[Breitbart] “Country” Joe McDonald, a hippie rock star of the 1960s whose “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag” was a four-lettered rebuke to the Vietnam War that became an anthem for protesters and a highlight of the Woodstock music festival, died Sunday. He was 84.
McDonald, who performed with his band, Country Joe and the Fish, died in Berkeley, California. His death from complications of Parkinson’s disease was reported by Kathy McDonald, his wife of 43 years, in a statement issued by his publicist.
McDonald was a longtime presence in the Bay Area music scene, where peers included the Grateful Dead, the Jefferson Airplane and his onetime girlfriend, Janis Joplin. He wrote or co-wrote hundreds of songs, from psychedelic jams to soul-influenced rockers, and released dozens of albums. But he was known best for a talking blues he completed in less than an hour in 1965 — the year President Lyndon Johnson began sending ground forces to Vietnam — and recorded in the Berkeley home of Arhoolie Records founder Chris Strachwitz.
In the deadpan style of McDonald’s hero, Woody Guthrie, “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag” was a mock celebration of war and early, senseless death, with a chorus concertgoers and others would learn by heart:
And its 1, 2, 3 what are we fighting for? Don’t ask me I don’t give a damn, Next stop is Vietnam, And its 5, 6, 7 open up the pearly gates, Well there ain’t no time to wonder why, WHOOPEE we’re all gonna die Got his turn.
At the time he wrote “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag,” McDonald was co-leader of the newly formed Country Joe and the Fish and he added a special “F-I-S-H” chant before the song: “Give me an F, give me an I, give me an S, give me an H.” By the time his group appeared at Woodstock in 1969, the Fish were on the verge of breaking up, the chant was a different four-letter word beginning in “F” and McDowell was performing before hundreds of thousands. Many would stand and sing along, a moment captured in the Woodstock documentary released the following year. (For the film, the song’s lyrics appeared as subtitles, a bouncing ball on top).
“Some people alluded to peace and stuff (at Woodstock), but I was talking about Vietnam,” McDonald told The Associated Press in 2019. He called the opening chant “an expression of our anger and frustration over the Vietnam War, which was killing us, literally killing us.”
#1
A true red diaper baby. His parents were both members of the Communist Party, and he was named after Joseph Stalin. His band name had a double meaning: "Country Joe" was a reference to Joseph Stalin, and "The Fish" was a reference to Mao. Though Wikipedia isn't going to tell you that.
#4
^ No TW. I think he was sincere. He was from the Bay Area, and it was just the water he swam in. I remember seeing him around now and again when I lived near Berkeley.
[Fox]The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) announced a new policy that would ban foreign nationals and noncitizens from accessing its loan services — a continuation of efforts to refocus federal resources to ventures that align with American prioritization.
"The Trump SBA is committed to driving economic growth and job creation for American citizens," SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler said in a statement on Friday.
The requirement will apply to its Surety Bond and Microloan programs and is an expansion of changes made in February to the SBA’s 504 and 7(a) programs — loans for small businesses looking to finance working capital, equipment or acquisitions. Those earlier reforms prohibited SBA loans from going to businesses that are partially or wholly owned by foreign nationals.
[BB] Pope Leo XIV has a new, custom-outfitted Ford Explorer SUV — complete with papal vanity plates — delivered personally by the automaker’s CEO Jim Farley, and his wife, Lia.
The black Explorer Platinum, customized with a 3.3-liter V6 hybrid powertrain and 10-speed hybrid transmission, was assembled at Ford’s Chicago Assembly Plant, located about 5 miles from Leo’s hometown of Dolton. It also features vanity license plates that read “DA POPE” and “LEO XIV.”
Inside, the seat tags feature the Chicago flag and the city’s skyline is stitched into the vehicle’s center console. Engravings of the skyline and St. Peter’s Basilica are found on the scuff plates near the bottom of the SUV’s doors.
[Fox] A new way to build cars
Musk has linked the Cybercab to a manufacturing strategy called Unboxed. Instead of a traditional linear assembly line, Tesla builds modules separately before bringing them together late in production. In theory, this approach reduces factory space and accelerates output. Musk has suggested a potential cycle time of one vehicle every 10 seconds. In reality, early production may move slowly as Tesla refines the process. Scaling a new car and a new manufacturing model at the same time adds complexity.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
