Arizona rockers

Glad to see Bright Eyes is reviving the Desap's. Their 2001 album is just sick!

Desaparecidos Reunite for Immigration Benefit

However, this Arizona thing is really getting my goat. Is it possible to be simultaneously against the Arizona law and against open borders? Being vehemently against the former seems to imply an ardent embrace of the latter, which I am definitely not cool with. I mean, isnt this whole "immigration reform" debate nothing more than an anti-versus-pro-open-borders discussion? Or is there more nuance to it? Do people truly want an open immigration policy when bordering on a failed state like Mexico where the drug cartels assassinate the political leaders? Even disregarding such differences, do people truly want an open border policy anyway? If not, isn't it necessary to actually ENFORCE whatever policy we do have in place? (I ask this honestly out of a complete inability to understand the impetus behind the Liberal doctrine on the topic, so dont call me a fascist or whatever, please.)

Anyway, put me down as one rock fan not terribly impressed by these little boycotts and protests being put on. Unless I hear more nuance to the arguments which convinces me otherwise.



Post Edited (07-06-10 19:15)

Thought this was gonna be about the Meat Puppets (who put on a good reunion show last year or so ago). Or JFA, or Don Bolles. Did you know Alice Cooper was originally from AZ? It's true! He had a garage band called The Spiders whose singles go for crazy money now.

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Is it possible to be simultaneously against the Arizona law and against open borders?

Yes, absolutely.
It isn't about an open or closed border, but (and this is the paralegal in me talking) a really bad law, one that makes so little sense, law enforcement doesn't even know how to go about dealing with it, as this article about a bewildering official police training video shows: "The law's various requirements have baffled many lawyers, and the training materials show that even the state government is not certain what some provisions require." And it's not a "liberal" issue - GOPers from Newt to Dubya don't want to close the borders - they loves them some "Guest Workers" so their corporate string-pullers don't have to actually, y'know, pay anyone.



Post Edited (07-06-10 19:51)

Alice Cooper? Well, Arizona has certainly had its share of visitors. The French missionaries and explorers began visiting there in the late 16th century.

Aaah, so its just a bureaucratic/legislative glitch! Bright Eyes and I really want the same thing - we just need to phrase the law better. Phew, that's a relief. I thought he wanted to stop identifying and deporting illegal aliens there for a second.



Post Edited (07-06-10 19:54)

Not to get on a rant here, but...the primary issue I have with the AZ law is that it addresses the symptoms, not the cause.

Perhaps I've been reading too many Latin American writers lately (actually, I'm going to have to plead guilty on that count), but I believe it's unfair to write off Mexico as a failed state...many of the leaders (elected or otherwise) in this country have been the victims of assassination attempts–successful or not–by shadowy groups over the past 230 years.

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it addresses the symptoms, not the cause.

Yup, the only thing that will end illegal immigration is when corporate America stops offering them jobs. And since no politician will go after the hand that bribes, er, feeds them, you get these useless apartheid-like measures. Time to play Gil-Scott Heron's South Africa protest tune "Let Me See Your ID":

[www.youtube.com]

Those '80s benefit records were usually pretty awful, but I dug "Aint Gonna Play Sun City."

I think the Peter Gabriel and Shankar track ("No More Apartheid") is a winner, too. That's another out of print CD that's going for a hefty sum these days.

Don't forget this one:

[www.youtube.com]

I'm not making light of the situation in AZ and elsewhere, and we can all debate states' rights until the cows come home...I'm just a regular US citizen (albeit one born in the USVI, which leads many/most of my fellow US citizens to compliment me on my English skills and ask me if I am an American citizen) with two children adopted from overseas.



Post Edited (07-08-10 08:50)

As someone who has lived in Arizona for 25 years, the best bands in the state are usually local stars only. Tucson's 80s heyday (at least for my generation) included Pollo Elastico and Al Perry and the Cattle. I think he now hosts a cool radio show down there. A thrash metal band called Dover Trench was insanely popular with the skating crowd and some of them were from my high school. I think they're still around in some form. In what must be the oddest pairing of band and place, Jody Foster's Army was based in Sun City, a Sheriff-Joe-loving retirement community.

Wasn't Green on Red from Tucson?

Nils Lofgren and George Benson live here in Scottsdale.

Dyke and the Blazers were a regional soul band in Phoenix. They were pretty big in the southwest, and they did the original version of "Funky Broadway" (about Phoenix's skid row) that Wilson Pickett later hit out of the ballpark. Their music, in hindsight, was not transcendental, only good. Poor Dyke got murdered in '71.

The Meat Puppets are, hands down, the best band from Arizona ever.

I've always been inordinately fond of the Sand Rubies/Sidewinders.

Don't forget:


Sun City Girls - candidate for weirdest band.


Your Bible Set off my smoke alarm - candidate for greatest album title

Although raised in LA, Charles Mingus was born in Arizona.

And while The Tubes are associated with the Bay Area, I think they started out in Phoenix.

Yes, Mingus is from Nogales. Linda Ronstadt is from Tucson. Michelle Branch is from Sedona, where former One Day at a Time Star Glen Scarpelli lives. (That has nothing to do with anything - I just like to throw that out.

> many of the leaders (elected or otherwise) in this country have been the victims of
> assassination attempts–successful or not–by shadowy groups over the past 230 years.

True, but such attacks haven't become so commonplace in this country that its elected leaders are afraid even to do their jobs. (We rely more on "character assassination" to do that.)

immigration (illegal or not) has always been part of american history. the corporate press, like a programmed ring tone, pushes the 'immigration' button when it needs to deflect attention from 'real' fuckups elected officials & agent provocatuers (youtube the Toronto G20) commit during the course (as delvin so eloquently put it) of its daily job.

jermoe,
Arizona was fed up with the federal government dragging heels on an issue that costs Ariz (and those of us in surrounding states) billions of dollars and increasing frustration. It's been a growing issue for two decades but when the states initiate change, the feds step in and say it's not a states' issue, so the states back off and wait....and wait...
Nobody expects efficacy from the law itself, the point was to prod the feds into action. It does put law officials in a weird bind ; it also initiates continual awareness, discussion and hopefully change. It was probably not the best way to go about it, and surrounding states are somewhat skeptical/relieved re ariz's risk-taking. So, like many weird political situations, a chief element is the testing of state's rights vs feds.



Post Edited (07-07-10 18:35)

I fear that a large percentage of the libs are against ANY KIND OF enforcement of immigraton laws on principle. Arent most of our biggest cities "sanctuary cities"?

man you gringos are making me hungry (and kind of sick at the same time)...
headed out now to one my fave mexican restau rants!

later...
much later

Jimmy Eat World
Duane Eddy
Authority Zero
The Gin Blossoms
The Refreshments/Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers
Dead Hot Workshop

Giant Sand/calexico

...and following the Giant Sand thread, the late, great Rainer (Ptacek)/Rainer & Das Combo, and Howe's brother's band, Low Max. Others: Black Sun Ensemble, Naked Prey, and River Roses.