Publication date: 2022-10-07
I encourage readers to listen to the “Culture Section” Hendrix song on loop while reading this article.
Pain
A recent comment to this newsletter stated that NATO is underestimating Russia's resolve. While this may be true, the reality is that tens of thousands more people will die if the insanity of this conflict continues: once more, tens of t h o u s a n d s. Should Russia withdraw, the Ukrainian Nazis and the "internal security" bureau, the SBU, will kill thousands in reprisals. Whichever way this cuts, thousands of people will die.
There is only one sensible course: Peace.
History informs us that peace is achieved by either of two paths. The aggressive "kill even more people" version is "unconditional surrender". The more diplomatically complex solution is dialogue. Anyone with a moral sense will choose the latter, despite its challenges. Negotiations are the raison d'être of diplomats. Lets "arm" them.
Lets pay the diplomats billions of dollars to find a way out of this terminal nightmare.
Peace
Benjamin and Davies spent months reading diplomatic statements to identify 66 nations demanding an end to this catastrophic conflict. NATO's sanctions on one of the world's largest resource traders, Russia, hurts economies globally. Economic sanctions are "war by other means" just as "war is politics by other means".
These policies are killing people.
The peoples of southern and eastern Ukraine are in a life threatening dilemma. NATO nations have been arming and training the "Armed Forces of Ukraine" to the tune of tens of Billions of dollars with the purpose of creating and furthering this hot war with Russia which we have witnessed these last 7 months. This must stop; the funding, the arming, the fighting: all of it.
A principle, never adhered to, is that anyone advocating war should enlist their children to fight. This would limit the advocates of war to only the most psychopathic. Their statements would been seen as horror; they would be denounced. War would been seen for what it is: horrific and insane.
Money
The "blood soaked" arms manufacturers would hopefully be less funded, and monies could be invested in social care, growth and uplift. How many playwrights, actors and theatres can be subsidized with billions of dollars? How many nurses and doctors? How many teachers? How many waste collectors? How many farmers?
The answer is not a number, it is a choice to create life and society in preference to death and destruction.
“When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.”
― Jimi Hendrix
Culture
“Bold as Love” from the 1967 "Axis: Bold as Love" album, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Various Artists - Topic, uploaded 2013-10-23
This is a complete cover, and a very good one. It is disingenuously advertised.
A copy of an originally produced recording can be found here. It sounds identical to the tape played on my “stereo” back in the 1980s.
Guitar solos are not everyone's love. Halfway through the song moves into an extended solo. The recording is from 1967. Nobody had ever played an electric guitar as Hendrix did. He completely re-defined the instrument. One thing is to hear a sound, another is to have struggled learning to play the instrument recorded. I am in the latter category. I cannot conceive the brilliance of this performance before I was even born. I remain stunned in amazement of Hendrix’s creativity and mastership.
As you listen to the solo, hold in mind the final lyric. First, understand that this song is a biography of Hendrix’s life and by extension ours.
The lyric to hold in mind is not "All these emotions of mine, keep me from giving myself to a .. rain .. bow .. like .. you". But rather "I'm bold, bold as love, yeah".
During the solo, Hendrix is Icarus, flying to the sun, screaming and seeking the devine succour of unconditional love. Do I love? We are love!
The rhythm section is superlative. Hear the six beat drum point between these lines which anchors the song. The core return to this rhythym just before the solo: again, twice 1, 2, 3. The sound recording is magnificently crisp. Hendrix's guitar plays "the axis", a mastery never before heard.
Bold as love.
Sources
'End War in Ukraine' Say 66 Nations at UN General Assembly, Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies, Common Dreams, 2022-09-29
A War By Other Means?, Jack Bowers, The Strategy Bridge, 2019-11-18
Politics By Other Means, “Big Serge”, The New Dark Age, 2022-10-05
Pope Decries “Shameful and Culpable Silence” on Arms Sales “Drenched in Innocent Blood”, Dan Froomkin, The Intercept, 2015-09-24
Patrick Lawrence: The Strong, and the Merely Powerful, Patrick Lawrence, Scheer Post (originally published at Consortium News on 2022-10-03), 2022-10-05
Clare Daly opposing the madness of war, Vanessa Beeley, youtube, uploaded 2022-10-08
Machine Gun, Jimi Hendrix Experience from the 1970 “Band of Gypsys” album, Tyler Malm, uploaded 2018-12-12
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I use "yt-dlp -x [url]" to download audio, and then vlc to play them. For the Culture section audio, I play them on loop.
btw I am a huge Hendrix fan and enjoyed reading your article :)