Lefsetz: University of Missouri Fiasco

Spectators cheer during Canada Day celebrations on Parliament Hill in Ottawa July 1, 2012. Canadians are celebrating their country's 145th birthday. REUTERS/Chris Wattie (CANADA - Tags: POLITICS SOCIETY ANNIVERSARY) - RTR34GEG

What kind of crazy, fucked-up world do we live in where the charge is led by football players?

One in which money talks.

That’s why the President resigned. The college was gonna lose a cool million if its football team didn’t play Brigham Young on Saturday.

Welcome to the sixties, they’re back again. That’s right, history repeats, but always with a twist.

Like the nineties, everybody thought the fifties were copacetic, that everybody was equal and happiness ruled. But this was untrue if you were black, ergo the protests on college campuses.

It always starts on campuses.

But back then, music went hand in hand with change.

The folk movement was integral to the protest movement. Bob Dylan became a national fixture.

Today, music, the most fast-moving of the entertainment medias, is completely out of step. Purely about hedonism. And this lack of resonance with the populace is what makes it second tier.

People are feeling their power. They’ve got cameras and social media and despite the fact that most employ these for narcissistic purposes, they can be harnessed to move the ball, to stand up to the powers-that-be.

And there’s so much to stand up to.

Not only are you paying a fortune to go to college, the state keeps cutting the budget. Listen to Malcolm Gladwell on Bill Simmons‘ podcast rave about the indignities of Wisconsin cutting $250 million from its university budget whilst paying $500 million for a new Milwaukee Bucks arena. The team owners are hedge fund billionaires.

Most people are not.

5cea669a2b19b4fe01f4b27b3ef58a7f.747x743x1You may think the United States is the greatest country in the world, but Canada was just rated No. 1 in personal freedom, and the United States didn’t even make the top ten. As for the most prosperous countries? Norway leads, the U.S. is number 11. But we’ve been brainwashed by fat cat Republicans that we live in the land of the free and the brave and opportunity is ripe and if you question what’s going on you’re un-American.

What’s going on, that’s what Marvin Gaye asked.

Sure, he liked the ladies, he liked the substances, but unlike today’s entertainment superstars he was unafraid of kicking back and questioning the injustices of the society he lived in.

Unlike today’s musicians who believe injustice is the public’s move from sales to streaming with the concomitant squeezing of revenues for some.

Wanna win in today’s world?

Align yourself with the people.

And the people are saying they’re mad as hell and they’re not gonna take it anymore.

It started in Ferguson. And then it went to the workplace. That’s what the raising of the minimum wage is all about, survival.

And if you think we’re only talking about ethnic groups, how about that report stating that death rates for middle-aged whites are rising? (http://nyti.ms/1RqkRFK) That’s what happens when you’ve got no hope, you drink and drug and commit suicide. Don’t shoot the messenger, read the article.

This is what happens when you live in an oligarchy preaching false hope to the underclass. The poor enable the rich until one day they realize the game is fixed and don’t want to play anymore. That’s what explains the rise of Carson and Trump and the demise of Bush. Something’s gotta give.

But it used to be that music rode shotgun. Whether it be “Masters of War” or “Eve of Destruction,” if you wanted to know which way the wind blew you listened to a record.

Before Clear Channel/iHeart owned all the radio stations and all the stars were two-dimensional nitwits afraid of their shadows who believed if you could piss off one person you should keep your mouth shut.

That’s right, we’re living in the early sixties musically. The era of girl groups and meaningless ditties, just before the Beatles, when a pent-up anger and desire caused the assembled multitude to throw over what had come before for something brand new and honest.

But the difference back then was it was harder to play, not everybody considered themselves to be a star. Today we’ve got the look-at-me crowd which wants the old system to tumble so they can get a chance, even though their bona fides are suspect, they can barely sing, never mind write.

So if you want to change the world, start by appealing to college students, they’re the only ones standing up to an unjust system, everybody else is either too scared of losing their job or too ignorant to know what’s going on.

In none of the reports I read was there any talk of the students singing, not even “We Shall Overcome.”

It’s like the music business itself has been beaten down by the oligarchs, so frustrated by the changes wrought by the internet that it has no self-respect and believes it’s got no power.

Hell, you don’t hear protesters singing “Shake It Off.”

And Kim Kardashian may have married a black man but she’s too stupid and uninformed to take a stand on human rights, she’s too busy burnishing her image in our Instagram culture, making sure her bank account gets fatter and fatter. As for her husband…all he keeps telling us is HE doesn’t get a chance. How about helping OTHERS get a chance?

Music can reclaim its spot in the forefront only if it realizes that money comes from hits and hits are that which resonate with the public and you just can’t make as much money as the techies but you can have a ton more power.

You may not think what happens in Missouri affects you.

But it does.

We’ve got an entire spectrum of disadvantaged people in America, one can argue they’re the majority, and now they’re speaking up and winning.

You may think people care about Obama’s birth certificate and Hillary’s e-mails but you’re too old school, you’re living in the pre-internet era, when people had no voice.

We’ve got a voice now. We own the internet. And we’re speaking.

Put your ear to the ground and listen.

For the times they are a-changin’.

http://www.mb-kc.com/
This entry was posted in Bob Lefsetz. Bookmark the permalink.

19 Responses to Lefsetz: University of Missouri Fiasco

  1. Jim a.k.a. BWH says:

    In an age when so many people think they have a right to NOT be offended, musical groups run away from any music or any opinions that might be controversial.

    Dixie Chicks, anyone?

  2. HARLEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! says:

    Bob…the civil rights movement started out with a small group making
    huge mistakes in how they handled their protests.
    the anti war movement in the 60’s an 70’s started out from a single
    man on a megaphone….talking about the war….and went thru
    many changes in how they demonstrated against the war.
    If you read of the great massive changes in history…its starts with
    mistakes…changes that blew up in people’s faces….media coverage
    that said this “will be nothing” and the establishment would comment
    about the far left or right being the driving force behind a small group
    of agitators.
    We hear that now. But the revolution has just begun. Missouri is just
    the start. It will spread. America is changing faster than any of us
    ever imagined because of social media and the internet.
    I predicted this several years ago. It will be far reaching and be bigger
    than anyone in the media today realizes.
    We are an evolving nation and world. And this is just the start of what
    will be the biggest change not only in America but in the world.
    Hold on to your hats.
    The world is changing!
    Harley

  3. chuck says:

    “Not only are you paying a fortune to go to college, the state keeps cutting the budget. Listen to Malcolm Gladwell on Bill Simmons‘ podcast rave about the indignities of Wisconsin cutting $250 million from its university budget whilst paying $500 million for a new Milwaukee Bucks arena. The team owners are hedge fund billionaires.”

    College costs are up, but why?

    http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/03/the_greed_of_super_wealthy_liberal_colleges_is_astounding.html

  4. chuck says:

    “Align yourself with the people.

    And the people are saying they’re mad as hell and they’re not gonna take it anymore.

    It started in Ferguson. And then it went to the workplace. That’s what the raising of the minimum wage is all about, survival.

    And if you think we’re only talking about ethnic groups, how about that report stating that death rates for middle-aged whites are rising? (http://nyti.ms/1RqkRFK) That’s what happens when you’ve got no hope, you drink and drug and commit suicide. Don’t shoot the messenger, read the article.”

    I think ya must have fallen and hit your head on your lava lamp.

    We have never, never been more divided as a country and what started in Ferguson really started in the Rose Garden. No one I know, or read about, is hoping for Rachel Jeantel and the parents of Michael Brown to lead us onto the tennis courts to hash out our differences before we storm the barricades.

    If there is music for this “movement”, it should be penned and performed by Flav A Flav for folks too stupid to read the clock on his chest. The batteries, leaking acid onto his pimp shirt, the clock’s hands stuck on Mid Night forever more, we will all hum Non Nobis and Te Deum for what was once a great country, while he “Bo Jangles” on the stage.

    Fu*k the Kardashians.

    • the dude says:

      Funny you should mention Flava Flav, Chuck. Being a part of the group Public Enemy, a group that actually had something real to say about the situation here in the US for black people.
      They deserve to be the voice of that movement.

      Power to the people.

  5. Guy Who Says What Others Think says:

    Today’s generation of beta-males and idiot teenage girls, who might be the most narcissistic generation of all time, are too concerned with snap chatting, posting to instagram, twitter, and all other social media to have the back bone to make any real change. The “sheeple” in Columbia are just doing what’s popular at the moment without putting any real thought behind it.
    Millennials? WORST. GENERATION. EVER.

    • Guy Who Says What Others Think, Really Just Blames Others For His Stupidity. says:

      And who created the Millenials? They didn’t raise themselves, and if they did thats your fault “Guy Who Says What Others Think”.

      Where were you f***ots?

  6. CFPCowboy says:

    At MU, it is already over. Alumni giving is already off over a million, making it impossible to continue to support the program. The Missouri Legislature is also moving to hold the University responsible for spending.

    • HARLEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! says:

      cowboy is a liar. Where do you make up such crap?
      The legislature wanted wolfe gone long before the student athletes
      called for a strike.
      Get real you liar!

  7. chuck says:

    My daughter graduated from MU. She is disgusted and has no plans to ever contribute a penny to MU.

    Here, it is hard to get your arms around how sophomoric and puerile this commentary from the Vice President Of The University Of Missouri Students Association is.

    http://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2015/11/12/mizzou-student-first-amendment-rights-creates-hostile-and-unsafe-learning-environments-n2079815

    Look, I get it that these are kids and have unmatriculated mush sloshing around between their ears in conjunction with raging hormones and natural (At that age.) tendency for a Bi Polar thought process, based on anything but consistency. That said, the almost metaphysical lack of ability by a so called “Student Leader” to understand the 1st Amendment and it’s importance during just such controversies is breath taking.

    These are not the brightest stars in the sky and in fact, are dim bulbs in a legion of under powered intellects that strut on a stage and should embarrass any faculty at any institution of so called “Higher Learning”.

    Maybe Ms. Clicks pleas for “Muscle” were in lieu of what she knew wasn’t available. Erudition.

    Pathetic.

  8. Frank says:

    Don’t blame the 1st Amendement. If it weren’t for the 1st Amendment, all of you down there in the middle of Missouri wouldn’t know what kind of filth your living amongst

  9. Furioso says:

    Until recently I lived out of the continental U.S. for the last 25 years. The one overwhelmingly obvious observation I’ve made since I got back is that the middle class has been destroyed so now almost everybody is trashy, overweight(EXTREMELY OVERWEIGHT), not so much unintelligent but robotic, etc.

    Now I noticed this ON MY FIRST DAY BACK IN THE U.S. I was shocked, I had read about this but I didn’t believe it until I saw it with my own two eyes. Yes, there’s about 5% or 10% of richer people living in their gated communities to hide away from all this but the rest is just pathetic.

    It’s not like everything is going downhill it’s really, truly OVER. O V E R. People are just fighting over the table scraps so yeah when they break down the institutions they’ll see what there is in store for them.

    And what is in store for everybody? Ruins, that’s all.

  10. Ernest Evans says:

    John Dos Passos used to say: “If fascism comes to America, it will come from the left.” It greatly saddens me to say this, but he turned out to be right. Since the pontificate of John XXIII all papal encyclicals have been addressed to “All Men and Women of Good Will.” I call on all American “Men and Women of Good Will”, of whatever political persuasion, to take a stand against an ongoing attack on our Constitutional rights. The right to due process is under attack by threats of race riots if individuals accused of racism are do not have their cases ajudicated “swiftly” and with “no legal niceties.” (When I was growing up in the South in the 1950s and 1960s the people who called for “swift justice” with “no legal niceties” wore white robes and burned crosses–now they populate the multicultural departments of major universities.) As we see at Mizzou, the right of a free press and of freedom of speech is under attack by a group of campus stormtroopers who would make Ernst Roehm ashamed. Yes, I know that these young people are “idealistic”–so were the Nazi stormtroopers. Our Constitution is under attack–and Americans must come together to defend this document.

  11. The left cares about nothing but power. All the noise it makes about “change” and “progress” and “revolutions” is just that: noise. The very last thing leftists want is any change that would cost them power, prestige and wealth. The left is ultra-reactionary.

    The ultra-reactionary leftists are those who have power and who snarl at anyone who wants a share of that power. These bosses have a stranglehold on government and on every powerful institution.

    What large nonprofit organizations are not wedded to chic leftist cant? What broadcasting empire is not soaked in leftist messaging and images? Public schools are all re-education camps, and academia ruthlessly purges any student or instructor who deviates from the dreary plantation of entrenched power. Every federal agency has been filled with dutiful flacks. Every union boss really works for leftist overlords. Even large corporations pathologically follow what officers and directors believe is politically correct.

    Harley and his ilk run this country. The American ballot box, stuffed with those who vote for a living in the new “Bread and Circus” Amerika and the influx of illegal and legal immigrants brought here to swing the pendulum at that ballot box have won.

    Hillary and Harley are on the ticket and it is a foregone conclusion.

    Traditional Americans are “Gravely Disappointed” and go gently into that black night.

  12. chuck says:

    Within 2 weeks, as the chaos dies down in Paris and the 24 hour news cycle steers us all back into a controllable somnambulance, the President will worry aloud about “Islamaphobia” and chide those who would question his immigration policies.

    It’s a Hale-Bop-Heaven for President Applewhite as he gets us into our purple shoes, reads us a bedtime fairy tale from the NY Times and gets us ready for a long winter night.

  13. threedawgs says:

    It’s always been about Inverted-Totalitarianism with the globalist bankers at the apex and the U.S. Government and it’s puppet allies actingas the enforcement arm of the cabal. Acting on behalf of less than 1% of 1% to the detriment of everybody else. Of course 97% of the brainwashed, apathetic, self-deluded, tyranny-worshipping morons don’t see it unfolding right in front of them.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *