Tuesday, August 18, 2009

In Memorium: Robert Novak meets Frank Zappa

Pundit and Valerie Plame-buster Robert Novak has died of brain cancer. He was 78.

One of my Facebook friends pointed to a great highlight in the right-wing career of journalist Robert Novak: the Crossfire episode with John Lofton of the Washington Times and rock-n-roll legend Frank Zappa. In the mid-80s, there was so much static about rock music and how it was going to turn children into devil worshipping, murderous thugs. Yours truly was just as suspect as the next child, wandering around my prep school campus with my walkman blaring The Ramones, and The Sex Pistols. These were the musicians that would have made all the white guys on the Crossfire set cringe... with the exception of Zappa, who probably would have been amused that I would mix in Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young... as well as a little Beethoven, Ella Fitzgerald and Bob Marley with the raucous rockers.

The image quality on this video isn't the best, but it's an enjoyable 10 minutes! Wonder if Novak will run across Zappa again in the after-life?

Nah!!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

That was fascinating and I hadn't seen it. I think that Zappa really hit the nail on the head and Novak will have his hands full. He was awful.

Peggins