*The Music: Simon and Garfunkel; Bookends. [1](1968) No particular reason…. It happened to come up in rotation, in Winamp.
I’ve always considered this one to be their best album. Certainly “Bridge over troubled water” was probably the runner up. 66’s “Parsley Sage Rosemary and Thyme” had more songs you’ll remember, I suppose, and might even sing along with. But this one is a full album, and can’t easily be broken up into singles without losing the intended effect. Also, like the Moodies, the sound tends to be somewhat bombastic at times and over the top. Yet, this album pulls it off, without beinga complete turn-off for the listener. In a lot of ways, it was as good a concept album as anything the Moody Blues ever turned out.
Roy Halee, far as I can hear, was about half this album. There are artist / producer, combinations that simply work…. work so well in fact that without THAT producer, the artist loses a signiture sound. The aforementioned Moodies and Tony Clarke, are one such in my view. The Beatles and George Martin, is another. The Association, The Turtles, and the Mama’s and the Papas, and Bones Howe.
Perhaps what tied it all together into a concept was the attitude displayed. one thing that brings that attitude across, is the production values involved. The music and the lyrics, powerful as they are in terms of imparting the overall sense of loss that this album brings on, would not be possible without the producers touch. Intangible perhaps, but insurmountable.
I have the original version of the album here, on vinyl, as well as on CD. I gather that there was a reissue about six years ago that was simply outstanding. Apparently the remastering is superb, by all accounts.
* Cosh has managed to re-appear. Good; I was starting to wonder, but didn’t want to comment for fear of starting something viral on the subject.
* It’s a spring day up here. About 55 outside, and nice sunshine. A good day to get the truck cleaned out. Of course we have the new car to worry about, too.
*Yesterday was nice, too. We did a road trip, as I said, and gave the car it’s first real road-trip shakedown. It really is a nice little car, getting about 35 to the gallon on the road, and a little closer to twenty around town. Quite acceptable. And boy, will that thing SCOOT. It’s serious over -torques the front tires on a full throttle start, so you have to play some serious traction games to get the thing going. Once you get it out of the hole, the 30 to 70 times are probably among the best I’ve ever seen in the class. You can get yourself into some serious trouble with this thing in a real hurry if you don’t watch yourself.
* Two destinations on the road trip the nearby Iroquois wildlife reservation, and Frontier Rail Yard, just outside Buffalo.
[2]Iroquois was something of a disappointment; it rained like you would not believe, and likely scared all the birds away that we gonna see. We did manage to see one heron flying right alongside the car. I clocked him at about 45. Here’s a shot of the swamp, as we waited for further developments that never came. You can drill these pics if you like for the full res shot.
After a while, we gave up there, and headed west out 33 to Frontier yard. Frontier, as you may or may not know, is the main rail operation for CSX in the western end of new York state. They run about 200 trains a day through this operation not counting local runs. I’ll pass along a few of the more interesting shops that we managed to take. 
[3]This one, for example, of a Wisconsin Central unit. It’s WC3027. This one is kind of rare, because WC hasn’t been in business as such for a few years now, having been bought up by Canadian National Railways, who was looking for inroads to the Chicago area at the time. You’ll notice the CN unit it’s MU’d to, if you look closely. Sorry for how grainy this one is, it was at the extreme range of my cameras ability, and I had to turn the electronic zoom on, as well as the mechanical. Those white squares that you see on the side, are actually flag stickers. Flags from all over the world, in fact.
[4]This particular afternoon would bring us a couple of additional treats. Aside from all the strictly freight stuff, we saw some power moves, such as Amtrak 810, caught in the unlikely position of being in a heavy freight train. 810 is something of a hard luck unit, having been reportedly in several accidents, and having some serious computer problems… the latter of which is not unusual for a first generation unit of a given design. 810 was one of the first P40 Genesis units produced by GE for Amtrak. The unit was dead in tow.
[5]
Another short wait, and we saw yet another passenger engine dead in tow, only this one was freshly shopped and looking quite good indeed… It was Metro North’s 4903, an F40PH. This thing shone like a new car, though the lighting doesn’t show it very well.
This spot is popular with local railfans because CSX now, and Conrail and the NYC before them, all use(d) this spot for crew changes. Not only does this mean shutterbugs get closeup shots that they actually have time to set up, but they alsoget to see a little drama as the trains start from a dead stop. Basic physics apply here… a mile long or longer train, being pulled by a few steel wheels on steel rails. It’s a wonder they move at all, given the limited traction.
[6]The drama in this case was made all the more potent by the dead weight in the third position. It took all 7000 horsepower and some skill to get this thing moving, as you see in this going-away shot. The smoke behind the second unit is a little unusual, these days.
* I see Jonah Goldberg [7], properly taking issue with Peter Beinart , In a time of it where the latter argues that the democrats in Congress ought to “go for it” meaning, that they should pull out all the stops in trying to end the Iraq war now, regardless of consequences. Beinart Says there were no consequences to speak up for the democrats in their opposition to the Vietnam War. And that given the passage of time and other factors they are less likely to pay for ending the war in Iraq prematurely. Goldberg, however, has a handle on the situation;
….even if you agree to his argument that Vietnam didn’t hurt the Democrats in the 1970s (I think there’s a debate to be had and — hey! — we just may have it) (it) certainly hurt the Democrats in the 1980s. Reagan’s popularity stemmed in large part from his ability to defeat the Vietnam syndrome. Clinton would never have been elected in 1992 with his Vietnam record if the Cold War hadn’t been over, and even then it was a tough haul. The war on terror won’t be over any time soon, so they can’t rely on a political peace dividend the way Clinton did in 1992. And the Democrats seem to be working overtime to make their foreign policy stance as indecipherable as possible. Peter sees nuance. It’s not clear to me average Americans will.
So into the mix comes Beldar [8], who says:
I’m not sure what I think about the ultimate issue they’re debating, but on the specific issue of whether the Vietnam experience was, overall, something that hurt the Democrats, I find myself in disgusted agreement with Mr. Beinart — and in fact, I’d go farther than he does, and argue that the Democratic Party never paid a serious political price over Vietnam at any time.
While I agree, that the Democrats have never paid nearly enough of a price for what they did to us and to the Vietnamese in the seventies, (they should have been jailed, at least) the price they paid was not inconsequential. The aftermath of Vietnam, and the situation in Iran, and the Democrat attitude about each, cost them Jimmy Carter’s second term. (Thank God for small favors) Indeed, Goldberg’s point about Clinton is well taken… there’s another disaster we’d not have suffered as a nation, had the lesson of ‘nam been taught. The Democrats would not have been taken seriously by the electorate for several generations.
For all that my disagreement with Beldar on this point is very real, he does say something very important here, that I want a pass on tonight.
Right now, though, I don’t care much about whether either party pays a political price. Instead, I’m worried about the consequences for our nation, and the world, if in the current debate about Iraq, Americans fail to consider properly what happened as a result of the American abandonment of South Vietnam in 1973-1975. I’m worried about the price we’ll all end up paying if we cannot overcome our national amnesia on that subject.
The one problem that I have with this statement is that had the Democrats actually paid the proper price, for what they did to us and the Vietnamese back in the seventies, there wouldn’t be all these questions about Iraq, now. We would have fought to victory without all the argument, had the lesson of Vietnam truly been learned.