keeping controversies out of its hands - notably those challenging its ability to detain individuals without legal process -- by appointing judges who will be deferential to its exercise of power and by its support of assaults on the independence of the third branch. The President's decision to ignore FISA was a direct assault on the power of the judges who sit on that court. Congress established the FISA court precisely to be a check on executive power to wiretap. Yet, to ensure that the court could not function as a check on executive power, the President simply did not take matters to it and did not let the court know that it was being bypassed. The President's judicial appointments are clearly designed to ensure that the courts will not serve as an effective check on executive power. As we have all learned, Judge Alito is a longtime supporter of a powerful executive - a supporter of the so-called unitary executive, which is more properly called the unilateral executive. Whether you support his confirmation or not - and I do not - we must all agree that he will not vote as an effective check on the expansion of executive power. Likewise, Chief Justice Roberts has made plain his deference to the expansion of executive power through his support of judicial deference to executive agency rulemaking. And the Administration has supported the assault on judicial independence that has been conducted largely in Congress. That assault includes a threat by the Republican majority in the Senate to permanently change the rules to eliminate the right of the minority to engage in extended debate of the President's judicial nominees. The assault has extended to legislative efforts to curtail the jurisdiction of courts in matters ranging from habeas corpus to the pledge of allegiance. In short, the Administration has demonstrated its contempt for the judicial role and sought to evade judicial review of its actions at every turn. But the most serious damage has been done to the legislative branch. The sharp decline of congressional power and autonomy in recent years has been almost as shocking as the efforts by the Executive Branch to attain a massive expansion of its power. I was elected to Congress in 1976 and served eight years in the house, 8 years in the Senate and presided over the Senate for 8 years as Vice President. As a young man, I saw the Congress first hand as the son of a Senator. My father was elected to Congress in 1938, 10 years before I was born, and left the Senate in 1971. The Congress we have today is unrecognizable compared to the one in which my father served. There are many distinguished Senators and Congressmen serving today. I am honored that some of them are here in this hall. But the legislative branch of government under its current leadership now operates as if it is entirely subservient to the Executive Branch. Moreover, too many Members of the House and Senate now feel compelled to spend a majority of their time not in thoughtful debate of the issues, but raising money to purchase 30 second TV commercials. There have now been two or three generations of congressmen who don't really know what an oversight hearing is. In the 70's and 80's, the oversight hearings in which my colleagues and I participated held the feet of the Executive Branch to the fire - no matter which party was in power. Yet oversight is almost unknown in the Congress today. The role of authorization committees has declined into insignificance. The 13 annual appropriation bills are hardly ever actually passed anymore. Everything is lumped into a single giant measure that is not even available for Members of Congress to read before they vote on it. Members of the minority party are now routinely excluded from conference committees, and amendments are routinely not allowed during floor consideration of legislation. In the United States Senate, which used to pride itself on being the "greatest deliberative body in the world," meaningful debate is now a rarity. Even on the eve of the fateful vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq, Senator Robert Byrd famously asked: "Why is this chamber empty?" In the House of Representatives, the number who face a genuinely competitive election contest every two years is typically less than a dozen out of 435. And too many incumbents have come to believe that the key to continued access to the money for re-election is to stay on the good side of those who have the money to give; and, in the case of the majority party, the whole process is largely controlled by the incumbent president and his political organization. So the willingness of Congress to challenge the Administration is further limited when the same party controls both Congress and the Executive Branch. The Executive Branch, time and again, has co-opted Congress' role, and often Congress has been a willing accomplice in the surrender of its own power. Look for example at the Congressional role in "overseeing" this massive four year eavesdropping campaign that on its face seemed so clearly to violate the Bill of Rights. The President says he informed Congress, but what he really means is that he talked with the chairman and ranking member of the House and Senate intelligence committees and the top leaders of the House and Senate. This small group, in turn, claimed that they were not given the full facts, though at least one of the intelligence committee leaders handwrote a letter of concern to VP Cheney and placed a copy in his own safe. Though I sympathize with the awkward position in which these men and women were placed, I cannot disagree with the Liberty Coalition when it says that Democrats as well as Republicans in the Congress must share the blame for not taking action to protest and seek to prevent what they consider a grossly unconstitutional program. Moreover, in the Congress as a whole-both House and Senate-the enhanced role of money in the re-election process, coupled with the sharply diminished role for reasoned deliberation and debate, has produced an atmosphere conducive to pervasive institutionalized corruption. The Abramoff scandal is but the tip of a giant iceberg that threatens the integrity of the entire legislative branch of government. It is the pitiful state of our legislative branch which primarily explains the failure of our vaunted checks and balances to prevent the dangerous overreach by our Executive Branch which now threatens a radical transformation of the American system. I call upon Democratic and Republican members of Congress today to uphold your oath of office and defend the Constitution. Stop going along to get along. Start acting like the independent and co-equal branch of government you're supposed to be. But there is yet another Constitutional player whose pulse must be taken and whose role must be examined in order to understand the dangerous imbalance that has emerged with the efforts by the Executive Branch to dominate our constitutional system. We the people are-collectively-still the key to the survival of America's democracy. We-as Lincoln put it, "[e]ven we here"-must examine our own role as citizens in allowing and not preventing the shocking decay and degradation of our democracy. Thomas Jefferson said: "An informed citizenry is the only true repository of the public will." The revolutionary departure on which the idea of America was based was the audacious belief that people can govern themselves and responsibly exercise the ultimate authority in self-government. This insight proceeded inevitably from the bedrock principle articulated by the Enlightenment philosopher John Locke: "All just power is derived from the consent of the governed." The intricate and carefully balanced constitutional system that is now in such danger was created with the full and widespread participation of the population as a whole. The Federalist Papers were, back in the day, widely-read newspaper essays, and they represented only one of twenty-four series of essays that crowded the vibrant marketplace of ideas in which farmers and shopkeepers recapitulated the debates that played out so fruitfully in Philadelphia. Indeed, when the Convention had done its best, it was the people - in their various States - that refused to confirm the result until, at their insistence, the Bill of Rights was made integral to the document sent forward for ratification. And it is "We the people" who must now find once again the ability we once had to play an integral role in saving our Constitution. And here there is cause for both concern and great hope. The age of printed pamphlets and political essays has long since been replaced by television - a distracting and absorbing medium which sees determined to entertain and sell more than it informs and educates. Lincoln's memorable call during the Civil War is applicable in a new way to our dilemma today: "We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Forty years have passed since the majority of Americans adopted television as their principal source of information. Its dominance has become so extensive that virtually all significant political communication now takes place within the confines of flickering 30-second television advertisements. And the political economy supported by these short but expensive television ads is as different from the vibrant politics of America's first century as those politics were different from the feudalism which thrived on the ignorance of the masses of people in the Dark Ages. The constricted role of ideas in the American political system today has encouraged efforts by the Executive Branch to control the flow of information as a means of controlling the outcome of important decisions that still lie in the hands of the people. The Administration vigorously asserts its power to maintain the secrecy of its operations. After all, the other branches can't check an abuse of power if they don't know it is happening. For example, when the Administration was attempting to persuade Congress to enact the Medicare prescription drug benefit, many in the House and Senate raised concerns about the cost and design of the program. But, rather than engaging in open debate on the basis of factual data, the Administration withheld facts and prevented the Congress from hearing testimony that it sought from the principal administration expert who had compiled information showing in advance of the vote that indeed the true cost estimates were far higher than the numbers given to Congress by the President. Deprived of that information, and believing the false numbers given to it instead, the Congress approved the program. Tragically, the entire initiative is now collapsing- all over the country- with the Administration making an appeal just this weekend to major insurance companies to volunteer to bail it out. To take another example, scientific warnings about the catastrophic consequences of unchecked global warming were censored by a political appointee in the White House who had no scientific training. And today one of the leading scientific experts on global warming in NASA has been ordered not to talk to members of the press and to keep a careful log of everyone he meets with so that the Executive Branch can monitor and control his discussions of global warming. One of the other ways the Administration has tried to control the flow of information is by consistently resorting to the language and politics of fear in order to short-circuit the debate and drive its agenda forward without regard to the evidence or the public interest. As President Eisenhower said, "Any who act as if freedom's defenses are to be found in suppression and suspicion and fear confess a doctrine that is alien to America." Fear drives out reason. Fear suppresses the politics of discourse and opens the door to the politics of destruction. Justice Brandeis once wrote: "Men feared witches and burnt women." The founders of our country faced dire threats. If they failed in their endeavors, they would have been hung as traitors. The very existence of our country was at risk. Yet, in the teeth of those dangers, they insisted on establishing the Bill of Rights. Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an ideological enemy with tens of thousands of missiles poised to be launched against us and annihilate our country at a moment's notice? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march-when our fathers fought and won two World Wars simultaneously? It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same. We have a duty as Americans to defend our citizens' right not only to life but also to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is therefore vital in our current circumstances that immediate steps be taken to safeguard our Constitution against the present danger posed by the intrusive overreaching on the part of the Executive Branch and the President's apparent belief that he need not live under the rule of law. I endorse the words of Bob Barr, when he said, "The President has dared the American people to do something about it. For the sake of the Constitution, I hope they will." A special counsel should immediately be appointed by the Attorney General to remedy the obvious conflict of interest that prevents him from investigating what many believe are serious violations of law by the President. We have had a fresh demonstration of how an independent investigation by a special counsel with integrity can rebuild confidence in our system of justice. Patrick Fitzgerald has, by all accounts, shown neither fear nor favor in pursuing allegations that the Executive Branch has violated other laws. Republican as well as Democratic members of Congress should support the bipartisan call of the Liberty Coalition for the appointment of a special counsel to pursue the criminal issues raised by warrantless wiretapping of Americans by the President. Second, new whistleblower protections should immediately be established for members of the Executive Branch who report evidence of wrongdoing -- especially where it involves the abuse of Executive Branch authority in the sensitive areas of national security. Third, both Houses of Congress should hold comprehensive-and not just superficial-hearings into these serious allegations of criminal behavior on the part of the President. And, they should follow the evidence wherever it leads. Fourth, the extensive new powers requested by the Executive Branch in its proposal to extend and enlarge the Patriot Act should, under no circumstances be granted, unless and until there are adequate and enforceable safeguards to protect the Constitution and the rights of the American people against the kinds of abuses that have so recently been revealed. Fifth, any telecommunications company that has provided the government with access to private information concerning the communications of Americans without a proper warrant should immediately cease and desist their complicity in this apparently illegal invasion of the privacy of American citizens. Freedom of communication is an essential prerequisite for the restoration of the health of our democracy. It is particularly important that the freedom of the Internet be protected against either the encroachment of government or the efforts at control by large media conglomerates. The future of our democracy depends on it. I mentioned that along with cause for concern, there is reason for hope. As I stand here today, I am filled with optimism that America is on the eve of a golden age in which the vitality of our democracy will be re-established and will flourish more vibrantly than ever. Indeed I can feel it in this hall. As Dr. King once said, "Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us."

Motown founder Berry Gordy Jr. put out some LP's of the Rev. Martin Luther King's speeches including this one on Gordy 906.... The records served a valuable role in defining the Reverend....

Sunday, January 15, 2006

Happy Birthday Martin Luther King!!!

You know it doesn't make much sense
There ought to be a law againstAnyone who takes offense
At a day in your celebration
Cause we all know in our minds
That there ought to be a time
That we can set aside
To show just how much we love you
And I'm sure you would agreeIt couldn't fit more perfectly
Than to have a world party on the day you came to be

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday

I just never understood
How a man who died for good
Could not have a day that would
Be set aside for his recognition
Because it should never be
Just because some cannot see
The dream as clear as he
that they should make it become an illusion
And we all know everything
That he stood for time will bring
For in peace our hearts will sing
Thanks to Martin Luther King

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday

Why has there never been a holiday
Where peace is celebrated
all throughout the world
The time is overdue
For people like me and you
Who know the way to truth
Is love and unity to all God's children
It should never be a great event
And the whole day should be spent
In full remembrance
Of those who lived and died for the oneness of all people
So let us all begin
We know that love can win
Let it out don't hold it in
Sing it loud as you can

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday
Happy birthday
Happy birthday
Happy birthdayOoh yeah
Happy birthday...

We know the key to unify all people
Is in the dream that you had so long ago
That lives in all of the hearts of people
That believe in unity
We'll make the dream become a reality
I know we will
Because our hearts tell us so

Stevie Wonder

Saturday, January 14, 2006

Lush Life indeed!


John Coltrane's "Lush Life" on Prestige 7188 Yellow Bergenfield labels.... this LP has been a revelation.... I guess like many people I have discounted his Prestige output (say in comparison to his Atlantic/Impulse ouevre).... this owes its explanation partly to the fact that I have a bunch of Prestige cd issues which are not really Coltrane issues but were released under his name after Coltrane hit it real big in the 1960s....i guess these turned me off to the label's Coltrane releases but I overlooked a few original Coltrane LPs.... anyways, I think Prestige itself did not think much of the songs on this LP.. why? because the notes on jazzdisco.org tell me the songs on this were recorded in the second half of 1957 and very early 1958 BUT the album was not released (I deduce this from looking at the release dates of the Prestige LPs around this one ..say 7187 , 7189, 7190, etc.) until late 1960 or early 1961..... so what happened? probably Coltrane had a hit, don't you think? something like "My Favorite Things" perhaps? on Atlantic.. this was probably Prestige's effort to profit... and don't labels do that well? what about the LP cover? again, at first when I saw this I thought it was Kenny Dorham! Coltrane looks a bit thin.. he's got bags under his eyes.. this is not the very professional looking Coltrane from his other album covers.... Prestige probably had to use the pictures it had..i dunno.. looks to me that this is the Coltrane from before he kicked his drug demons and dealt with his other addictions.... i love the blue fonts utilized for his name and album title by the way.. which are changed to boring white for the cd issue.....

and the music? the first side is a session from 1957 (recorded after the Blue Train session for Blue Note) with coltrane, bass and drums..reminds me of the contemporaneous Sonny Rollins release Way Out West.. except it was apparently an accident as the scheduled pianist Red Garland (who at the time was like Coltrane in Miles' quintet) did not show up! in any case, it sounds great with Coltrane out there soloing on his own.. not grounded by the piano chords.....Coltrane is at his melodious best on some ballads and an improvised blues "Trane's Slo Blues"....this is Coltrane before the abrasive sheets of sound period...... a Coltrane that I think is always underrated as I enjoy him most when he is playing ballads..be it Impulse's Ballads set or the Johnny Hartman collaboration or even "Spiritual"... the second side has one track which adds Red Garland and Donald Byrd: the 14 minute centerpiece "Lush Life"... very very nice version and interesting to compare to the version he cut a few years later with Johnny Hartman....this LP also includes a version of a Cole Porter song, "I Love You" which never did get as much play as some of Cole's other songs.. though it sure sounds like Cole Porter... great stuff. highly recommended.. a lost classic in my opinion!.. a Coltrane record you will play over and over again!!..

Thursday, January 12, 2006


Blue Note 1585: Jimmy Smith's Groovin' at Smalls' Paradise..recorded live in Harlem late 1957.... i love this LP cover.. but i got to say that Jimmy Smith's trio LPs are beyond dull and some of his ballads go on and on in a style reminiscent of chamber music or baroque period classical.... there's nothing funky or greasy about them.... this LP is just beyond slow with tortous versions of standards such as Laura (particularly harrowing) and My Funny Valentine...do love that LP cover though!

Wednesday, January 11, 2006


this is the cd i was talking about which introduced me to the wonderful music of beny more.... "grandes voces del bolero beny more el barbaro de la melodia"... on spanish reissue expert label caney (why i say expert? cause caney belongs to the same group as blue moon which did some wonderful reissues of billie holiday's entire columbia recordings..including the priceless outtakes.. before columbia issues them themselves as part of the lady day box set).. anyways this is caney ccd 801... 18 tracks..boleros...worth every penny..some liner notes which do tell us the tracks are from between 1955-1957 which i guess must be beny more's peak period of sorts...

Beny More's "Pare...Que Lllego el Barbaro"!!!


and lastly.. Beny More.. Cuba's Frank Sinatra.. Cuba's greatest singer bar none.....he died in 1963 (too early) but left a legacy that will probably never be matched... i have heard about him being this super duper legend for years.. when last year i found some compilation of him singing boleros (slow love songs)... his reputation is that of being the best bolero singer of all time.. in any case its wonderful 50s cuban music and they are not all boleros..its pre-castro stuff with beny more leading an orchestra.. anyways i'll post the cd picture on the blog just for the sake of completeness but you know me.. i wanted something on vinyl and this is the album i always wanted because of the wonderful cover.... unfortunately with latin music often times its unclear when it was recorded, there are no liner notes, no listing of musicians... someone like beny deserves more but ultimately his music wins out..its just too good to suffer at the ups and downs and de-development of latin america..this record i think is a compilation of what must have been sides cut for 78s or very very early cuban lps (five of the tracks on the cd comp i got are on this album: preferi perderte , que me hace dano, oh vida, fiebre de ti and no puedo caller)...it was put out by a miami based company discuba which may have migrated from cuba after castro fell and i'm sure was set up to cater to the community of cubans that set up shop in miami post castro takeover.... who knows? they may have just taken their 78s or cuban lps and created new lps? i have two others in addition to this one...... can't find much info on the specifics of the record.. it was discuba LPD-501 and my label is light blue and i'm guessing the gold label was the original and the silver the second pressing so mine is probably a late 60s or even 70s pressing...but who cares? this stuff is hard to come by period..... the songs on this alternate some classic boleros oh vida or the wonderous que me hace dano with more fastpaced material such as "maracaibo oriental" (which features some horn breaks that sound like they could be bvsc's manuel guajiro mirabal... )... ultimately when you hear this stuff you do think "ah this is where the buena vista social club came from"..certainly ibrahim ferrer singing his slow boleros and remember he was a bolero specialist has to remind you of beny more...its intereresting to ponder that beny more stayed in cuba .. what would have happened if he had migrated to the US a la celia cruz? who knows.. he died of liver disease apparently..too much good rum i guess...my understanding is beny more recorded in cuba for rca cuba... that he had his own orchestra.. that he was black as where all his band members... that he fought against discrimination down there....that he was loyal to his band and they loved him for it....oh and that his nickname was "el barbaro".. not sure but i think it means "the great one" and that no one can deny...oh one last word.. on the cover it looks to me like he is in a car in havanna facing the sea in front of what must have been one of cuba's luxury hotels....

so much fabulous music around

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Willie Colon plays DC on farewell tour!!!!!


this lp which i'm proud to say i found for a buck at crooked beat records has also been critical in spurring my interest in fania salsa and more generally latin music.....its a compilation of willie colon materiall... and i cannot say willie colon without confessing my heartbreak in reading this week that willie colon brought his career closing tour to the H20 club here in dc... why am i hearbroken? because colon who started recording at 15 (!!!!!!!) is retiring afte 40 years in the biz from touring to concentrate on writing or so he says... well the gist is just last week i looked on his web site and pollstar to find out if he was touring and found out he was putting together this career ending tour but there was no mention of any dates at all.. fast forward to yesterday when i pick up a paper and find a review of his concert! ahhhhhh..no fair! in any case willie colon has to be one of the most important salsa musicians of all time... sure, he plays the trombone but his role in arranging and writing and in some sense helping make the careers of two of salsa's top singers ruben blades (the willie colon masterpiece "siembra" was recorded with blades) and hector lavoe (my absolute favorite salsa meister these days) merits him full on legend tag... in any case back to this lp... this is some no name compilation but its got all the right names and cherry picks from colon's vast fania catalog to include a song with celia cruz, one with blades and most importantly to me SEVEN classics with hector lavoe iincluding some of the best songs this genre has ever seen: i'm talking "el dia de mi suerte " ("the day of my luck"), la murga, che che cole, abuelita etc......anyways this greatest hits titled willie colon su vida musical 14 exitos originales (so creative: "willie colon his musical life 14 original hits") was released by some no name label profono internacional in 1982 and its a winner.... and who knows maybe i'll trek somewhere to catch willie colon's show... check out some of willie colon's album covers from fania if you can find them (the reissues are worth it just for the cover art)..i'm talking "el malo" ("the bad one"), "the hustler", etc....check them out on ebay...

give me FANIA or give me death!


ultimately this cd was critical in confirming to me the importance of the fania record label.. i had seen the movie salsa at the smithsonian (faithful blog readers will know what i'm talking about) and by happenstance i picked this cd up which was recorded during the first stages of the fania all stars back in around 1968.... in any case its footstomping salsa..... hard core.....this is fania all stars vol. 2 recorded live at the red garter.. the band's leader is introduced by fania all star label co-founder johnny pacheco...ray barretto the master conga maestro (mr. hard hands!)... who says a few words... hector lavoe sings a couple of tracks... obviously this is a criminally poor fania reissue .. these cds are hard to come by! and i wonder if now that the fania catalog got sold off for a measly 9 million to some no name miami based company things will improve.. i'm skeptical..which is criminal as this is the blue note blue chip catalog of latin music... also on this according to the cover art are tito puente and eddie palmieri (who coincidentally is playing the blues alley here in dc later this year)....but of course one can't tell where they are playing as there are zero absolutely zero zilch liner notes.. we are not even told the date of the recording.. on the back it says 1972 but i know it was far ealier... in any case my favorite salsa singer hector lavoe kills on a few tracks...the first track "son cuero y boogaloo" is great as is charlie palmieri's "kikapoo joy juice" (which lavoe sings).. red garter strut is pretty funky...its all full of great percussion and congas all over the place.. you can't help but shake to this stuff....the slower tune includes is "and if this world were mine" a strange cover of a marvin gaye song which initially seems like the odd man out on this but will eventually win you over upon repeated listening! anyways i love this cd and can't wait to get more of this stuff this year.. but like i say its real tough to find it.. and original pressings on vinyl? fuggedaboutit! as i read somewhere on the web: these were major party records and very few made it unscathed...the cd was produced by fania impresario jerry masucci whose estate was recently sold (did he pass away recently?) including the aforementioned fania catalog....why blue note or emi or some major label did not want to invest a measly drop in the bucket 9 million for this stuff is beyond me! oh the catalog number is FACD 364..... fania begins at 325 in the first half of the 60s and goes all the way to the 600s but quality drops after the high 400s.....

oh one more thing about babasonicos album anoche

track 8 "falsario" features guitar work by carca who is a strange cult figure/ personage/character of the argentine nightlife demi monde... i caught his show in buenos aires at niceto (2002) which started at about 3:30 am! it was his last show before moving to spain.... not sure where he is now.. i'd bet he has returned to buenos aires (it will never let you go)... anyways the dude is one weird and i'd guess coked up cat.... huge AFRO supported on an incredibly tall wiry frame clad in purple spandex but man in the words of ziggy could he play guitar! the guy was rock'n'roll and i have never seen anything like him...babasonicos have always been big boosters of his work even having produced a record of two of carcas.....

oh another thing about babasonicos while i'm at it.. ian brown/stone roses fans may notice that ian has a solo song called "babasonicos".... and its not a coincidence.. i'm fairly certainas ian brown's woman is from argentina and he's been known to spend time in buenos aires...

a little babasonica

Chicago Tribune summary of Babasonicos "Anoche"

After reading the article which proclaims Babasonicos "Anoche" the best record of 2005 (I guess Latin category but not sure) I thought the summary was just great so I'm going to link to article here:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/arts/chi-0512110247dec11,1,2796017.story?ctrack=1&cset=true

and copy blurb cause i think the description is just right on the money (how curious as roxy music and black sabbath are two bands i've been listening to more and more!):

1. Babasonicos: "Anoche" (Universal Latino)The fact that Babasonicos has delivered the best Latin album of the year for the second time in a row speaks volumes about the privileged position this Argentine sextet occupies in Latin rock. "Anoche" expands Babasonicos' sonic palette with a punchy collection of 14 straight-to-the-point tunes that combine the crafty melodies of Roxy and Depeche Mode with the primal riffs of vintage Black Sabbath.


and i recommend you check out babasonicos own web site:

www.babasonicos.com

My favorite rock record from 2005 came out towards the end of the year... Babasonicos "Anoche" ("Last Night").... a return to the form exhibited on "Jessico" which was the best Argentine dance rock record of 2001....Jessico's follow up "Infame" never made much of an impression but this one is just wonderful and hits all the right spots.... 14 songs in 36 minutes... great melodies and lyrics about what else? going out! youth!... "algunas noches soy facil...oh oh oh.. no acato limites" ("some nights i'm easy... oh oh oh..i don't obey limits").... as in the past few babasonicos records andrew weiss of ween production fame was involved....one thing i'd never seen and find interesting on this record..: songs 2 , 3 and 4 utilize the same choruses or i should say 2 and 3 have the same chorus and 3 and 4 have the same chorus if that makes sense...the chicago tribune latin music critic picked this as his album of the year.. lead singer adrian d'argelos is splendid wether on the rockers or ballads (i think he can sing/inhabit a traditional spanish bolero i.e. "capricho" in much the same way gene ween gets into his characters)....or "el colmo": "i want to tempt the abyss and con death.. lets return to zero...erase it all and celebrate if tomorrow i awake sober and happy...so song take me far away where no one remembers of me...i want to be the murmuring of some city that doesn't know who i am...i would give my dream to see this farce fail...lets lose the center..burn it all and ask that tomorrow no one come make me comply..so song take me far way where no one remembers of me i want to be the murmur of some song that doesn't know who i am...i trade it all for the gift of making women laugh...their world sinks me in its prints and ask that tomorrow i become another sad soul.."

Thursday, January 05, 2006

Letterman tells Bill O'Reilly how it is

tuesday night on letterman:

Letterman to the Big O: "I have the feeling that 60% of what you say is crap..."

Letterman to the Big O: "I'm very concerned about people like yourself who don't have anything but endless sympathy for a woman like Cindy Sheehan. Honest to Christ."

ipod/dvd kill sound system!

so true....check it (copy full continous link to browser window):

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20060104.wxhifi04/BNStory/Entertainment/

Blog Archive