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Lying Eyes

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You have to hand it to Ted "Country Boy" Cruz.  He knows how to turn a seemingly harmless question into a political statement.  The amazing thing is that Rolling Stone didn't call Ted out on this.  It took Bill Maher to point to the blatant hypocrisy in the statement, with one of his panelists noting that Cruz will say literally anything to pander to the religious right wing, who is decidedly country when it comes to music.

It's not like "classic rock" musicians didn't respond to 9/11.  A huge concert was held at Madison Square Garden nine days later that had rock stars from around the world and across the political spectrum coming together to praise the first responders, with proceeds going to the ongoing recovery.  Among those were John Mellencamp and Kid Rock putting aside their political differences to sing Mellencamp's classic, Pink Houses.  Kid Rock comes in at about the 6 minute mark.  The Who capped off the evening with Won't Get Fooled Again, which I suppose could be taken many ways in the aftermath of the heinous attacks across America.

The memorable evening also included many television and movie actors, which the Right wing also loves to bash.  How dare those damn "liberals" tread on their "America First" domain!  The concert was later made into a film, directed by Spike Lee, Kevin Smith and Jerry Seinfeld, among others, with more proceeds going to the recovery efforts.  All together the rock event raised over $30 million.

One can understand Fox letting Cruz get away with these kinds of statements, but the mainstream media pretty much let it slide.  Of course, you probably don't want to call more attention to Cruz's outlandish statements than they deserve, but this guy is the ultimate fraud, and should be repeatedly called out as such, not allowed to say whatever he damn well pleases on national television with no repercussions.  

I chalk this up to the initial media flirtation with 2016's first declared presidential candidate.  Whatever his musical tastes are, it had nothing to do with the way rock and roll music responded to 9/11.  As the Eagles would sing, You Can't Hide Your Lying Eyes.


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