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PCR #109. (Vol. 3, No. 17) This edition is for the week of April 22--28, 2002.
Matt's Rail

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DIAMOND DAVE AND RED ROCKER UNITE
As PCR scoopster Mike reported in last week's "Rant", Van Halen ex-frontmen David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar, are joining forces for a summer tour to be called: Song for Song: The Heavyweight Champs of Rock and Roll tour, which is scheduled to kick off May 29th in Cleveland. Unofficially, it's being called the "Sans Halen Tour", which I think rocks, and gets my personal vote. Most folks, especially wearers of "hats", probably recall that these two guys didn't like each other very much, especially after Roth split VH and Hagar came on and took his place. Roth even used to refer to Hagar as "my bitch", but evidently, they didn't even meet until a couple months ago.
Sammy and Dave"Sammy and I are like fraternity brothers that have been through the same shitty hazing," Roth told reporters.
Hagar recently said on his website that he was "blown away at how well they got along together."
Both guys are going to play for 90 minutes each, with Roth planning to do "almost exclusively" Van Halen tunes, which is a HUGE bonus.
Evidently Hagar is trying to get bassist Michael Anthony to join up with him. They just hooked up with Neal Schon of Journey to record some songs as "Planet Us".
Dave also said that Eddie Van Halen, who has been fighting cancer for some time now, "is not doing too well."
"All joking aside, I wish the best for him."

As for the latest ex-lead singer of Van Halen, Gary Cherone, playing any shows with Sammy & Dave ...Roth joked that Cherone was busy "performing The Vagina Monologues."

You gotta love it.

SPEAKING OF VAN HALEN....
Apparently, the remaining trio of Van Halen are tired of pissing off lead singers and are now focusing their efforts on their fans.

After re-registering the VH trademark logo and 5150 logo, a notice went out of all fan tribute pages that they had to immediately remove said logos or face prosecution from the band. Just another stupidly ridiculous thing! I can almost hear the conversation now: "Roth, Hagar, Cherone.........there's no one left to shaft....hey, how about our true and loyal fans?"

Not suprisingly, this news was met with quite an abundance of profane expletives on message boards throughout the country, and tribute sights started becoming, in essence, Van Halen Sucks sites.

This would explain why, after only 24 hours, the legal decree was pulled back by the band, saying that now it was okay to use the logos, "provided you agree with the licensing agreement". Hmmmmmm, could this be that your right to use the logo could be pulled if you exercise your right to free speech and post negative comments? Obviously, the band visits these sites. The following is what was sent to Yahoo groups VH tribute sites:

From the lawyers....

"A decision has been made to also permit fan web sites to license the use of the trademarked Van Halen logo on their web sites. This will be covered in the same licensing agreement as the Frankenstein design that will be made available at www.van-halen.com in approximately one week."

In VH we trust,

Brad
The Official Van Halen Web Site
http://www.van-halen.com

How big of them. NOT!!!!!

I think everyone would agree, certainly Nolan and Mike, that if we had multitudes of fans who wanted to make tribute sites to us, we'd be dancing on our heads in glee. Or as Dr. Klahn might say "They would have our gratitude, with thankfulness of extraordinary magnitude".

ON A MORE SOMBER NOTE.... COURT NOT VERY "SUPREME"
What is it going to take in this country before the supposed higher learned individuals sitting in the Supreme Court start holding to law instead of re-writing it. In what has to be the most obscenely stupid act (and there have been quite a few), the SC says it is unconstitutional to not allow cyber-porn, or more to the point, cyber-child porn, to be shown in libraries across America. Boy, I can't tell you how thrilled I am at this action.

For those of you unaware of cyber (or virtual) child porn, let me fill you in. Basically, it is computer-generated women and men engaging in explicit (though "virtual") acts of sex with young virtual children, sometimes infants. Graphic as they can be, they leave NOTHING to the imagination, and are much more realistic than a cartoon. The Supreme Court said, and I'm quoting, "digital images of "virtual" children engaged in sexual activity must be afforded a higher level of constitutional protection". HUH????

Wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy for the majority (who must be mentally ill or satanic)..."The Court's First Amendment cases draw vital distinctions between words and deeds, between ideas and conduct,"

Well, scumbag, let me tell you about ideas and conduct. Conduct are the result of ideas. This is the fundamental property of all action ever undertaken by living man. For someone on the Supreme Court, let along 6 of them, to use something as baseless and unthinking as 'that' to subject more innocent children to cyber-child porn maniacs is beyond disturbing.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not talking out cyber-porn as it pertains to adults. I fully understand that some people have strong desires or perceived needs for this, and being a "free will" believer, have personal qualms only. Although I do have a problem with it being allowed and "protected by the constitution" for viewing in libraries.

You realize, of course, that the first lawsuit is just waiting to happen when someone drooling over this crap in a library is made to get off the site. Hey, they'd be infringing on his constitutional right! It isn't like children ever go to a library to study?!?! Surely Jeffrey Dahmer never had the "idea" about hurting someone's child before he did! Right???

Even so, my primary concern is the kids whose lives are going to be ruined. And I have to tell you, that my heart is just breaking in two over this.

There are only two reasons for people to watch this virtual child porn, and that is to either "get off" while watching it, or prepare to "get off" with someone's child. Maybe yours.

Isn't it wonderful to know that the United States of America is more concerned with protecting sick and demented pedophiles than it is the children of this Nation? Should we be suprised that the road to ruin we've been on the last thousand years should change now? Do we have any reason to suspect things will get better for the children of this nation?

I don't feel very proud to be an American right now!

Till next time, take care and God bless,
Matthew

   I heard this verdict as well, but didn't draw quite the same conclusions. The part about libraries wasn't emphasized in the broadcast I saw, and Matthew, I admit I'm not crazy about the idea.
   Traditionally, the vital "distinction between ideas and conduct" is more about the institutionalizing of thought police than anything else. Admittedly, as many child molesters that are caught every year, many more are not. BUT, what I believe they're saying is there are many who THINK about it but never ACT on it. As depraved as either may seem, that is an important distinction (as the Catholic Church is rediscovering).
   One newscast pointed out that if "Romeo and Juliet" were executed accurately as a 3D animation (and as Shakespeare--not Disney--wrote it), a case could be made that it was child cyber-porn (Romeo and Juliet were teenagers).
   However, the part about it being freely viewed in libraries reminds us of how available access to the internet is...for anyone...and bears watching carefully.---Nolan


"Matt's Rail" is ©2002 by Matthew Drinnenberg. Webpage design and all graphics herein are creations of Nolan B. Canova. All contents of Nolan's Pop Culture Review is ©2002 by Nolan B. Canova.