This diary is mostly self-centered, a way of dealing with 'writer's block' for the project I'm working on.
Her:
Racism lives in the U.S. today.
Better get hip to what Martin Luther King had to say.
I don't want my kids being brought up this way.
Hatred to each other is not okay.
Him:
Well I'm not a preacher just a singer's son.
But I can see more work to be done.
It's what you do and not what you say.
If you're not part of the future then get out of the way.
If you don't know where this is from, I can't say you're to blame.
These lyrics are sung by John Cougar Mellencamp and India Arie. I never heard the song until a couple days ago myself, but it struck me powerfully and seems to have been written specifically for this election, even though it was released back in the fall of 2001 (supremely bad timing for a song titled Peaceful World).
Before I go on, I should give a link to the music video, so you can judge for yourself whether I'm off my rocker for thinking this song fits with a lot of themes in this election.
Peaceful World, performed by John Mellencamp and India Arie.
Continuing on with the namesake for this diary, what is left out:
The money's good and the work's ok.
Looks like everything is rolling our way.
'Til you gotta look the devil in the eye.
You know that bastard's one big lie.
These verses, along with the others above, ended up on the cutting room floor in one fool's effort to bind together this song and this election.
Trying to make a video worthy of both the song and the Obama campaign is difficult, and one of the choices faced when beginning something like this are questions about viewer's ability to pay attention for longer than three minutes. I erred on the editorial side of caution and chopped everything in the youtube video from the 40 second mark to the 2:50 mark. The verses above, left out.
Another difficulty is trying to match the artistic spirit and skill behind the original video, to blend in imagery from the campaign as seamlessly as a donk like me can muster, without leaving traces of my hackery behind. Of course I'm doing my best to confuse the issue by cluttering the video with enough accidents to leave people wondering whether anything decent wasn't intentional.
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On second thought, instead of posting this diary as a lame shot out to 'writers block in-progress', I'll wait and post it at the same time I put the video up on the internets. That way it only has to scroll once down the recent diaries roll.
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In the middle of a break right now, in the middle of the night, wondering how it will turn out... if I let my biases run wild, I'd say so far so good, nearly true to the material I'm working with, but half as original.
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Above, I mentioned that the song is really fitting for this election, but when I think about the hook of the song...
Come on baby take a ride with me.
I'm up from Indiana down to Tennessee.
Everything is cool as can be in a peaceful world.
...I realize that for these words to ring truer, Obama will have to at some time poll ahead of McCain in Indiana and Tennessee. That's a tall order. Oh, and the part about living in a peaceful world, that might be a bit off the mark if one wants to get all literal and shit.
Fake writer's block break is over. Time invested so far, about 14 hours. Until morning.
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Ok, I suppose it's done. Just a matter of uploading and then taking my hits for putting up one more candidate diary.
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Compared to the source, passable. Anyone want to take a look at the results?
Thanks.