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A Review of Bonnie Raitt’s “Souls Alike” (Capitol Records: 2005)

The incomparable Bonnie Raitt has produced an another incomparable masterpiece. “Souls Alike” confirms that she can create cutting edge new art even after decades at the top, while still being able to connect deep into the mainstream.

Long enshrined in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Bonnie’s shelf full of Grammys has not compromised her commitment to her craft, her adventurism or the creative demands of her raw talent.

There are ballads on this new album that remind us how Bonnie manages to speak to the pop mainstream with an integral clarity of soul and vision. There are others that take us deep into a world of hard blues and experimental jazz. How she pulls it all off is why she’s, well, Bonnie Raitt.

Three ballads are for the ages.

Several decades ago, “controversial” subjects in news media included many issues that are now well beyond controversy. During the first half of the 1960s, fierce arguments raged in print and on the airwaves about questions like: Does a black person (a “Negro,” in the language of the day) have the right to sit at a lunch counter, or stay at a hotel, the same way that a white person does? Should the federal government insist on upholding such rights all over the country?

Some agonizing disputes, in the media and on the ground, came to a climax with passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Suddenly, after many decades of struggles against Jim Crow, federal law explicitly barred racial discrimination in public accommodations and employment. After President Lyndon Johnson signed the measure, saying “Let us close the springs of racial poison,” controversy faded about access to restaurants and hotels.

Help raise money to continue the valuable discovery of privatized electronic vote recording and tabulation problems. If adequate funding is raised immediately, discovery will continue with meaningful machine inspections conducted by academic experts.

There are real and serious problems with the 2004 General Election results. Although we have seen similar issues in other states, the analysis in New Mexico, due to the availability of the data, and thoroughness and manner in which the analysis was conducted, has pinpointed serious problems according to specific machine types at the precinct level. Troubling patterns of unreliability and gross errors in the official election results especially in Native American and Hispanic communities have emerged. Problems include:

* 24,000 "under votes", that is , a ballot cast but no vote recorded, with the highest under vote percentages in Hispanic and Native American precincts - but only when those voters votes on specific electronic paperless voting equipment. These under vote rates in the same precincts dropped when voters used paper ballots.

Every year or so, some right-winger in America lets fly in public with a ripe salvo of racism, and the liberal watchdogs come tearing out of their kennels, and the neighborhood echoes with the barks and shouts. The right-winger says he didn't mean it, the president "distances himself," and the liberals claim they're shocked beyond all measure. Then, everyday life in racist America resumes its even course.

This past week it's been the turn of that conservative public moraliser, William Bennett. He should have known better than to loose off a hypothetical on his radio show. Announce publicly that "if you wanted to reduce crime, you could abort every black baby in this country and your crime rate would go down," and many Americans reckon that's no hypothesis, that's a plan waiting to happen.

I’ve got to confess, I occasionally yell helpful driving suggestions to others on the road; I often talk back to newscasters and politicians on TV; and I always wish I could add my comments on-line to the letters to the editor.  Polite people say that opinions are like elbows, everybody’s got one (or two.)  While it’s good to be passionate, small, differing opinions can divide an otherwise cohesive populace.  Wedge issues are used by political strategists to splinter us into opposing groups and divert our attention from the big issues that most of us would agree on.  

Thanks for the interesting speculation on Miers on the Supreme Court and analysis of the Plame case, and President G W Bush's likely collusion in it.  

I have a quibble with the statement about Joe Wilson's New York Times Op-Ed piece.  Far from "...expos(ing) as utter nonsense the Bush claim that Saddam Hussein was shopping for uranium in Africa", Wilson's Op-Ed stated Saddam sought uranium from Niger, but that he was likely to have been unsuccessful.  More importantly, Wilson cited President Bush's avoidance of the likelihood of Hussein's failure to buy yellowcake, while also pointing out the forgery of the documents on which his words in the State of the Union relied, a fact Joe Wilson couldn't have known when he made the trip to Niger, since it wasn't known then.  Whatever Wilson's Op-Ed stated, this was the essence of his report to the CIA.  Bush used the document's assertions in his State of the Union speech  making his case for the Iraq attack by ignoring the results of Hussein's quest for yellowcake (uranium).

Historian Michael Foley said during times of war pacifists often get mugged. As a non-violent activist working to end the war in Iraq and the corporate war profiteering that comes with it, September 2005 has been the most surreal time of my life and I definitely feel like I got mugged by Australian Attorney General Phillip Ruddock and the Australian government.

After three lovely months of traveling through Australia and meeting people, one Wednesday afternoon during the second week of September I was called by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization, or ASIO, and asked to come in for an interview. I asked if I was required to do so and the woman at the other end of the phone said “No, you are not obliged too.” I then asked if this would affect the remaining two weeks of my time in Australia and she said she couldn’t say. I should have listened with closer attention to that non-answer.

I joined a contingent of 12 people from Oregon who went to Washington last week to demonstrate against the Iraq War, and I want to share my experiences with the public because I believe they offer learning opportunities and inspiration to the burgeoning movement to take back our country from the extremists who have taken over our government.

thank you for making this a big deal, because it really IS, and people just do not seem to be getting it.

"The Free Press calls for an independent investigation" and truly *independent*! yes! thank you!

please let us know what to do how to help make that happen.

you always come though. i love you guys' courage and integrity!

please keep on your vital work!

with deepest admiration, always!!
metta