I shall (be) overcome …
May 29th, 2008 by David Shapiro
I hate it when old geezers smugly put down the ways of the young, but sometimes the offspring step in it so deep that a pat on the head doesn’t seem the appropriate response.
To wit: I was minding my own business shuffling through my iTunes collection when Peter, Paul and Mary came up singing “We Shall Overcome.”
I could see my daughter in the next room shaking her head. “Is there a problem?” I asked.
She smirked condescendingly. “Two white guys and a blonde woman singing about oppression? Come on.”
She said if I wanted to understand the true meaning of the song, I should listen to the gay version. Or at least the gospel version. Or I should have heard her and her college chums sing it when George Bush the Elder launched Operation Desert Storm.
Grrrrr.
“We Shall Overcome” became an anthem during the civil rights movement of the 60’s, and those two white guys and the blonde woman were on the Washington, D.C., stage on Aug. 28, 1963, where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech.
They were also with King on his historic march from Selma to Montgomery; “We Shall Overcome” was sung a few times along the way, I’d wager.
She wasn’t so dismissive of Peter, Paul and Mary when I drove out in the Washington snow when she was 8 or 9 to take her to her first grownup event, a PP&M concert at Constitution Hall.
I’ll give her the gospel version …
Nap time at Honolulu Hale. Did everybody catch the great quote from Ira Rohter, the University of Hawai’i political science professor, on his surprise that no challengers are taking on the five City Council members up for re-election this year:
“They have constantly been portrayed as kindergarten buffoons and this vacillation on the rail issue is amazing. If you’re bored with television, go down to Honolulu Hale and watch a hearing on a controversial issue. It’s comical. There is a common perception that they are not the best and brightest.”
Actually, that’s a bit harsh on kindergartners, don’t you think? My granddaughter starts school in a few months and it’s my humble opinion that she possesses more common sense and maturity of judgment than some council members.
If council members get even with me for this dig by taking it out on my daughter the next time she has to cover one of their meetings, she can stand outside their chambers and give them a few bars of “If I Had a Hammer.”
Tags: City Council, civil rights, family
May 29th, 2008 at 5:33 am
Dave, don’t worry. We Shall Overcome.
Someday.
May 29th, 2008 at 7:26 am
Deep in your heart, do you believe that, charles?
Hey, good song.
Seriously, though, I can’t believe that I actually agree with Rohter on this one. Usually, he just criticizes the status quo and waxes philosophic about what he consideres the ideal, whipping up others in a frenzy that has little to do with practicality. But darned it if I actually agree with the guy today. I better watch out for lightning in the afternoon!
May 29th, 2008 at 8:58 am
The brightest kids I went to high school with in central California ten years ago could do a better job of running this city. Anne Kobayashi makes me ill just by looking at her.
May 29th, 2008 at 10:19 am
Ira Rohter, former(?) of the Green Party(are they still around?) does not have a good track record for political analysis. It always puzzles me that he and Neil Milner, also of the U.H.Poly Sci dept. are always called upon by the local media for comments on the local political scene. They are usually full of mainland type comments and have little understanding of local politics.
May 29th, 2008 at 11:19 am
I have watched the city council meetings on TV and agree whole heartedly with Mr. Rohter’s assessment of the meetings. It makes me wonder how these folks ever got elected. Kobayashi, Marshall, Tam, Dela Cruz, Cachola and Djou have something missing. Each has his/her own agenda and is unwilling to do what is best for the city. The others are not that great either but at least the have some common sense. They are individualists trying to work as a team but it is only a facade.
May 29th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
I am continuously amazed at people that are surprised that our politicians are well, … just like us, folks. Think about it - we elected them because we like them! They are just like us!
They are not too “smart” or “mainland type politicians”, “pushy” or “too haole”. Guess what we got - the council that looks just like us.
In ancient Greece the Democracy was interpreted in a way that allowed everyone to govern on a round robin basis:
January: First ten people in the phone book;
February: Second ten people, etc, etc
Aristotle despised Democracy and considered it the “rule of the worse” since “the best” and “the worst” are always in the minority by definition.
So, folks, that’s what we got - the rule of the mediocre.
Sure beats Dictatorship, I must say. Long live the lame and stupid - for they shall inherit the Earth.
May 29th, 2008 at 5:22 pm
These nine people represent about 900,000 of us here on O`ahu and, despite the fact that I give most them a lot of credit for running in the first place, today they are a sorry bunch.
If I have to hear Kobayahi whine “I don’t understand” one more time, I am going to leap up out of my seat and throttle her. If I have to hear Marshall proudly say one more time “I’m not against mass transit because I rode the rails for years, but I cannot support this system because ….(whatever sounds the best before a particular audience), I’ll beat her death with a dirty old sock.
And the others are just as bad.
I’ve asked more than a dozen people to run this year for the Honolulu City Council in all five of the districts up for grabs: CD 1 - Todd Apo; CD 3 - Barbara Marshall; CD 5 - Ann Kobayashi; CD 7 - Romy Cachola; CD 9 - Nestor Garcia. Three people looked at me as if I’d escaped from the Funny Farm; however, the others all said that they’d wait for publicly-funded elections, thank you. In a couple of cases, folks said that they’d do it if I would raise $100K or more to take on the incumbents.
Money Talks and the rest of us get to watch the Nine Stooges in action against a masculine version of Lucille Ball.
May 29th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Whoops!!!
Kobayahi = Kobayashi