rock on buffy

[Dan Scanlan <coolhanduke@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

From: KOLA
Date: 08/05/06 13:47:47
Subject: [KOLANews] Buffy Sainte-Marie's censored sounds.

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096413425

Buffy Sainte-Marie's censored sounds

Posted: August 05, 2006
by: Brenda Norrell / Indian Country Today

PHOENIX - Nearly two decades after Cree singer and songwriter Buffy
Sainte-Marie's song ''Universal Soldier'' was released and shipments  
of her
records mysteriously disappeared, the truth of the censorship and
suppression by the U.S. government became public.

Now, in federal court, Charles August Schlund III stated he is a covert
operative and supports Sainte-Marie's assertions that the United States
took action to suppress rock music because of its role in rallying
opposition to the Vietnam War.

Sainte-Marie says she was blacklisted and, along with other American
Indians in the Red Power movements, was put out of business in the  
1970s.

''I found out 10 years later, in the 1980s, that [President] Lyndon  
Johnson
had been writing letters on White House stationary praising radio  
stations
for suppressing my music,'' Sainte-Marie said in a 1999 interview with
Indian Country Today at Dine' College.

''In the 1970s, not only was the protest movement put out of  
business, but
the Native American movement was attacked,'' Sainte-Marie said.

In an affidavit to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in a Racketeer
Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act lawsuit against President  
George
W. Bush and others, Schlund alleged he has been tortured in his  
attempts to
reveal the truth about the Bush family's manipulation of U.S. voting
results and the Drug Enforcement Agency's covert drug supplies to black
communities.

Detailing the assassinations of the Kennedys and exposing the ''Don
Bolles'' papers, named after the murdered Phoenix news reporter, Schlund
said he remains alive today because of FBI protection.

Schlund, who said he previously worked in the covert drug operations in
Phoenix, said rock music posed a threat to the United States and  
played a
role in opposition to the Vietnam War.

In his federal court affidavit, Schlund said he has knowledge of ''the
detailed plans for the break-up and destruction of rock n' roll music
including the assassinations of many people to achieve their goals. The
detailed plans to replace rock n' roll music with all-American music  
called
country western.''

''This massive CIA and DEA covert operation was being conducted to stop
political overtones in the rock n' roll music and to stop foreign
influences on Americans caused by the exposure to foreign music. This
operation was conducted because the Rockefellers had lost the Vietnam  
War
because of the protest that was in part directly linked with rock n'  
roll
music. In these files, the Rockefellers had needed the natural  
resources of
Vietnam for the expansion of their corporate empire and they blamed the
loss of the war in part on rock n' roll music.

''The assassinations started long before Vietnam but the plans to  
replace
rock n' roll with country western music started during the Vietnam  
War and
have continued to the present,'' Schlund stated to the court.

In his federal court affidavits filed in Maricopa County in Arizona,
Schlund also stated that singer Buddy Holly, killed in an airplane  
crash in
1959, was considered a threat to the U.S. government.

Meanwhile, Sainte-Marie said she cut a singular path as she was being
censored in the '60s and '70s.

''I usually didn't do what other people did. You didn't find me at peace
marches. I was out in Indian country.''

Earlier, a young Bob Dylan heard Sainte-Marie sing in Greenwich  
Village and
recommended she perform at the Gaslight, another hangout of the avant
garde. Janis Joplin, Elvis Presley and Tracy Chapman were among those  
soon
recording her lyrics. On the road, she traveled the world and received a
medal from Queen Elizabeth II.

During this time, Sainte-Marie was selling more records than ever in  
Canada
and Asia. But in the United States, her records were disappearing.
Thousands of people at concerts wanted records. Although the distributor
said the records had been shipped, no one seemed to know where they  
were.
One thing was for sure: They were not on record store shelves.

''I was put out of business in the United States.''

Later, Sainte-Marie discovered the censorship and pressure applied to  
radio
stations by Johnson during the Vietnam era, particularly toward  
''Universal
Soldier'' during the anti-war movement.

Sainte-Marie said Native people were put out of business, not just  
because
they were succeeding in Indian country, but because they were  
succeeding in
the broader community. She and others were a threat to the  
moneymakers of
concert halls, uranium and oil, she said.

Then, fellow activist and Santee poet John Trudell's wife, mother-in-law
and children were burned to death in a mysterious house fire shortly  
after
Trudell burned an American flag in Washington, D.C., Feb. 11, 1979.

''I was just one person put out of business. John Trudell is just  
another
person whose life was put out of business. Anna Mae Aquash and Leonard
Peltier were put out of the living business - we were made  
ineffective,''
Sainte-Marie said of slain American Indian Movement activist Aquash and
imprisoned Peltier.

But Sainte-Marie continued with her music and efforts with children  
after
becoming a familiar face on ''Sesame Street.'' In the 1990s, from her  
home
in Hawaii, she created the Cradleboard Teaching Project to link American
Indian students with other students online around the world.

Remembering the 1970s and Trudell, Sainte-Marie said, ''We just kept
chugging on. We kept coming to Indian country. We didn't worry about the
fortune and fame because we went with our sincerity, our hearts and with
our friends.''

Those years, however, were filled with pain.

''It was hard - seeing people hurt,'' she said.


---
© 1998 - 2006 Indian Country Today.





Dan Scanlan
coolhanduke@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.coolhanduke.com

"We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious  
is the first duty of intelligent men." — George Orwell