If you’re a first generation watcher of MTV, you must remember the year 1984 and  Band Aid. Bob Geldof and other musicians from Duran Duran, Genesis, Culture Club, The Police and U2 teamed up to make a record which would raise money to buy food for starving people in Africa.

How? Through record sales. In other words: Capitalism.

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They didn’t demand that any government should pay the tab for the recording, production or distribution of their product. They relied on the free market system to solve the problem.

There was no politically correct objection to the song’s refrain which clearly references “Christmas” by saying “feed the world, let them know it’s Christmas time again.” (more…)

Recently, I was called cranky in an article posted at the Huffington Post.  The good news is that it’s one of the few times that anything approaching the truth has been posted there.  The part I resented, though, was having my crankiness attributed to age.  The fact is I was a precocious curmudgeon.  But the question that springs to mind is why more people aren’t cranky these days when there is so much to be cranky about.

For instance, it used to irk me that Carl Bernstein, a rather minor footnote in America’s history, who only came to prominence because an anonymous snitch chose to pass along secrets to him and Bob Woodward, was depicted in two major motion pictures, “All the President’s Men” (Dustin Hoffman) and “Heartburn” (Jack Nicholson), when so many more deserving people haven’t been featured in any.  But that pales when compared to the number of movies that have glorified Che Guevara, a blood-thirsty villain.  In addition to numerous TV productions, he has shown up in “Che!” (Omar Sharif), “Evita” (Antonio Banderas), “Motorcycle Diaries” (Eduardo Noriega Gael Garcia Bernal) and “Che: Parts One and Two” (Benecio Del Toro). (more…)