The Chronic Curmudgeon

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July 15, 2006

The Last 5 Sounds I'd Save

Since Linkmeister called me out for not finishing my last list (and since he's the only one who cares), here's the top five recordings I'd save for posterity.

5. FDR's First Inaugural, 1933 Franklin Roosevelt's courage and guidance carried the United States not only through World War II, but through the greatest economic challenge and one of the biggest political threats to our democracy ever -- the Great Depression. While his leadership and inspiration cannot be summed up in one speech, the phrase from his first inaugural, 'The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" etched itself into the memories of all who lived when he said it -- and served as the rallying cry as America brought itself back from the brink. Listen here.

4. Jack Buck's call of Kirk Gibson's home run, 1988 World Series. And I don't even care one way or the other about the Dodgers... but when Kirk Gibson limped gingerly to the plate in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series in the bottom of the ninth, barely able to walk from hamstring and knee injuries, having told his manager he thought he had one good swing left in him, you had a sense that something miraculous might be about to happen.

But when he actually did it -- the crippled, injured star whose legs would only give him one swing actually hit a game winning home run with that swing (he was so badly hurt that this his only at bat of the World Series) -- the seventy-something dean of US baseball announcers, Jack Buck, said what we all were thinking... "I DON'T BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW! I DON'T BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW!" -- and his childlike incredulity instantly amplified the legend. This is my all-time favorite baseball call, and to this day I get a lump in my throat and start chuckling like a little boy when I hear it. This clip is everything I love about baseball. Listen here.

3. Martin Luther King, "I Have A Dream, 1963" The most passionate commitment to the ideals of Americanism, and of the courage it takes to find optimism even when reality tells you there is little reason for it, ever uttered. King was one of the greatest orators in not just American history, but in human history -- and this speech is the most beautiful expression of freedom I suspect I will ever hear. Watch it here.

2. Joseph Welch stares down Joseph McCarthy, 1954 From America's greatest expression of freedom to its most courageous and exasperated rebuttal to the right wing forces in our own country that represent that freedom's greatest threat... words and a spirit that we would be especially wise to be remembering today, with McCarthy's heirs Cheney and W occupying the White House and trying to shout down and initimidate not just all opposition, but even all thought that diverges from their own ideology. They say it could never happen here... it almost did in the early 1950s, it is happening today, and what I wish for most of all is for a courageous Joseph Welch in our generation to stand up to the bullying forces of demagoguery. Sadly for me and for America, no Democrat has yet shown this kind of leadership.

Welch's takedown of McCarthy's relentless -- yet warrantless and wholly invented -- gutless and cowardly fearmongering and intimidation via character assassination and personal attacks stands as the most important act of courage in America's post-Colld War history. And we dare not forget it, given the ideologiy and tactics of Dick Cheney and George W Bush.

Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?

Indeed.

And my number one sound I'd save????

Posted by Christopher on July 15, 2006 02:16 PM

Comments

Posted by: Linkmeister at July 17, 2006 01:34 AM