Cat Stevens at the Jon Stewart rally

[MichaelB]

Playing Peace train right now...

 

[ziggy29]

You mean "the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens."

 

[mickeyd]

YouTube - cat stevens Wild World

 

[HFWR]

Enjoyed him back in the day. Glad he's decided to [-]enhance his retirement fund[/-] rediscover his music.

YouTube - Cat Stevens - Moonshadow

 

[rescueme]

You mean Yusuf Islam?

 

[HFWR]

Yeah, [-]Steven Demetre Georgiou[/-] [-]Cat Stevens[/-] Yusuf Islam.

I think we all knew who he meant...

 

[Birdie Num Nums]

But everyone knew him as Nancy.

 

[donheff]

Yusuf was OK, but then Colbert brought out Ozzy Osborne and a competition was engaged -- that was more fun. I was standing behind a group of Falun Gong members who sat on the ground in the lotus position -- weird.

 

[ERD50]

You mean "the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens."

I thought he meant "the comedian formerly known as Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz".

-ERD50

 

[grasshopper]

When the Cat changed his stripes, No mas.

 

[youbet]

Playing Peace train right now...

I didn't get to watch any of this. Did he play that as a war protest? Or was he just running through some of his past hits to fulfull his contract and collect his paycheck?

 

[MichaelB]

I didn't get to watch any of this. Did he play that as a war protest? Or was he just running through some of his past hits to fulfull his contract and collect his paycheck?

As Donheff said – he started playing Peace Train and suddenly Ozzie broke in for a duel. Kinda weird. Still, I listened to mostly hard rock when young, Cat Stevens was the only “light” stuff I enjoyed for some reason.

grasshopper – what do you mean by “changed his stripes”?

 

[audreyh1]

Does this mean Cat Stevens is no longer on the no fly list? I thought he had been denied entry to the US.

 

[MichaelB]

Does this mean Cat Stevens is no longer on the no fly list? I thought he had been denied entry to the US.

Sometime last year he was taken off the list and re-issued a visa to the US.

A short interview with Charlie Rose, dated 8/13/09 Charlie Rose - A conversation with musician Yusuf Islam

 

[Nords]

As Donheff said – he started playing Peace Train and suddenly Ozzie broke in for a duel. Kinda weird.

"Peace Train" to "Crazy Train"?

Only Stewart & Colbert could've brainstormed that playlist...

 

[BigNick]

Does this mean Cat Stevens is no longer on the no fly list? I thought he had been denied entry to the US.

Yeah, I always thought that was probably due to someone in the DHS sitting around saying "hey, anyone know the names of any Mooo-slims?".

Apparently there was a Republican senator called Stevens and his wife Catherine goes by Cat, spelt exactly like that. Because of the highly sophisticated design of the no-fly list (viz: first name, last name), she was having all kinds of trouble getting on a plane, despite not even having the same gender as the singer. (Sometimes I wonder how America managed to put people on the moon, especially since it involved government money and computers.)

 

[grumpy]

These two were followed by the OJ's singing "Love Train". Despite the pathetic performance by the D.C. Metro system we had a great time at the rally. Some of the signs and costumes were hilarious. My favorite was two little girls, aged approx. 5 and 8 with signs that said "My daddy says I'm too smart for a tea party"

 

[ERD50]

My favorite was two little girls, aged approx. 5 and 8 with signs that said "My daddy says I'm too smart for a tea party"

That was your favorite?! Seems rather sad to me (regardless of which/any 'party' that was being singled out as "stupid").

First, it's using little kids as pawns. A real cheap shot.

Second, let the kids grow up and make up their own minds. I guess they feel the need to brainwash 'em before they can form a thought on their own. Weak.

-ERD50

 

[samclem]

I guess that on Yusuf Islam's Peace Train we kill passengers with whom we disagree.

From the BBC Show "Hypotheticals", 1989

Robertson: You don't think that this man deserves to die?
Y. Islam: Who, Salman Rushdie?
Robertson: Yes.
Y. Islam: Yes, yes.
Robertson: And do you have a duty to be his executioner?
Y. Islam: Uh, no, not necessarily, unless we were in an Islamic state and I was ordered by a judge or by the authority to carry out such an act - perhaps, yes.
[Some minutes later, Robertson on the subject of a protest where an effigy of the author is to be burned]
Robertson: Would you be part of that protest, Yusuf Islam, would you go to a demonstration where you knew that an effigy was going to be burned?
Y. Islam: I would have hoped that it'd be the real thing

Ya can't get more peaceful than that!

 

[M Paquette]

I guess that on Yusuf Islam's Peace Train we kill passengers with whom we disagree

I'm pretty sure the Whack-a-Doodle Train line isn't limited to odd English folksingers. There seems to be a healthy supply of Crazy to pass around.

I ran into a delegate back in the 2004 campaign season who was convinced that anyone who wasn't in the current President's political party was providing aid and comfort to the enemy, which she defined as any other political party, and therefor was guilty of treason and should be put to death. Seriously. As in demanding that I be removed for pointing out that this was not the expected way of handling disagreement in our political system. Yeah, someone active in American politics, representing voters in a party caucus, who thought executing half the voting population was a good idea, and perfectly legal and constitutional.

Oddly enough, in spite (or perhaps to spite) all the crazies, those of us not actually on Capitol Hill or on a 24/7 news+politics channel manage to somehow get along without mass executions or civil war, and actually keep things running pretty smoothly in this country.

Jon Stewart's closing speech:

I can’t control what people think this was. I can only tell you my intentions. This was not a rally to ridicule people of faith or people of activism or to look down our noses at the heartland or passionate argument or to suggest that times are not difficult and that we have nothing to fear. They are and we do. But we live now in hard times, not end times. And we can have animus and not be enemies.

But unfortunately one of our main tools in delineating the two broke. The country’s 24 hour political pundit perpetual panic conflictinator did not cause our problems but its existence makes solving them that much harder. The press can hold its magnifying up to our problems bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden, unexpected dangerous flaming ant epidemic.

If we amplify everything we hear nothing. There are terrorists and racists and Stalinists and theocrats but those are titles that must be earned. You must have the resume. Not being able to distinguish between real racists and Tea Partiers or real bigots and Juan Williams and Rick Sanchez is an insult, not only to those people but to the racists themselves who have put in the exhausting effort it takes to hate--just as the inability to distinguish terrorists from Muslims makes us less safe not more. The press is our immune system. If we overreact to everything we actually get sicker--and perhaps eczema.

And yet, with that being said, I feel good—strangely, calmly good. Because the image of Americans that is reflected back to us by our political and media process is false. It is us through a fun house mirror, and not the good kind that makes you look slim in the waist and maybe taller, but the kind where you have a giant forehead and an ass shaped like a month old pumpkin and one eyeball.

So, why would we work together? Why would you reach across the aisle to a pumpkin assed forehead eyeball monster? If the picture of us were true, of course, our inability to solve problems would actually be quite sane and reasonable. Why would you work with Marxists actively subverting our Constitution or racists and homophobes who see no one’s humanity but their own? We hear every damn day about how fragile our country is—on the brink of catastrophe—torn by polarizing hate and how it’s a shame that we can’t work together to get things done, but the truth is we do. We work together to get things done every damn day!

The only place we don’t is here or on cable TV. But Americans don’t live here or on cable TV. Where we live our values and principles form the foundations that sustains us while we get things done, not the barriers that prevent us from getting things done. Most Americans don’t live their lives solely as Democrats, Republicans, liberals or conservatives. Americans live their lives more as people that are just a little bit late for something they have to do—often something that they do not want to do—but they do it--impossible things every day that are only made possible by the little reasonable compromises that we all make.

Look on the screen. This is where we are. This is who we are. (points to the Jumbotron screen which show traffic merging into a tunnel). These cars—that’s a schoolteacher who probably thinks his taxes are too high. He’s going to work. There’s another car-a woman with two small kids who can’t really think about anything else right now. There’s another car, swinging, I don’t even know if you can see it—the lady’s in the NRA and she loves Oprah. There’s another car—an investment banker, gay, also likes Oprah. Another car’s a Latino carpenter. Another car a fundamentalist vacuum salesman. Atheist obstetrician. Mormon Jay-Z fan. But this is us. Every one of the cars that you see is filled with individuals of strong belief and principles they hold dear—often principles and beliefs in direct opposition to their fellow travelers.

And yet these millions of cars must somehow find a way to squeeze one by one into a mile long 30 foot wide tunnel carved underneath a mighty river. Carved, by the way, by people who I’m sure had their differences. And they do it. Concession by conscession. You go. Then I’ll go. You go. Then I’ll go. You go then I’ll go. Oh my God, is that an NRA sticker on your car? Is that an Obama sticker on your car? Well, that’s okay—you go and then I’ll go.

And sure, at some point there will be a selfish jerk who zips up the shoulder and cuts in at the last minute, but that individual is rare and he is scorned and not hired as an analyst.

Because we know instinctively as a people that if we are to get through the darkness and back into the light we have to work together. And the truth is, there will always be darkness. And sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t the promised land. Sometimes it’s just New Jersey. But we do it anyway, together.

If you want to know why I’m here and want I want from you, I can only assure you this: you have already given it to me. Your presence was what I wanted.

Sanity will always be and has always been in the eye of the beholder. To see you here today and the kind of people that you are has restored mine. Thank you.

 

[samclem]

It sounds like everyone had a fun time.

We've now had a series of these rallies on the mall. Jim Treacher announced that the next one was to be the badly needed "Rally to Restore Smugness" (sponsor and beneficiary left unmentioned here).

 

[BigNick]

Yeah, someone active in American politics, representing voters in a party caucus, who thought executing half the voting population was a good idea, and perfectly legal and constitutional.

To say nothing of candidates for senior elected office advocating "Second Amendment Solutions"...

 

[HFWR]

I guess that on Yusuf Islam's Peace Train we kill passengers with whom we disagree.

From the BBC Show "Hypotheticals", 1989


Ya can't get more peaceful than that!

To whatever extent he espouses, promotes, or supports this particular viewpoint, he should be called to task by those of us who vehemently disagree. But NOT because his name is Yusuf Islam...

 

[ERD50]

I'm pretty sure the Whack-a-Doodle Train line isn't limited to odd English folksingers. There seems to be a healthy supply of Crazy to pass around.

I ran into a delegate back in the 2004 campaign season who was convinced that anyone who wasn't in the current President's political party was providing aid and comfort to the enemy, which she defined as any other political party, and therefor was guilty of treason and should be put to death. Seriously.

Yep, there are some weirdos out there. And I bet if someone started a thread about this person singing a peace song at a rally, the hypocrisy would be noted,

... he should be called to task by those of us who vehemently disagree. But NOT because his name is Yusuf Islam...

regardless of what name they use.

-ERD50

 

[MichaelB]

This was a thread about a singer and a song, both of which I remember fondly from my youth. Nothing more.