Mountain Views News, Combined Edition Saturday, April 22, 2023

15

OPINION

Mountain Views-News Saturday, April 22, 2023 

RICH JOHNSON 

NOW THAT’S RICH

STUART TOLCHIN

TOM PURCELL

MOUNTAIN 
VIEWS

NEWS

PUBLISHER/ EDITOR

Susan Henderson

PASADENA CITY 
EDITOR

Dean Lee 

PRODUCTION

SALES

Patricia Colonello

626-355-2737 

626-818-2698

WEBMASTER

John Aveny 

DISTRIBUTION

Peter Lamendola

CONTRIBUTORS

Stuart Tolchin 

Audrey Swanson

Meghan Malooley

Mary Lou Caldwell

Kevin McGuire

Chris Leclerc

Dinah Chong Watkins

Howard Hays

Paul Carpenter

Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

Peter Dills 

Rich Johnson

Lori Ann Harris

Rev. James Snyder

Katie Hopkins

Deanne Davis

Despina Arouzman

Jeff Brown

Marc Garlett

Keely Toten

Dan Golden

Rebecca Wright

Hail Hamilton

Joan Schmidt

LaQuetta Shamblee

PUT THE LIGHTS ON


WHAT WE NEED THIS 
EARTH DAY IS MORE 


FREE SPEECH

THE LAST BRITISH 
INVASION 1964

Undoubtedly you have heard 
it said “Music soothes the 
savage beast”. While often 
quoted, the quote is actually a 
misquote from a play written 
just few years before…in 1697. 
The play “The Mourning Bride” and the quote reads, 
“Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast. To 
soften rocks, or bend the knotted oak.”

If you know me personally, you know music has 
played, and continues to play a gigantic role in my 
life. On Saturday night you may run into me and my 
band, JJ Jukebox, performing songs from the 1950’s, 
60’s, 70’s and 80’s at Nano Café here in Sierra Madre.

Sunday morning you may also find me playing 12 
string guitar or bass during the church service at 
Bethany Church also here in Sierra Madre.

Music soothes this savage beast! And I can tell you 
the exact moment I caught the music bug: Sunday 
evening, February 9, 1964. The Ed Sullivan Show. 
Me and 73 million other viewers witnessed the first 
attack of the British Invasion. There were 50,000 
requests for seats at the Ed Sullivan Theater (it has 
728 chairs). That night the Beatles, described as four 
mop-tops from Liverpool, performed 5 songs, the 
last one being their first big hit, “I Want to Hold Your 
Hand”.

“I Want to Hold Your Hand” was number one here 
in America for 7 weeks, “She Loves You” was number 
one next for two weeks and then the musical miracle 
took place.

On April 4th, 1964, the Beatles held the top 5 spots 
on Billboards top 10:

1. “Can’t Buy Me Love”

2. “Twist and Shout”

3. “She Loves You”

4. “I Want to Hold Your Hand”

5. “Please, Please Me”

The Beatles also broke records having 14 songs in the 
Billboard top 100 songs. So who knocked The Beatles 
out of the number one song? “Satchmo”. Louis Armstrong 
with his classic song “Hello Dolly”.

Two years earlier, on New Years Day 1962, the Beatles 
drove to London to audition for the most prestigious 
record company in the UK, Decca Records. Dick 
Rowe was Decca’s Talent Spotter who turned down 
the Beatles telling their manager, “Guitar groups are 
on their way out, Mr. Epstein”.

A year later Dick Rowe signed a group. Whether it 
be urban myth or true, the story is George Harrison 
became a friend of Dick Rowes and gave Dick the 
tip of going down and signing this new group. Their 
lead singer’s name was Mick Jagger and the band of 
course, was the Rolling Stones. All’s well that ends 
well.

My band, JJ Jukebox will be back at Nano Café Saturday, 
May 6. Tonight is M&M and next Saturday night 
Mercy and the Merketts are performing at Nano 
Café. Make reservations by calling (626) 325-3334. 
Nano’s is at 322 W. Sierra Madre Blvd, Sierra Madre

-Rich

 In 1964 I was a College 
Student at the University 
of California 
Berkeley, a big-time 
University putting me in 
contact with all kinds of 
influences. I was a very 
sheltered person who 
almost had never had a date and never had 
attended a play or musical. Sheltered me became 
caught up in the Free Speech Movement 
(FSM) which was the first mass act of civil 
disobedience on an American College Campus 
in the 1960’s. FSM was an organized student 
protest to abolish restrictions on student’ 
free speech rights throughout the University 
of California system. I became absorbed in 
a quest to receive information and ideas; the 
struggle to have the right to impart this information 
and my own ideas is a continuing part 
of my responsibilities connected to this quest. 
Perhaps this responsibility explains my continuing 
effort to write these unpaid and possibly 
unappreciated articles for the past fifteen 
years.

 Amazingly, the FSM protests were so huge 
and famous that even today, almost sixty years 
later, there are pictures of the demonstrators 
right on the corner of Colorado and El Molina 
in Pasadena, California, about 2 blocks from 
my daughter’s law office. In fact her office, the 
office of a respected progressive attorney, is 
where I am right now. I walked over here after 
parking the car near the corner where the picture 
still stands.

 The point is that these public huge 
demonstrations influenced my life, my 

daughter’s life and the subsequent life of the 
nation. The demonstrations centered on the 
need for student free expression which really 
melded into anti-war protests and Civil Rights 
Protests. The next year,1965, I entered UCLA 
Law School, still intending to avoid the Draft 
but now already certain of my own political 
values. UCLA was hardly a hot-bed of radicalism 
at that time. Most of our class discussions 
concerned the possibility of connecting with 
big firms and how to schedule interviews. 
I never did such a thing. I was dissatisfied 
with the state of the legal profession which 
at that time was prohibited from exercising 
free speech to advertise so as to reach the less 
wealthy. I was an unpaid volunteer with the 
Lawyers Guild assisting clients fighting the 
draft. We represented a great many potential 
draftees and I am sad to admit that almost all 
of our clients were well-off white kids. Who 
else went to lawyers then?

 Classmates of mine then were, Len Jacoby 
and Steve Myers who decided to do something 
about the lack of availability of lawyers 
for the non-wealthy. Len Jacoby pioneered the 
idea (perhaps you have heard of him) of fair-
priced Legal Clinics who could exercise their 
right of free speech by advertising. Every day 
as you drive the streets and freeways you see 
(perhaps too much) the results of their efforts. 
The unrestricted right to Free Speech is the 
underlying issue in the recently settled (not 
litigated) case of Dominion v Fox News which 
yesterday settled with the agreement that Fox 
News pay $785.5 million thereby averting a 
trial which would have made public their willful, 
knowing connection to a fictitious plot 
to steal the 2020 election. Damn! We have 
the right to know and that right to know goes 
right along with the right to the free exercise 
of free speech and I don’t believe it was necessary 
to go to Berkeley or go to Law School to 
understand that. Just like many of us, I am 
very disappointed by the settlement. Part of 
our quest and responsibility is to obtain information 
and we have been prevented from 
hearing the whole story. 

 Of course news media are not governmental 
agencies. Their responsibilities are primarily 
to their stockholders and that responsibility 
is to MAKE MONEY and KEEP MAKING 
MONEY. WHAT’S WRONG WITH THAT? 
Lots!! The huge settlement satisfies both 
sides. Dominion gains an incredible amount 
of money and Fox News gets to go on just as 
it has. So who’s hurt? WE ALL ARE. The entire 
electorate has been confused and undermined. 
Is there anyone or any source that can 
ever be trusted; or is it all about money for 
everyone? 

Earth Day is coming April 22, and 
I can’t think of a better opportunity 
for Americans to get their hands 
dirty.

When Earth Day became an annual event in 1970 its 
purpose was to demonstrate support for protecting 
the environment.

Today, more than 1 billion people in almost 200 
countries will celebrate with events coordinated 
globally by EarthDay.org.

One of the most common activities — one that I am 
thinking of doing myself this year — is to plant a 
garden.

If you can grow and harvest tomatoes and cucumbers 
in your own backyard, after all, you won’t need 
to buy these items in a store — items that have to be 
transported through the burning of fossil fuel.

I’m in favor of anything that can help all of us be 
better stewards of the environment, but I see additional 
psychological benefits from gardening that 
our country desperately needs.

To wit: we need to become more “down to earth,” a 
term that is not used much anymore.

According to Merriam-Webster, “down to earth” 
is defined as “demure, humble and unpretentious.” 
It also means “earthy,” which Merriam defines as 
“plain and simple in style.”

The origin of these terms is not clear, but the act of 
getting our hands dirty in garden topsoil sure does 
have the effect of making you more humble and 
unpretentious.

I grew up in the suburbs with a large yard. We grew 
tomatoes every summer and they were much larger, 
redder and sweeter than anything bought at the 
store.

Our neighbor, Mr. Bennet, had a magnificent garden 
that was 12×30-feet big.

He grew such an abundance of beautiful lettuce, tomatoes 
and zucchinis that he often shared his bounty 
with us and we enjoyed the most delicious salads 
you will ever enjoy.

Managing a garden of that size required quite a 
commitment.

Mr. Bennet toiled every day to nurture his vegetables. 
He had to pluck the weeds to protect his prized 
plants and he built a fence to keep the deer out.

His toil and the sweat — and the lessons he learned 
from nature to help his plants flourish — connected 
him to the realities of the natural world and brought 
him a peace and calm that only gardeners can know.

That is to say, Mr. Bennet was down to earth!

Unfortunately, though, as Americans have moved 
from the countryside to large metros, millions of us 
have lost any sensual connection with topsoil and 
nature — but even a small garden on your apartment 
building rooftop can fix that.

Wherever or however we can, let’s all start gardening 
this year.

Taking care of even a few plants will humble us, and 
the sounds, smells and other realities of nature will 
bring us back to our “common senses.”

The people who founded our country and crafted 
our Constitution were farmers who were closely 
aligned with the realities of nature — what they 
called the Natural Law. It is no accident that our 
Constitution is “plain and simple” in style.

They knew they had to understand 
the basic, unforgiving 
realities of nature if 
they wanted to keep their 
crops and animals from 
dying — and to help them 
all survive and flourish.

Down-to-earth people 
truly in touch with nature 
enjoy the gift of common 
sense or “horse sense”— 
something our country 
is running short of these 
days.

So this Earth Day, let’s begin 
to address this important 
matter — and bring 
calm to our souls — by 
planting a garden!

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Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com