Sadly Joan, no.

While you were sweating on the eliptical machine this morning, I was watching CNN and MSNBC. Our chirpy, slappy, bobblehead news readers gave the coming Blackwater hearings short shrift, in fact they gave more weight to an Amber Alert being canceled in Florida, and the story of the Las Vegas child molester on the run. And then of course, there was Brittany's lost custody battle for her two kids.

No. We are not going to wake up. What's the point? Even if CNN, MSNBC and the networks covered the Blackwater story every hour, and played back the smirking and condescending testimony of Blackwater executive Prince, what would America do? There is no outrage. Why should there be outrage? These guys shot up an Iraqi street, not a street in Springfield, Ill., or Modesto, Calif.

Here's what you're not getting, I'm sorry to say: Americans don't give a fuck about the Iraqi people. They could all be incinerated and I don't think it would bump Brittany off the nightly news.

It's a sad damned thing.

By the way, Thom Hartmann on Air America a few hours ago did a whole segment on how the civilian local police in this country are arming themselves in paramilitary gear and conducting themselves like ... well ... Blackwater!

Blackwater was in New Orleans, "protecting businesses."

Soon, Blackwater is going to be "protecting" you, too.

...but if you really want to put things in perspective, listen to the Heiligedankgesang from Op. 132 by Beethoven. No-one yet has done that particular thing better.

I remember near the end of the 2004 election debacle watching the Concert for Change and seeing Bruce lead the group in Patti Smith's "People Have the Power" and trying not to cry. The feeling of solidarity and the thought that things just might change was overwhelming. One of the few heartening facets of the the entire election cycle that year was Springsteen's involvement with the campaign and the streak of populism he brought with it. Of course, we got our ass handed to us, but we all know what '06 brought and what '08 will bring. One only hopes Bruce will be out there to put his bootprints on the ass of whatever GOP lickspittle who pandered enough to the rednecks and fascists to weasel the nomination. By the way, I've been teaching my 4-year-old foster son to say "The Boss rocks!" upon request.

Now, that's how an editor should write. Thank you for "finally," "belatedly" getting it.

That's what I thought in 2004.

Joan quoted Springsteen as saying, in the Sunday Times:

I can't think of another band where all of the original members are still living, and on stage together and enjoying it.

Hey Bruce ... I'd like to introduce you to Cheap Trick. Oh, and these other guys called "Aerosmith."

We are finally going to wake up, aren't we?

Figger them odds.

Joan, I know exactly what you mean. I'm one of those people who had the big SPRINGSTEEN bumper sticker on the back of my Plymouth Valiant. He's always been able to reach through a world of mess and make the common seem sublime for me; he made it feel very good to sit on the hood of a Dodge drinking warm beer in a soft summer rain.

When the overproduced & badly drummed (but still sometimes great) Born in the USA album came out, I remember him on stage doing the songs much better than they were on the album, and warning both Reagan AND Mondale to stop mentioning him in campaign speeches or he'd come out and tell people what he really thought. They both stopped; I don't know whether this was due to the warning or to somebody realizing that the title track actually isn't a jingoistic anthem.

Anybody who has followed Springsteen's artistic development knows that he's all about societies -- whether teen angst gangs, wives and kids, bandmates, union workers, brothers in arms, groups of immigrants; he's about realizing that your family is out there ready to reach for you if you'll just reach first.

"Well my daddy come on the 0hio works

When he come home from world war two.

Now the yard's just scrap and rubble

He said, "Them big boys did what Hitler couldn't do."

These mills they built the tanks and bombs

That won this country's wars,

We sent our sons to Korea and Vietnam and

Now we're wondering what they were dyin' for"

--Youngstown

This post is cringe inducing.

There's a topic of the day @ Salon? I think 75% of today's content is about Blackwater. Which is fine, tomorrow will be 75% something else. Oh well I guess you could interview Walt/Mearsheimer again.

Joan you served up a blog here with a double theme: Blackwater and Springsteen.

You see what even Salonian Americans are interested in responding to? Springsteen. It's like I said in my opener, the American people in general just don't give a damn what Blackwater did/does in Iraq. Blackwater could shoot up an elementary school in Baghdad and it would get minimum play in the news. Oh sure, for one news cycle the story would compete with Britney's problems or her exposed anatomy, but Blackwater massacre would generate a "oh, well. That's Iraq for ya. Terrible place. Lotsa violence. Too bad for them. Hey Honey, what's for dinner? Who do like in the playoffs tomorrow night, the Rocks or the Phillies?"

But you served up Bruce Springsteen's new album mingled in with the Blackwater story and what do you know, everybody is "Ooooo, The Boss, man! Ooooo! I taught my four year old to say, 'Boss Rocks' man! Springsteen is like God, man. Far out!"

The conversation immediately turns away from Blackwater and the murder of innocent civilians in Iraq, to a rock star.

But forget all that. I found the pictures of Britney's va-jay-jay on the Internets! The hell with the people of Iraq.

... and I forgot to mention that my son is a Army Captain serving now just outside of Bahgdad. He's responsible for the lives of 200 other soldiers. His second child was born a few months ago while he serves. I'm not an idiot -- I care viscerally about the outsourcing of this war, and the war in general. I care very much about the Iraqis and politics. Why else would I be reading Salon?

But I'm also naturally drawn toward the kind of real hope that Bruce Springsteen's art gives me.

So, to spite you I'm afraid, here's another lyric:

"For the ones who had a notion,

a notion deep inside

That it ain't no sin

to be glad you're alive

I wanna find one face

that ain't looking through me

I wanna find one place,

I wanna spit in the face of these badlands"