I wonder how this guy feels now that Senator Obama's got his own satellite TV channel?
Makes Bill Ayers best pal look like Pat Boone, doesn't it? No, wait, that's not fair to Pat; it makes him look more like Lawrence Welk. Yessiree, a well-spoken and telegenic Great Leader in a clean shirt, one who won't scare the populace until it's too late, that's the ticket. Decent haircut. And gosh-darn it, none of that poetry stuff, either, it makes the ignert flyovers all uncomfy.
Y'know what? All things considered, I like Gil Scott-Heron a lot better than the Senator from Chicago. Man looks you in the eye, unequivocally tells you where he stands -- and still packages it better than anyone running for office. Politically, he and I are poles apart on everything except perhaps the lack of content in rap lyrics. Musically, a guy who can get me to sit through a fretful song about a power reactor that acted up (but didn't go kaboom and has nevertheless been a focal point of freeze-in-the-dark PSH ever since) near Detroit is doing very well indeed.
Hunh... reminds me of sort of the inverse of Hardy's "The Man he Killed" we all had to learn in school.
ReplyDeleteUnder different circumstances, we'd be trading lead, not snirking at each other's high poetry on YouTube.
What a fascinating age we live in.
Much of my secondry education having consisted of A) Radio and TV Production, B) Electronics, C) sneaking SF books behind my school books and D) sneaking out for a smoke with the tough kids, I had to go look up the poem before I could reply!
ReplyDeleteYou're right about the left-handed resemblance between the two works.
As for trading lead, I don't know -- I get the impression Mr. Scott-Heron might be more of an exasperated observer, his militancy more despairing than aggressive.