What is an "A-Lister"?

You hear it everywhere on tabloid shows - a new rating system they've invented to tell us who THEY think are the most valuable Hollywood so-called "stars" - to influence us to believe these people are greater than they are. When I hear them refer to certain people as "A-listers," sometimes I'm taken aback. What IS this new rating system tabloidists have invented? Is it something political? Are public relations firms PAYING for these so-called ratings? I'd like to know! Because the "A-listers" they chase after and talk about non-stop appear to be average, mediocre people with very little talent, with one differentiating factor: something they've done has caused them to be chased by paparazzi; they're famous for being famous. Do these so-called "A-listers" have any proven track record or any great accomplishments? For the most part, I've observed that those who garner all this attention haven't the accomplishments commensurate with the attention they're getting. So what is this media-driven ratings system? I wonder.

What John Lennon Meant by "Imagine"

I've been a fan of John Lennon's music since I was born. I was intensely inspired by his gift and his incredible way of fusing universal thoughts with gorgeous melodies. To me, he was magical and phenomenal. He inspired me like no other artist. But, as I grew older and more aware, I was astounded by the hate people felt toward him - the resentment, the jealousy. Mostly I was confused and baffled that people could possibly reinterpret his beautiful song "Imagine" to be anything but a positive anthem.

I've thought about it for many years and having read almost every book and article ever written on John Lennon (to a point) - especially about his political problems - I felt I was informed enough to comment on the topic... but, then, right wing and left wing people came along bringing all the divisiveness in our society - and all the arguments and frustration - I'm sure it would be a nightmare for John Lennon, who, in the '70s was frustrated enough to eschew all social, political or financial involvements 'til his untimely death. I just stopped thinking about it. I stopped listening to his music. I stopped feeling his pain and the pain of his assassination. I wanted to find a resolution and could not go on listening to John's words and music until a real solution revealed itself to me.

That solution came today. A friend sent me this wonderful video: a song John Lennon loved and performed ("Stand By Me"), which, I believe, has achieved (via technology) what John Lennon loved, prayed and hoped for in his lifetime. "This globe-spanning YouTube video is inspiring. It comes from 'Playing For Change.' The group provides resources and education to musicians around the world. The goal is to promote peace and connect people through music. This video represents that mission perfectly. A film crew traveled the world with a single song. At each stop they found musicians to play "Stand by Me." The musicians added their own voice and talents to the song. When edited together, it creates a global ensemble." Go here to watch the video now.

They say John Lennon was a political activist... but he wasn't. The words to his masterpiece, "Imagine" have been misinterpreted widely and politicized. There were the billboard events ["War is Over (If You Want it)"] which John and Yoko carried out around the world for their peace campaign... and the bed-ins in Amsterdam when they were married. (In a staged publicity stunt, they used the media's usual hounding of them as an opportunity to campaign for world peace and speak out against the Vietnam War. Later, this would prompt an extensive FBI investigation into the supposed covert, anti-American activities of John Lennon, someone with whom Nixon was growing more and more agitated. But John Lennon was simply using Gandhi's principles and techniques of nonviolent action to express the concepts in his own music.) These ideas represented to me a really practical way to create and use art and music to heal the world.

Watching John Lennon heal himself and thus, heal others through his art, had a great influence on me; because of his brand of raw expression, I underwent a long series of healings that began a year before he was assassinated. Even his death would inspire music in me, just as it caught the imagination of the rest of the world. I wrote a song in tribute to him: "Let's Save the Human Race," based on Yoko's statement: "John loved and prayed for the human race; let's do the same for him."

AMAs: Slick Bods, Great Hair, No Talent

I'm glad I'm not the ONLY one who was disappointed watching the American Music Awards. Here's a blog that pretty much says it all.

Over the past year or two, I rarely even bother to watch these music awards shows any more because they're so annoying and disappointing. Last night I noticed a lot of slick bodies, great hair and makeup, but mostly mediocre talent - or lack thereof. The songs are forgettable; and when they're not lip-synching, they're off key; it's just plain boring and uninspiring. It just seems to be all about fashion, dancing and stripper poles.

From the whiney Rihanna singing, to the tribal dancing Beyonce, to those no-talent Pussy Cat women doing stripper routines with their ass cheeks hanging out... I was annoyed the entire time (I couldn't stomach the whole show). And how about those Jonas kids and their whiney whimpery out-of-tune singing? Too bad these 21st century Beatle wannabes didn't sound as good as they looked. But the biggest disappointment for me was Annie Lennox live - she's such a brilliant singer! What happened to her voice??

I didn't have to watch Miley Cyrus to know what she'd do - she's always the same: annoying. She needs to go to school and learn a few skills and hone her minimal talent. And what was with that eye patch on Rihanna? I was hoping they'd take it off halfway through the song and they did... that was the highlight of her performance. I thought that Natasha was good, but her hair was really irritating to watch with the wind machines blowing it in her face.

All in all, it was totally forgettable and disappointing. No great songs. No great artists to remember.

An Historic Day for America... and a Special Thanks to Our President

I want to join others in offering heartfelt congratulations to Barack Obama on his incredible victory and may God bless him and lead him to help our country overcome its hardships, to face the monstrous challenges that lie ahead. The big thing that is so important in my mind is that Americans divided by race may now have the chance to once and for all heal the wounds of our tainted history... now we can all stand together as American citizens without thought of race. At last, equality is not just a dream, but a reality!

By the same token, I wanted to let President George W. Bush know how much I appreciate all his hard work, discipline and determination. So here's my letter to him:

Thank you, Mr. President, for keeping us safe and sound since 9/11. I am so sorry you've had to suffer such terrible criticism... but I, for one, have enormous respect for and appreciate you and ever since the day I had the privilege to shake your hand at the Talker Magazine convention in NYC right before you ran for President, I have admired you greatly. You looked into my eyes, gave my hand a firm shake, and I knew right then that you were a decent, courageous man and you have not failed me yet! You and Laura brought dignity and class back to the White House... you both will always hold a special place in my heart because you inspired me to vote for the first time in my adult life. --Your American citizen, SF

Here are two wonderful articles that echo my feelings:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122584386627599251.html
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/11/an_election_day_note_thanks_pr.html

Van Gogh's Colors of the Night

MoMA is featuring the paintings of Vincent Van Gogh which focus on the night, sunsets and nocturnal landscapes and interiors. It's a very moving show which features some of his actual letters to Theo and the gorgeous "The Starry Night over the Rhone" and, of course, "The Starry Night," which Don McLean made famous in his song about Vincent. There are paintings in this exhibit I've never seen before such as "Night" (after Millet) and "The Dance Hall in Arles," in which you can see Gauguin's influence. Every time I see Vincent's paintings, I'm so touched to witness up close and personal brush strokes, the effervescence of his colors and the special touches of himself in every painting. Van Gogh is a rock star - the most famous artist to ever live - and that is evidenced by every showing of his work where the lines are a mile long just to get in and how difficult it is just to see the paintings up close. But it's well worth the pain because he himself went through hell to create these paintings in the first place. In his Poetry of the Night, I could imagine him with his straw hat filled with candles struggling with his paints traipsing across the landscapes in the darkness to capture twinkling lights and a beauty all his own.

Half Century Madonna

Madonna might be trying desperately to hang on to her youth by dedicating her movies and concerts to Britney Spears, who has become more and more boring as her life goes on. [Though half her age, B.S. is not nearly as interesting as Madonna, who's lived a very colourful life (to say the least).] So why does Madonna feel the need to do such a thing?

After all, she's got everything - fame, fortune, beauty, power, prestige... She's the envy of all the world and has more than reached her goal of "conquering the world" in the eyes of so many. She's great at collaborating on 3-1/2-minute videos that are brilliantly choreographed and designed. She's marvelous at arriving at carefully orchestrated photo shoots that depict her in the best possible light. She knows a good fashion show when she parades in one. She's got it all: marriage, children, the adulation of millions... And rumor has it that she might even go to the moon. At 50, her concerts are still sellouts and she's got the body of a 25-year-old. So why does she need Britney - a blubbery bobble-head bore that can't possibly measure up?

Madonna was recently referred to (by a nameless FNC commentator) as "shrewd, but not very bright." Maybe that's it. Maybe not. I was never a Madonna fan - that is, until her record, "Ray of Light" - a wonderful album produced by William Orbit - came out. I thought it was brilliant. I'd enjoyed "Vogue" and always sang along to the gorgeous "La Isla Bonita"... and reveled in the dominant feminine "Express Yourself"... but "Ray of Light" was the first time I really listened to Madonna and respected her as an artist (even if she more than likely had very little to do with the actual production of the album). I discovered it was William Orbit who really deserved most of the credit.

I speak from experience. I, myself, recorded an album - having been a songwriter since I was born - and I know the pain and labor that goes into the creation of a record. So I respected Madonna's efforts yet understood her limitations. I, myself, wrote my songs from start to finish, I played the instruments and sang and produced and sweated every aspect of my record. I don't think Madonna knows how to play an instrument and, having seen her play guitar on stage, I'd advise her never to do that again!

But she overcame a lot to sell her ideas and bring them to fruition. We have to give her a lot of credit. Though long-and-drawn-out, I enjoyed listening to her acceptance speech at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; and the stories of how she "made it" were educational, albeit methodical and calculated - how determined she was! A true American success story! (It's too bad she's opted, now, to trash her own country and talk up and support other countries much in the same way as Oprah.)

Madonna's best in the rough... she was great in that MTV special when she goes back to the warehouse in New York in which she'd once resided during her early struggling days. She was marvelous in "Desperately Seeking Susan" playing herself - no matter what the critics say. She's most original and captivating in the video "Secret" where she portrays a street urchin, a torch singing vamp with smeared makeup huddling with the street people... Like Shelley Winters said, "Those are the most beautiful black people in that video!"

She found herself over and over, but as she admitted in "Ray of Light" - lost herself, too ("I traded fame for love...") What makes an artist the most interesting? The fact that he/she can admit to his/her own faults, limitations, fallacies and strives to be "something better than you are today." And reinvent... recreate... be born anew. Madonna is and remains, after all, Madonna.

VMAs B.S.

Reading about the culture/talent-devoid VMAs this morning, the first line I saw was: "It took a year, but Britney Spears got the comeback she was seeking from the MTV Video Music Awards -- and she didn't even have to sing or dance." She won 3 awards!!! And a standing ovation!! For what? Bad behavior?? She stated she was shocked and didn't expect it - well, hello! She shouldn't have been honored in any way! What has this country come to when someone like her - who basically spent the past two years of her life running around the streets, jumping in and out of cars without underwear, getting in car accidents, being committed to mental wards and losing custody of her infant sons - is rewarded?!

How could a train wreck like B.S. "sweep" the VMAs unless they've lowered their standards to the pit of the bottom-feeders? And how can they call such a vile display as this show "tame"? Have they lost their minds?

They had Lindsay Lohan, skank queen of the year, giving out an award - someone who has accomplished nothing but bad acting in a lot of awful movies, singing like Minnie Mouse and endangering people's lives with her bad driving and drug use - and joke-of-a-lifestyle. And Ms. Famous-for-nothing, Paris H. representing as usual - a perfect match for the soulless show.

I was so depressed when I tuned in and saw two black guys wallowing around on stage grunting incomprehensible garble into microphones - one with his pants literally falling off! I thought, where's the talent? The lemmings in the audience stood up as though they'd witnessed the second coming!

I've loved music all my life and this fiasco really hurt. I was in pain watching it... and nauseous, too... and just had to turn it off.

It's Time for Women... and My Mom's a Shining Example

Though I am, as a rule, a-political by choice (that doesn't mean I'm wishy-washy) - that is, I claim no membership in either of the major or minor parties and don't call myself an "Independent," which seems to be the label of choice for those who don't quite want to commit (much like the term 'agnostic,' which, to me, is total wishy-washy-ness)... I was excited for the first time in this presidential race by McCain's VP pick today: Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

I've always thought it would be a great idea to elect a housewife to run this country because most housewives are so skilled at multitasking and brilliant at taking charge of many difficult situations all at once while always landing on their feet... and the fact that women are able to use both sides of their brain... well, I think we're long overdue in America for a woman president.

Pro-choice/anti-abortion notwithstanding (we'll never agree on that which should not be a political issue in the first place), I like Gov. Palin because she's the epitome of America's dreamgirl! She's strong, fought her way up the ladder to become Mayor, then Governor, gave birth five times and still has a waistline! And a neck!! She's 44 and gorgeous, outspoken, successful and articulate. She reminds me of my mother.

I argue with my mother all the time and, hearing the frustration in her voice, always remind her that I learned to be driven, articulate and outspoken from her... and that's not to say, "Sometimes being a bitch is all a woman has to hang onto..." She didn't teach me to be a bitch; she taught me to fight to survive in a man's world and not to make excuses for my own failures but, rather, to accept self-responsibility above all else!

However, our recent disagreement had to do with a statement she made about Blacks in America (she knows I HATE rash generalizations!) - that Black people have been treated like sh-- for a long time - to which I replied something like, 'That may be... but I don't think any Black person with dignity wants to wallow in self pity and just crawl up in a shack and become a dependent of the State.'

I reminded her that she herself was treated like sh-- many a time and that all odds had been against her from the very start having sprung from worse than humble origins - a shack in Tennessee with a mother who'd given birth to 10 kids and died at 42 from exhaustion; a father who was mentally ill and shot himself in front of her... to having been left in the [mis-]care of orphanages and foster homes - a lost girl in America.

Yet, through it all - having seven kids, raising most of us (with almost no help at all from our fathers), being a wildly successful woman who owned two employment agencies in Chicago in the '60s and '70s, gorgeous, ambitious and driven - she made it ALL ON HER OWN. Never once do I remember my mother even hinting at the thought of going on welfare (she just ran out and got another job), or applying for food stamps or any other government assistance. And my mother never did drugs, smoked, or drank her problems away. She suffered in silence and kept on going. She taught me the most valuable lesson in life - that you're only as weak as you convince yourself you are.

She just chuckled and agreed: 'That's true, but not many people have it in them to go through all that and survive.' After having left the corporate world in the late '70s, she embarked on a spiritual journey that led her to study all aspects of the spiritual world - philosophy, religions of the Far East, yoga, meditation - and is now one of the greatest mediums and teachers of meditation the world has ever known. She's got an enviable library, having read hundreds of books; she's a great artist, gardener and grandmother of... well... we lost count... Now each of the flowers in her garden become paintings and in those paintings are her children and grandchildren and the colors from the prism are new and those she has expanded upon beyond anything words could ever describe.

She's my hero. www.elizabethbaron.com

Celeb-Reality Check

Showbiz Tonight has done it again! They're experts at one thing: lowering the standards of America. They consistently report on made-up scenarios designed to suggest ideas as truths that are not only false, but twisted and almost perverted. They rarely focus on actual news and facts; instead of entertaining us with celebrity news, they fill their hollow hour by interviewing publicist speculators who offer their opinions and hypotheticals - rarely offering any substantive reality. It's no wonder lawyers are getting rich and the actual celebrities they're talking about are fed up!

Tonight they hit rock bottom suggesting that three celebrities - Oprah, Angelina Jolie and Paris Hilton - actually may influence the presidential race! I was appalled listening to a puppet/talking head from The Britto Agency trying to convince the ST audience that Oprah is a "global voice" with massive influence; and that Paris Hilton is well versed! We all know who these celebrities are and any sensible person knows that these people are the LAST ones to go to for advice on anything relative to practical existence in America.

All I can say is that people of all races, creeds, colors and religions need to band together from this day forward and vow to curb their television viewing, shut out this kind of influence and brainwashing, and start thinking for themselves. What kind of person would ask Oprah Winfrey what book to read? Having been so incredibly rich and famous most of her life, she's so far out of touch with most of us; there's no way she could possibly be able to empathize with ANY of us, much less be able to tell us what to read! How could she possibly understand our problems, much less be able to choose a candidate for us?

It's the same with sports figures. Many consider them to be "heroes" - but they're not; they're athletes with special abilities. Heroes are those men and women who are sacrificing their lives so we can live free in America. Heroes are scientists that are working day and night to find cures for diseases. Heroes are those who give of themselves unselfishly that others may live fruitful lives.

Celebrities should be just that - people who got famous for one reason or another - not who tell us how to live our lives and especially not who to vote for! Americans need to break the spell of these marketing magicians by turning off and tuning out and reprioritizing their lives to include what really matters most: family, friends, home and love.

Purposeful Walks

Forrest Gump may have taken off across America "for no particular reason," but we all remember how his cross-country run inspired so many people along the way - interpreting his reasoning as they may.

Similarly, on May 26, 2008 Keela Carr began a 2,700-mile walk from Barstow, California to Arlington with a laptop computer and some clothes, her few remaining possessions. She sold her home, furniture and everything, to have enough money for the trip across the country. "I wanted to do something extremely personal," Miss Carr said after visiting injured veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Northwest. She stayed at hotels during the beginning of her walk, but said she began making connections with strangers who heard about her mission. Many of them took her into their homes and fed her. Miss Carr arrived at Walter Reed on Wednesday with her Aunt Rochelle Narain who was driving alongside Miss Carr when she collapsed just outside the military hospital. [more...]

In 1930, Mahatma Gandhi (age 61) set out on his famous "Salt March" as an act of civil disobedience by defying the salt laws - 241 miles in 24 days. He was a shrewd politician with incredible marketing skills and made sure the worldwide media covered the event. Events at each village were scheduled and publicized in Indian and foreign press. Upon arriving at the seashore, Gandhi raised a lump of salty mud and declared, "With this, I am shaking the foundations of the British Empire." He then boiled it in seawater, producing illegal salt. Today the Salt March is acknowledged the world over as the one event that shook the British Empire to its core.

Kim Denmark of Dayton, Ohio walked across America with the goal of dramatizing the need for change as it relates to welfare reform, homelessness and poverty.

Since April 14th, Will Buchanan and his wife have been walking coast-to-coast across the country, from Oregon to New Hampshire 'on a quest to gain more freedom for our country by spreading the message of freedom and liberty along the way.'

Stuart Hamilton and Dave Toolan crossed the U.S. on foot. Why? Why not? Just to leave things behind and head off in the direction of things they'd never seen before - to take in the scenery and experience and see new things. In 2006 they walked 2,000 miles from Delaware to Kansas City. In May 2007, they rejoined the American Discovery Trail in Kansas City and headed west to Point Reyes in California - a distance of over 3,000 miles.

Steve Vaught made the decision to walk across America to lose weight and regain control of his life. "I decided to attempt something so radical because somewhere along the line I’d lost control; I'd lost myself. In life, I transformed from a skinny boy, to a fit U.S. Marine and ended up an obese man, approaching middle age and it was obvious that I was no longer able to cope with the course my life had taken." He lost the weight and rediscovered his dignity and life purpose.

Walking is the "perfect exercise" and those who take their daily walks seriously and walk their dogs regularly reap the rewards of the wonderful benefits that result. It really allows you the time to clear your head and think straight.