Wednesday Open Thread | Music That Makes You Think Week

Posted on August 19, 2015 by rikyrah

“Blowin’ in the Wind” is a song written by Bob Dylan in 1962 and released on his album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan in 1963. Although it has been described as a protest song, it poses a series of rhetorical questions about peace, war and freedom. The refrain “The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind” has been described as “impenetrably ambiguous: either the answer is so obvious it is right in your face, or the answer is as intangible as the wind”.[2]

In 1994, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. In 2004, it was ranked #14 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the “500 Greatest Songs of All Time”.

Origins and initial response[edit]
Dylan originally wrote and performed a two-verse version of the song; its first public performance, at Gerde’s Folk City on April 16, 1962, was recorded and circulates among Dylan collectors. Shortly after this performance, he added the middle verse to the song. Some published versions of the lyrics reverse the order of the second and third verses, apparently because Dylan simply appended the middle verse to his original manuscript, rather than writing out a new copy with the verses in proper order.[3] The song was published for the first time in May 1962, in the sixth issue of Broadside, the magazine founded by Pete Seeger and devoted to topical songs.[4] The theme may have been taken from a passage in Bound for Glory, where Woody Guthrie compares his political sensibility to newspapers blowing in the winds of New York City streets and alleys. Dylan was certainly familiar with Guthrie’s work and reading this book had been a major turning point in his intellectual and political development.[5]

In June 1962, the song was published in Sing Out!, accompanied by Dylan’s comments:

There ain’t too much I can say about this song except that the answer is blowing in the wind. It ain’t in no book or movie or TV show or discussion group. Man, it’s in the wind – and it’s blowing in the wind. Too many of these hip people are telling me where the answer is but oh I won’t believe that. I still say it’s in the wind and just like a restless piece of paper it’s got to come down some …But the only trouble is that no one picks up the answer when it comes down so not too many people get to see and know . . . and then it flies away. I still say that some of the biggest criminals are those that turn their heads away when they see wrong and know it’s wrong. I’m only 21 years old and I know that there’s been too many . . . You people over 21, you’re older and smarter.[6]

Dylan recorded “Blowin’ in the Wind” on July 9, 1962, for inclusion on his second album, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, released in May 1963.

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59 Responses to Wednesday Open Thread | Music That Makes You Think Week

  1. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 9:32 pm

    this will make you smile

    https://twitter.com/Lilblackbabies

    Reply
  2. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 9:27 pm

    Cain S. LaTrans @snkscoyote
    WATCH: White school board crowd boos NAACP, call blacks ‘racist’ over objection to ‘Dixie’ fight song http://www.rawstory.com/2015/08/watch-white-school-board-crowd-boos-naacp-call-blacks-racist-over-objection-to-dixie-fight-song/#.VdUIBeLHsJ0.twitter …

    Reply
  8. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:40 pm

    ShordeeDooWhop ‏@Nettaaaaaaaa 4m4 minutes ago
    The STL City police are shooting and firing gas at protesters tonight hours after killing a teenage black boy. THIS IS HAPPENING, AGAIN

    Reply
    • yahtzeebutterfly says:
      August 19, 2015 at 7:48 pm

      Brittany Packnett ‏@MsPackyetti 2m2 minutes ago
      The swat tank literally rode down a practically empty street and shot the gas into the air. Where protesters weren’t. Where kids were.

      Brittany Packnett ‏@MsPackyetti
      My friend’s parents got gas seeping into their house. They’re retired. My mother was in Church. Gas seeped in.People ran inside for shelter

      Brittany Packnett ‏@MsPackyetti 30s30 seconds ago
      I know so many kids in this neighborhood. I grew up going to church here. This is wild.

      Reply
    • Liza says:
      August 19, 2015 at 8:10 pm

      Pray for the folks in St. Louis.

      And what in the name of the Almighty God is it going to take for the federal government to step up and DO SOMETHING about the police and the killings and the attacks on unarmed, innocent people?

      Reply
  10. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:36 pm

    RIP and thank you for your work in showing our humanity.

    https://twitter.com/jazziz2/status/634100571113422848

    Reply
  11. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 2:15 pm

    I want her GONE. She’s incompetent and corrupt.
    …………

    Brown: Dems seek open primary for state’s attorney

    Written By Mark Brown Posted: 08/18/2015, 05:55pm

    A Cook County Democratic endorsement committee chose Tuesday not to name a preferred candidate in a crowded field for the 2016 state’s attorney election, passing over incumbent Anita Alvarez.

    The same 30-member group narrowly recommended party support for Circuit Clerk Dorothy Brown’s re-election and flirted with an endorsement of former Cook County Board President Todd Stroger for a seat on the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District before backing down.

    The full Cook County Democratic Central Committee, composed of 80 ward and township committeemen, is scheduled to vote on the recommendations Wednesday, at which time there is expected to be a renewed push to endorse both Alvarez and Stroger.

    This is the process long known by party insiders as “slating” or “slatemaking,” where Democrats try to pick a ticket that will keep the various party factions happy and hopefully prevail.

    ………………………

    Some will tell you the party endorsement can be more a hindrance than a help to a candidate, but that rarely stops any candidate from seeking it.

    “In the end, everybody’s going to do what they want anyway,” observed one committeeman, meaning the party leaders don’t necessarily honor the party endorsement any more than do the voters.

    Although the slatemakers deliberated behind closed doors, in this case what looked like a 4-inch thick castle door, the candidates presented their credentials in public.

    Three would-be challengers — Kim Foxx, John Fritchey and Donna More — declared their intentions to run against Alvarez in the March 15 primary.

    Alvarez, seeking her third term, pitched herself as someone who has not only been tough on crime, as is her reputation, but also is “smart on crime.”

    http://chicago.suntimes.com/politics/7/71/888496/brown-dems-seek-open-primary-states-attorney

    Reply
  12. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 2:05 pm

    Dana Houle ‏@DanaHoule Aug 18
    Non-proliferation experts are about as divided over Iran deal as climate scientists are divided on human-caused climate change

    Reply
  18. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 12:22 pm

    Donna Brazile ‏@donnabrazile 12h12 hours ago
    #JulianBond’s final request will be carried out in a burial at sea on Saturday, August 22, 2015 at 2:00pm Central Daylight Time.

    Reply
  19. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 12:21 pm

    One fateful decision. Years of neglect.
    Five once-average schools remade into the worst in Florida.
    Aug. 14, 2015
    Times Staff Investigation

    In just eight years, Pinellas County School Board members turned five schools in the county’s black neighborhoods into some of the worst in Florida.

    First they abandoned integration, leaving the schools overwhelmingly poor and black.

    Then they broke promises of more money and resources.

    Then — as black children started failing at outrageous rates, as overstressed teachers walked off the job, as middle class families fled en masse — the board stood by and did nothing.

    Today thousands of children are paying the price, a Tampa Bay Times investigation has found.

    They are trapped at Campbell Park, Fairmount Park, Lakewood, Maximo and Melrose — five neighborhood elementary schools that the board has transformed into failure factories.

    Every year, they turn out a staggering number of children who don’t know the basics.

    http://www.tampabay.com/projects/2015/investigations/pinellas-failure-factories/5-schools-segregation/

    Reply
  20. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 12:19 pm

    Greg Sargent ‏@ThePlumLineGS 55m55 minutes ago
    Rep. Steve Cohen of Tennessee announces support for Iran deal. Was seen as key undecided Dem.

    Reply
  25. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 9:35 am

    When a health care plan isn’t really a health care plan
    08/19/15 08:00 AM—UPDATED 08/19/15 08:06 AM
    By Steve Benen
    Republican presidential hopeful Scott Walker ran into a little trouble last week. He told a national television audience that voters should look past the Trump “media frenzy,” go to his campaign website, and pay attention to all the substantive policy details.

    The trouble, of course, was that his website, at least at the time, didn’t have a single policy detail anywhere. There wasn’t even an issues page. Walker was directing voters to resources that didn’t exist.

    To his credit, that changed yesterday. Walker’s first real policy rollout of the year brought us the Wisconsin governor’s plan to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act. There’s even something resembling a policy paper available for public review.

    8/18/15, 2:11 PM ET
    Scott Walker unveils plan to repeal and replace Obamacare

    Like every other GOP reform plan, Walker’s pitch includes all the predictable clichés – tort reform, high-risk pools, insurance sales across state lines, HSA expansion – that serve as staples of every Republican scheme. It also includes some (very) modest subsidies, which vary based on age, not income.

    But as Jeffrey Young and Jonathan Cohn explained, there’s a root challenge the Wisconsin Republican makes no real effort to address.

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/when-health-care-plan-isnt-really-health-care-plan

    Reply
  30. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 8:14 am

    Huh
    HUH?

    …………..

    A family in public housing makes $498,000 a year. And HUD wants tenants like this to stay.

    By Lisa Rein
    Washington Post
    August 18, 2015, 5:38 PM

    A family of four in New York City makes $497,911 a year but pays $1,574 a month to live in public housing in a three-bedroom apartment subsidized by taxpayers..

    In Los Angeles, a family of five that’s lived in public housing since 1974 made $204,784 last year but paid $1,091 for a four-bedroom apartment. And a tenant with assets worth $1.6 million — including stocks, real estate and retirement accounts — last year paid $300 for a one-bedroom apartment in public housing in Oxford, Neb.

    In a new report, the watchdog for the Department of Housing and Urban Development describes these and more than 25,000 other “over income” families earning more than the maximum income for government-subsidized housing as an “egregious” abuse of the system. While the family in New York with an annual income of almost $500,000 raked in $790,500 in rental income on its real estate holdings in recent years, more than 300,000 families that really qualify for public housing lingered on waiting lists, auditors found.

    But HUD has no plans to kick these families out, because its policy doesn’t require over-income tenants to leave, the agency’s inspector general found. In fact, it encourages them to stay in public housing.

    “Since regulations and policies did not require housing authorities to evict over income families or require them to find housing in the unassisted market, [they] continued to reside in public housing units,” investigators for Inspector General David Montoya wrote.

    The review, conducted in 2014 and 2015 at the request of Rep. Phil Roe, R-Tenn., found that 45 percent of the 25,226 public housing tenants with incomes higher than the threshold to get into the system were making $10,000 to $70,000 a year more. About 1,200 of them had exceeded the income limits for nine years or more, and almost 18,000 for more than a year.

    http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-low-income-housing-abuse-20150818-story.html

    Reply
    • TyrenM says:
      August 19, 2015 at 9:08 am

      Yes those people way over the limits should be fined and booted. That rule needs to be changed. Too many need that housing.
      That said, nice hit piece on HUD.

      Reply
  35. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 8:00 am

    Glad someone did, because I knew it was a fraud and a scam.

    …………………………….

    I Read Scott Walker’s Health Care Plan So You Don’t Have To
    —By Kevin Drum

    | Tue Aug. 18, 2015 1:12 PM EDT

    It’s health care day for Scott Walker. Today he released “The Day One Patient Freedom Plan,” a title that’s apparently designed to give the impression that his plan would start on Day One of his presidency. Yuval Levin comments that Walker’s proposal “will be familiar to health wonks,” and it’s true. It’s the usual conservative mish-mash of HSAs, high-risk pools, tax credits, interstate insurance sales, tort reform, and block-granting of Medicaid.

    Oh, and Walker’s plan won’t require any tax revenue. This is….a little hard to believe since a quick swag suggests that the gross cost of Walker’s tax credits will run about $200 billion per year. I figure the net cost, once you account for the end of Obamacare subsidies and other current outlays, is still in the neighborhood of $100 billion or so.1 That’s a lot, so I assume Walker explains pretty carefully how he’s going to pull this off without any new taxes

    Indeed he does. Here’s the answer: “We would simplify and reform how the federal government helps people access health insurance.” Gee, I wonder why no one’s thought of that before?

    So far, there’s nothing very interesting here. Every Republican candidate is going to release a plan very similar to this. But there is one other thing I was curious about. It turns out that protecting people with pre-existing conditions is really popular, and this means that Republicans all feel like they have to support the idea. But how? Apologies for the long excerpt, but I want to make sure you see Walker’s whole answer:

    …………….

    This is literally a non-answer. We do know a couple of things: (a) if you let your insurance lapse, you’re screwed, and (b) Walker will somehow prevent insurance companies from raising your rates if you maintain continuous coverage. He provides no clue just what kind of insurance regulation would accomplish this, and for a good reason: I doubt there is one. Obamacare accomplishes it via community rating, which requires insurance companies to cover all comers at the same price, but Walker surely rejects this approach. What he replaces it with remains a mystery.

    One other thing worth noting: Walker’s tax credits would, at best, pay only for catastrophic coverage. Maybe not even that. Nor will his plan cover everyone. Nor is it likely to cost nothing. Nor does it have any concrete proposals to reduce the cost of health care. If you think that’s OK, then Walker is your guy. If you think everyone should be able to receive affordable routine health care, and you’re willing to pay for it honestly, you might want to stick with Obamacare.

    http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2015/08/i-read-scott-walkers-health-care-plan-so-you-dont-have

    Reply
  36. rikyrah says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:54 am

    Good Morning, Everyone :)

    Reply
  37. Ametia says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:42 am

    Let’s not lose track of Trump’s NEFARIOUS history, folks. We know he’s been bankrupt multiple times. He’s made shady dealings and manipulation to scam the system. And somebody’s digging, it’s only a matter of time when the pile is revealed.

    but now, he like Palin served the greater good of the GOP by riling the racists white Amerians who want a country back, that never belonged to them in the first place.

    Reply
    • rikyrah says:
      August 19, 2015 at 7:56 am

      The thing about him, and I’ll say it over and over.

      He’s telling the bold, brutal truth about what the GOP IS…
      and not hiding behind Frank Luntz-approved dogwhistles.

      THAT is the problem they have with him.
      Because his language doesn’t allow the MSM to pretend that the GOP isn’t what it is.
      And, if they can’t pretend, then how can they aid and abed the GOP?

      Reply
  38. Ametia says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:04 am

    FAILURE

    Reply
  39. Ametia says:
    August 19, 2015 at 7:03 am

    It’s HUMP day!

    Reply

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