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Monday, May 27, 2024

Cultural Information in Late May of 2024.

  


The grandson of enslaved African Americans, harmonica player DeFord Bailey rose to prominence in the 1920's. He was the very first performer introduced on the Grand Ole Opry stage when it started in 1927. Bailey was a virtuoso playing and mimic train sounds on the harmonica. Country music in the 1940's had many dynamic changes. From 1940 to 1945, the Special Service Division of the U.S. military introduced hillbilly bands to a wide audience of soldiers in the USO shows Honkly tonk, blue grass, and other country standards spread across the world. By 1942, Roy Acuff and Fred Rose created Acuff-Rose Publishing. In 1942, Ernest Tubb's recording of Walking the Floor Over You made him an overnight sensation which promoted honky-tonk. Republic Studios called Roy Rogers the King of the Cowboys, producing a film by the same name. In 1945, Nashville, Tennessee became the center for country music, but country music culture is found across America plus throughout the world. In 1947, Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys record the record of "Blue Moon of Kentucky." This was one of the major examples of the new bluegrass style of country music. By 1948, KWKH radio in Shreveport, Louisiana introduced Louisiana Hayride to the airwaves. By 1950, Country music, radio, and movie star Gene Autry moved to television with the Gene Autry Show. Roy Rogers promoted the Roy Rogers Show in 1951. From 1954 to 1955, Elvis Presley promoted rock and roll music via Sun Record sessions. He also promoted his version of Blue Moon of Kentucky. By the 1950's, there were rockabilly artists like Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty, Buddy Holly, and the Everly Brothers started to record hit after hit. Cowboy films were promoted by Dale Evans, Rogers's wife, the Sons of the Pioneers, and Spade Cooley. Lefty Frizzell had great popularity in country music in the 1950's. By the 1950's, the Nashville sound movement existed with artists like Eddy Arnold, Jim Reeves, and Jim Ed Brown. Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, and Webb Pierce of Bakersfield, California were found on honky-tonk bars in California. 


 


World War One was an invent that changed the world forever. This war existed between the tensions of world Empires found in Europe, Africa, and Asia. Great Britain, France, Germany, the Ottoman Empire, Russia, Austria-Hungary, etc. wanted to control as many resources of the world as possible. The European powers never solved their competition to gain the world's resources via colonialism, imperialism, genocide, stealing lands, and other forms of evil actions. Then, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, caused World War I officially. He was murdered by the Bosnian Serbian person named Gavrilo Princip and other people found in the Black Hand. The Allied Powers defeated the Central Powers (made up of Germany, The Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary, etc.). The war saw tanks, planes, and chemical warfare in a high level for the first time in human history. During the war, there was the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, the Russian Revolution (that caused the Soviet Union to exist, and the Soviet Union left the Allied side to be neutral by the end of WWI), and the destruction of the Ottoman Empire. After the events of World War One, the Treaty of Versailles existed, and the League of Nations was formed. The League of Nations didn't cause the great peace internationally, because the League of Nations had a problem of  ts rules being enforced, it wasn't strong enough to handle international disputes, and massive economic problems caused the organization to lack funding to handle its policies. Ironically, the League of Nations was a foundation for the creation of the United Nations after World War II (which started in September 1939). The lesson now is that we must oppose imperialism, colonialism, and capitalist exploitation. Also, another lesson of WWI is that we have to learn about international affairs as we can't live in the sand in one nation. What happens overseas can happen here in the United States of America. With the wars in Ukraine, Gaza, and other places of the world, we must be on the sacrosanct, righteous path of righteousness, truth, and justice. 



 


Diana Ross made more albums like The Force Behind the Power in 1991, Take Me High in 1995, and Every Day is a New Day in 1999. By 1991, Diana Ross was one of the few American artists to have headlined the annual Royal Variety Performance, performing a selection of her UK hits before Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh at the Victoria Palace Theatre, London. This marked her second appearance at the Royal Variety Performance, the first being in 1968 with the Supremes. The Force Behind the Power sparked a comeback when the album went platinum in the UK. It led by the No. 2 UK hit single "When You Tell Me That You Love Me." The album produced 9 singles across international territories, including another Top 10 UK hit "One Shining Moment." In 1993, Ross returned to acting with a dramatic role in the television film, Out of Darkness. Ross won acclaim for her role in the TV movie and earned her third Golden Globe nomination.


In 1994, One Woman: The Ultimate Collection, a career retrospective compilation, became a number one hit in the UK, selling quadruple platinum. The retrospective was EMI's alternative to Motown's box set Forever Diana: Musical Memoirs. Ross performed during the opening ceremony of the 1994 FIFA World Cup held in Chicago, and during the pre-match entertainment of the 1995 Rugby League World Cup final at Wembley Stadium. The World Cup ceremony had her take a penalty kick that was staged for her to score, and the goalposts were intended to fall down from the power of her shot. She infamously missed the penalty instead. On January 28, 1996, Ross performed at the Super Bowl XXX halftime show, held at the Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona. Earlier that month, Ross's Tokyo concert, Diana Ross: Live in Japan, filmed live at the city's Nippon Budokan Stadium, was released. In May 1996, Ross received the World Music Awards' Lifelong Contribution to the Music Industry Award. In that awards show, Diana Ross sat on Michael Jackson's lap and sang to him. On November 29, EMI released the compilation album, Voice of Love, featuring the singles "In the Ones You Love", "You Are Not Alone" and "I Hear (The Voice of Love)."


On February 8, 1997, EMI released the Japanese edition of Ross's album, A Gift of Love, featuring the single, "Promise Me You'll Try." In May, she performed with operatic tenors Plácido Domingo and José Carreras again at the Superconcert of the Century concert, held in Taipei, Taiwan. She later inducted the Jackson 5 into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on May 6. On February 19, 1998, Ross hosted the Motown 40 telecast on ABC. In 1999, Ross was named the most successful woman singer in the history of the United Kingdom charts, based upon a tally of her career hits. Madonna would soon succeed Ross as the most successful woman artist in the UK. Later that year, Ross presented at the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards in September of the year and shocked the audience by touching rapper Lil' Kim's exposed breast and pasty-covered nipple, amazed at the young rapper's brashness. In 1999, she and Brandy Norwood co-starred in the television movie, Double Platinum, which was aired prior to the release of Ross's album, Every Day Is a New Day. From that album, Ross scored a Top 10 hit in the UK in November that year with "Not Over You Yet."



 

By July 3, 1930, President Herbert Hoover signed the appropriation bill for the Boulder Dam The dam was renamed he Hoover Dam during the Truman administration. By 1931, people started to build the dam. The population of Las Vegas increased from around 5,000 citizens to 25,000, with most of the newcomers looking for a job building the dam. However, the demographic of the work force consisting of males from across the country with no attachment to the area created a market for large-scale entertainment. A combination of local Las Vegas business owners and Mafia crime lords helped develop the casinos and showgirl theaters to entertain the largely male dam construction workers. Despite the influx of known crime figures, the local business community tried to cast Las Vegas in a respectable light when the Secretary of the Interior Ray Lyman Wilbur visited in 1929 to inspect the dam site. However, a worker was found with alcohol on his breath (this was during the time of Prohibition) after a visit to Block 16 in Las Vegas. The government ultimately decided that a federally controlled town, Boulder City, would be erected for the dam workers.


Realizing that gambling would be profitable for local business, the Nevada state legislature legalized gambling at the local level in 1931. Las Vegas, with a small but already well-established illegal gambling industry, was poised to begin its rise as the gaming capital of the world. The county issued the first gambling license in 1931 to the Northern Club, and soon other casinos were licensed on Fremont Street, such as the Las Vegas Club and the Hotel Apache. Fremont Street became the first paved street in Las Vegas and received the city's first traffic light in 1931. In reply, the federal government restricted movement of the dam workers to Las Vegas. Smuggling and circuitous routes then were developed. In 1934, to curtail these activities and the resulting growth of criminal figures in the gambling industry, the city's leading figures purged gambling dens and started an effort to stem the flow of workers from the dam. This only emboldened some dam workers who still contrived to visit Las Vegas. A celebration of this era has become known as Helldorado Days.


Although the suppression efforts resulted in declines at gambling venues and resulted in a business downturn, the city was recharged—both literally and figuratively—when the dam was completed in 1935. In 1937, Southern Nevada Power became the first utility to supply power from the dam, and Las Vegas was its first customer. Electricity flowed into Las Vegas, and Fremont Street became known as Glitter Gulch due to the many bright lights powered by electricity from the Hoover Dam. Meanwhile, although the dam worker population disappeared, the Hoover Dam and its reservoir Lake Mead turned into tourist attractions on their own and the need for additional higher-class hotels became clear. In 1940, U.S. Route 95 was extended south into Las Vegas, giving the city two major access roads. Also in 1940, KENO, Las Vegas's first permanent radio station, began broadcasting replacing the niche occupied earlier by transient broadcasters. The war years in Las Vegas lasted from 1941 to 1945. On January 25, 1941, the U.S Army formed the flexible gunnery school for the United States Army Air Corps in Las Vegas. 


 



The John Brown raid in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia) was a massive time in the antebellum period of American history. It happened in 1859 which is almost 100 years after the birth of America. America was born in the midst of conflict and controversies. The British Empire wanted to control the colonists in America, but many colonists wanted to set up their own independent country, free from monarchical rule. America at one point almost lost the Revolutionary War, and even Norfolk, Virginia was burned to the ground during the conflict. Yet, aid from France, Spain, and other nations along with American resiliency caused the Patriot to be victorious by the end of the Revolutionary War (after the Treaty of Paris in 1783). Many Americans back then wanted justice for all, and many Americans didn't desire that aim. The Preamble of the Constitution mentioned that "all men are created equal," but slavery, oppression against women, and genocide against Native Americans were realities. John Brown was an eclectic, eccentric man who desired an end to slavery against black Americans. He didn't just talk about ending slavery. He was actively engaged in Kansas to fight pro-slavery forces. It is important to note that the black freedom included people of many colors, but it originated and was headed by black people. The prominent role of black people in the overall global black freedom struggle should be acknowledged regardless of DeSantis and his MAGA allies trying to sugarcoat black history. John Brown's raid was not supported by everyone in the abolitionist movement, because many felt it was a suicidal, impossible mission, but no one can discount John Brown's courage and firm conviction to fight overt tyranny in American society. There were black and white men involved in the raid. Most of these men lost their lives in service to the cause of freeing black people from bondage. Slavery involve torture, rape, splitting families, ruining culture, murder, kidnapping, other forms of abuse, and other evils that have no justification. The survivors of the raid moved into other places of America to live their lives. John Brown's raid was one of the final events before the American Civil War (Many Southern states seceded from the Union by the early 1860's, and the Confederate Constitution explicitly condoned slavery). The American Civil War ended overt legalized slavery and expanded the federal government into new heights to reckon with the reality that one nation means one nation (not multiple states acting as separate nations). John Brown and his allies will forever be remembered as heroic people who desired goodness to prevail over injustice. In the end, good will triumph, and that day will be so glorious in the eyes of Almighty God. 

 


Marilyn Mosby was sentenced to one year of home detention. She faced multiple years in prison, but the judge has shown compassion to her. She has three years of supervised release. Marilyn Mosby was a victim of a political agenda in trying to target Mosby, because she was a progressive black woman who fought for civil rights and human rights. Marilyn Mosby used the money that she used to create a better life for her family. I agree with her that she should be pardoned. The recent Supreme Court decision of Alexander vs. State Conference of the South Carolina NAACP represents Alito and other Justices' biases. The decision sought to keep a congressional map that a lower court had found to be an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. Alito and five other Republican justices made it harder to challenge racial gerrymandering (like moving black voters from one district to another in South Carolina to promote a stronger Republican political power base).



Nikki Haley saying that she is voting for Trump in November is not shocking. It is typical of many Republicans caring more for party than justice. Trump has promoted the lie that the 2020 election was stolen and his embrace of fascist rhetoric shows Trump to lack character as a human being. Trump disrespected Haley's own husband, but Haley wants to vote for Trump. That's cowardice. Haley said that Biden has been a catastrophe which is false. Biden passed some of the most progressive legislation in American history since the LBJ era. President Biden oversaw massive reductions of the unemployment rate, growth of business, the cutting of child poverty, and an increase of the greatest economic recovery from the pandemic than any Western nation on Earth (proving the resiliency of the American economy). Haley believes in the myth that Trump and Biden are equally bad when Trump wants a Muslim ban, desires to harm the press if it disagrees with him and seeks to promote immunity for officers who commit police brutality. Haley is a hypocrite who condemned Trump's statements disrespecting the military, but she wants to vote for him. Haley doesn't embrace Putin, but many GOP and MAGA cultists glorify Putin like Tucker Carlson.


Many people have talked about the Diddy apology video. In that video, Diddy never said Cassie's name or made a direct apology to Cassie at all. He did apologize for what he had done, but he lied previously in denying all allegations against him. What he has done has no justification. Witnesses from bodyguards, Cassie, other victims, and videotape evidence document Diddy's history of emotional and physical abuse. Many people accused Diddy of sexual abuse and human sex trafficking. Diddy is desperate to salvage his reputation. The truth is that the story of Diddy is filled with materialism, violence, and depraved actions. The video shows it all. Diddy not only beat Cassie up, but he threw an object at her. This relates to a vicious mentality. Even during the 1990's, I knew that something wasn't right with Diddy. In our time, we have to promote ethics and morality, not nihilism. You will notice that Diddy lied in his initial statement that all of these allegations against him were false. Diddy was sorry that he was caught point-blank period. His recent video proves that his recent denials are lies. Therefore, the Golden Rule is one great truth that we must all live by.



Amber Rose supporting Donald Trump makes her a hypocrite. Rose hypocritically claims to be for women's empowerment, but Trump is a documented sexist (who demonizes women constantly), found liable for raping a woman, and goes about to support policies antithetical to the rights of women. In retrospect, we shouldn't be surprised. She demonized black women in Philadelphia, said the n word, and went out of her way to defend the racist Donald Trump now. Amber Rose hypocritically lives in a blue state, but she ignores how many people in Mississippi and Kentucky are denied health care, economic rights, and other benefits that are found in many blue states. The irony is that tons of Southerners are some of the most progressive fighters for justice in American history (then and now). Amber Rose said that Biden doesn't care about black people. First, Rose doesn't identify as black, so she in her own words is not black. She has no right to dictate the terms of how we black people decide to vote for our interests. Second, Biden has a track record of funding HBCUs, cutting child poverty in half, investing black-owned businesses (which has grown in record levels in America), seeing the record low unemployment rate in the black community, and crime rates going down in places nationwide. Trump wants the police to beat suspects in custody, he wants to eliminate DEI programs, Trump supports voter suppression policies, and he is overt in his bigotry (by praising schools being named after Confederate traitors). Therefore, Amber Rose embraces the Trump ignorant rhetoric that black people must vote for a con artist like Trump. She is wrong. 


 


The conundrum of the 2024 election is that we must balance the truth with reality. Voting Trump out of office is more than about Biden. It is about saving America from a MAGA fascist cult that is theocratic, sexist, racist, imperialist, and anti-democratic. Donald Trump makes a mockery of the rule of law, demonizes his political opponents, lies about the 2020 election being stolen, and seeks to ally with reactionary enemies of truth. Trump is more in league with Netanyahu's excessive war crimes in Gaza than Biden. So, the lie that Trump and Biden are the same must be exposed now and forever. Some people rather have people with a lack health care, human rights being further violated, allow Ukraine to be a Russian vassal state, and seek more environmental destruction for the sake of allowing Biden to lose the election (and promote some punishment against Biden). Therefore, those folks are people that I don't agree with. The imperfections of President Biden don't mean that Trump is the savior. Trump has said that he wants to re-impose the Muslim travel ban and reject any immigration of any refugees from Gaza. It means that the problems of the world are rooted in the system and a revolutionary change to make the system in favor of justice must be instituted comprehensively.


One of the most stirring new developments of our time is that the International Criminal Court prosecutor has charged Netanyahu and other leaders of Hamas with war crimes. This is a change in history. I saw Netanyahu on Good Morning America denying all charges, but Netanyahu has used excessive conduct in the war in Gaza. We know that Hamas has done murder, rape, and kidnapping of innocent human lives. Hamas is a blatantly evil terrorist organization that murdered innocent civilian Israelis. Netanyahu accused the ICC of using a moral equivalency and the Biden administration has condemned the ICC's actions. The ICC prosecutor Karim Khan accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Galant of presiding over the murder the extermination of Palestinians, using starvation as a method of war, and other acts of violence against the Gazan civilian population (to collectively punish the Gazan population). Khan has applied for arrest warrants against the leaders of Hamas, Netanyahu, and Gallant. Netanyahu's regime has destroyed homes, schools, churches, and hospitals in Gaza alongside universities. Israeli leaders called the Gaza civilian population "animals." Some Israeli leaders said that they want no electricity, no food, and no fuel in Gaza. Israeli forces have killed a peacekeeping van with innocent people in it. If these aren't war crimes, then I don't know what is. The ICC is right that Hamas and Israeli war crimes have no justification.



By Timothy


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