[Mb-hair] Good press

[richard haase]

hi katie
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Katie Kasben" <katiekasben at hotmail.com>
To: <mb-hair at islandlists.com>
Sent: Friday, September 23, 2005 3:24 PM
Subject: [Mb-hair] Good press


> Hey Kids,
>
> I wanted to share with you a great letter to the editor of the Raleigh
News
> and Observer (our state capitol's paper, and about 4 hours away from
here):
>
> *the last two paragraphs are my favourite...
>
> Mark Schultz
> Orange County editor
> The News & Observer
> Chapel Hill News editor
> (919) 932-2003
>
> Now is the time to act
> Perry Young column for September 05
>
> A few weeks ago, a very nice lady organized a genteel gathering at
> the downtown post office in support of Cindy Sheehan's anti-war
> protest outside the President's vacation ranch in Crawford, Texas.
> I hung about the edges, expecting to be bored by the usual liberal
> speeches.  But, no, this woman said there would be no speeches, just a
> quiet show of support.  And, so, for several long minutes, we just
> stood there.
>
> I finally wandered off, frustrated that nobody was saying anything,
> nobody was doing anything.  More to the point, why wasn't I doing
> more?
>
> After witnessing the obscenity of the senseless slaughter in Vietnam
> as a correspondent, I came back and joined in every major peace march
> on Washington.  Then, as now, our President showed a profound
> indifference to poor people in this country and the devastation we
> were causing half way around the world.  As we sang, "All we are
> saying is give peace a chance," armed troops surrounded the White
> House and turned the tear gas on us.
>
> Now it seems one pathetic Gold Star mother has finally aroused our
> outrage about the lies that led to the current quagmire in Iraq.  Ms.
> Sheehan's courageous and timely stand was pushed to the back pages by
> hurricane Katrina and  the unbelievable pictures of the needless
> suffering and dying of people not in Somalia or Iraq, but in our own
> backyard.
>
>
> We looked in the mirror and were appalled by our own self-image.  The
> richest country the world has ever known was simply incapable of
> taking care of its own people in a time of crisis.  The Bush
> administration was suddenly exposed for what it has been all along:
> an incompetent bunch of ideologues who are simply not worthy of the
> high offices they've been pushed into.
>
> It is one thing to giggle and grin about the sport of hardball
> politics; it is quite another when these kinds of self-serving
> decisions result in the loss of lives and livelihoods of hundreds of
> thousands of people.  The President is guilty of criminal neglect on a
> scale never before seen in America.  We are left with the indelible
> images of the poor people in Louisiana and Mississippi crying out for
> help while Condi Rice gads about New York and Bush blithely flies off
> to San Diego for another multi- million dollar fund raiser.
>
> It is eerie to watch; as Bush actually seems to look more and more
> like Nixon with his weirdly inappropriate facial gestures and that
> loony giggle that often follows even the most solemn words written for
> him to mispronounce.
>
> But in this moment of our country's dire need, some rays of hope
> shine through.  The glamorous stars of television came alive as never
> before and proved themselves worthy of the profession of Edward R.
> Murrow.  For once, the administration could not put a happy face on
> yet another catastrophe.  This time, their lies could be proven by the
> pictures, live and in color from the battlefront.
>
> And in spite of our leaders indifference, the American people have
> responded with an outpouring of love and generosity unparalleled in
> our history.  People aren't just giving money, they're offering up
> their times, their homes, their very lives to help.  Maybe we are
> finally overcoming the greed and selfishness of the 1980s and 1990s.
> As if in answer to my personal yearning for the 1960s, I was recently
> invited back to Asheville for a new production of the rock musical,
> Hair.
>
> Now, if you think nothing could be more dated than this show which I
> first saw as a cabaret skit at Cheetah discotheque in New York in
> 1967, you are dead wrong.  As I sat listening to the joyful music of
> protest to war, to racism, to the destruction of the environment, I
> realized that every word was just as relevant today as it was 40 years
> ago.  Tears flooded down my face as an Asheville delegation of
> Veterans for Peace staged the last scene in this version of Hair,
> bringing in the flag-draped casket of the young hippie who got drafted
> and killed in Vietnam.  I urged the incredibly talented young
> director, Katie Kasben, to take the show on the road.  All America is
> ready to renew those anthems of peace and  "let the sunshine in"!
>
> Just as I remembered from the 1967 show, there were  "peace and love"
> people outside the theater getting signatures on petitions and signing
> people up for the bus ride to the next big peace march on Washingtron.
> It'll be on Saturday, September 24.  I plan to be there; I love the
> smell of tear gas in the morning.
>
>
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