Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 12h

And also he literally says "I ain't no fortunate son" over and over, and he enunciates that part clearly. You really don't need to do a deep analysis here - not getting it pretty much requires flat out divorcing words from their meaning, experiencing songs like a flipping chimpanzee.

3

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 12h

Admittedly I was raised on Peter, Paul, and Mary and my grandma had a giant painting of a major 19th century proletarian uprising and whatnot, so I had a category to put it in, but I was also a child who honestly didn't understand most of what was being said. It was just the vibe of the song!

1 2

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 12h

I mean the tone of his voice alone suggests the singer is angry. Even before I could distinguish many of the words (I just refreshed my memory and it turns out I *still* don't know about a third of them) I knew it was biting commentary on the hypocrisy and unearned privilege of the ruling class.

1 7

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 17h

I honestly thought the band's name makes their political philosophy perfectly clear all by itself.

3

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 17h

Someone looked at the numbers and trends and is gambling that performing the obviously inevitable course correction immediately would pay off in the medium term (and possibly the short term, too). In theory, this kind of repositioning also means you still get interviews after the realignment.

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 17h

And was extremely enthusiastic about displays of patriotism consistent with that perspective. We never ever skipped the Pledge of Allegiance or the frequently subversive song. I honestly didn't notice until I heard other people talk about the kind of patriotism displays they experienced in school.

6

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 17h

Plus "The Battle Hymn of the Republic". She was unironically the kind of patriot who found all kinds of things happening in America absolutely horrific on principle, and that includes half the things standard libertarians are mad about and also everything the civil rights movement was against.

1 7

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 17h

My 5th/6th grade teacher had us all learn to sing I think eight or nine different "patriotic" songs, and she moved to the US from Canada in part because she really believed in American exceptionalism and the values expounded by the Founders. Half the songs were protest anthems!

1 10

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 18h

Which is why it's so much easier to sing than the actual anthem!

(For the uninitiated, it is not you or your entire class in school or half the people who sing before sporting events all being terrible at singing; "The Star-Spangled Banner" is legitimately a serious technical challenge.)

1

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 19h

Hey, there's a preview image now! Yay! Anyway, Portland still isn't burning.

Is Portland Burning?

No. See real-time Portland cameras, PulsePoint incidents, and sourced fact checks.

isportlandburning.com

1

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 21h

This requires acquiring enough bags and putting them in a place such that any stack or pile of all of them together *seriously* interfers with your ability to do something you do regularly. That or just a place you spend a lot of time looking at, like directly across from a toilet.

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 21h

My dad and stepmom have a policy of annoying places to put bags, and whenever the bag collection in the kitchen gets too tall, they redistribute them to the cars. There's almost always at least two or three big bags in each trunk and quite possibly some in the backseat; empty bags never go inside.

1 1

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 21h

Like, I read Washington's letters to Congress where he's like "my men are starving and losing toes to frostbite, if you want an Army at all you will fix this yesterday," it's not a new problem, but what's even the point of having the best logistics system on Earth if you neglect the troops' needs?!

1 19

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 21h

I've never understood this thing where the US government allows so many servicemembers to live on the edge of or actually in poverty. Seems like a really obvious readiness/retention issue any competent commander should be aggressively interested in resolving immediately.

1 1 21

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 22h

When I was a kid, my mom bonded with enlisted wives over couponing and communal purchases of a pallet of dried pinto beans and strategically raiding multiple Goodwills for new school clothes. The economizing stuff she did just because she grew up that way was a lifeline for these families. ☹️

2 1 22

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 22h

Every enlisted wife I've known was on food stamps/WIC for at least the first few years, because the promotions didn't make up for the cost of another kid.

It's just like the grad school wives, though they often have stable employment (which means better pay) because they don't move all the time.

1 2 29

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 22h

Actually the history is pretty well-known; they had a pro-Stalin reporter soft-pedaling and outright lying about the Holodomor, the gulags, the show trials, etc. He got a Pulitzer for lying relentlessly about the starvation stuff, and everyone with power in the Times organization allowed it.

Walter Duranty - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

5

(((Sarah))) @smpa.bsky.social · 23h

The 1992 Los Angeles riots back this up - I know people from all over the region and they all remember smelling/seeing it. If they hadn't cancelled school (citywide shutdown of schools, transit, sporting events, and even mail service!), we'd've all been on indoor recess due to the poor air quality.