Thomas Wictor

Here’s my second interview since 2002. It’s with bassist Joe Burcaw.

We have a lot in common, and we would likely disagree on nearly everything if we got into it politically and socially. But why would I do that to Joe? I like his playing. That’s all that matters.

There was one question that I had to ask, because I’ve never been given the opportunity. Joe is a member of the band Black 47, outspoken supporters of the Irish Republican Army. My brother Paul and I were nearly murdered by the IRA on July 20, 1982. We were so close to the nail bomb in Regent’s Park that we felt the blast wave.

So I asked Joe about it, and he answered.

There.

I don’t think my personal issues intruded. Terrorist attacks are significant events. If a band supports the groups that carry out such attacks, I don’t think it’s out of bounds to ask them how they feel about the victims.

This is why I would never make it in today’s media atmosphere. I refuse to sandbag people. It’s also not important for me to announce my personal opinions when discussing someone else’s. The interview is about Joe, not me.

Confrontational journalism is bogus for so many different reasons, the main one being that it’s not practiced consistently. The same “heroic” reporters who grill one person turn into fawning lapdogs in the presence of another.

I was going to write a post called “Journalists Are Assholes.” The reason I wanted to write it is that I grew up thinking that Kitty Genovese was murdered while thirty-eight people sat around and watched, ignoring her screams for help. That’s what I was told by teachers and lots of other adults.

Well, it turns out that this is a complete fabrication of the New York Times, the Paper of Record. The Old Gray Lady. All the News That’s Fit to Print.

Bullshit.

They did it for two reasons: to sell papers and to convince people that our society is rotten. There’s a certain type of wealthy, successful, materialistic American who spends all his or her time bitching about how horrible we are. It’s not that they believe or disbelieve it themselves. People just yap out whatever all their peers are yapping. We used to have this flock of tiny birds that landed in the same tree every evening and proceeded to create an earsplitting racket for the next hour.

Were they socializing? Fighting? Gossiping? No idea.

But that’s what reflexive America haters are like. Screechy little birds with micro-brains.

I deeply resent the fact that I was LIED TO about Kitty Genovese. The reputations of all the people in that neighborhood were smeared. “Fake but accurate” would no doubt be the rationale. It’s like the cretins who say that 9/11 was an “inside job.” When you say that, you’re accusing every single investigator of the New York Police Department, the New York Fire Department, and the Port Authority of covering up the murders of their friends and colleagues.

It’s such a deeply stupid thing to think. How the fuck did the Republican Bush administration convince all those Democrats in New York City law enforcement to go along with the mass murder of their brother and sister officers? Saying 9/11 was an inside job is an insult to every single person who was killed and every single person who lost somebody.

The only thing stupider than thinking 9/11 was perpetrated by a Republican administration and happily covered up by Democrats is the notion that the footage of the crashes is fake. Here’s an idiot who claims that his video proves the “holographic” nature of the airliners.

The video shows no evidence of holographs. Instead, it says that the footage is CGI, computer-generated imagery. But the reality is that the airliner wing goes behind the building because the edifice is in front of the airliner. It’s a projection on top of a building in the foreground, not a giant skyscraper in the background.

As for his other imbecilic statement, here’s the damage that a B-25 bomber did when it crashed into the Empire State Building on July 28, 1945.

A Boeing 767 weighs 179,168 kg and has a top speed of 237 meters per second. A North American B-25 Mitchell bomber weighed 9207 kg and had a top speed of 122 meters per second. Kinetic energy is measured in joules and is calculated by multiplying mass by the square of the speed and then multiplying by 1/2. Therefore the 767 hitting the World Trade Center had a kinetic energy of 5,031,843,696 joules. The B-25 hitting the Empire State Building had a kinetic energy of 68,518,494 joules. The 767 had seventy-three times—7300 percent—more force than the B-25.

No building has ever been hit that hard before or since, especially by an aircraft with the massively strong wing spars of the 767. The wings are designed to take a maximum load of 620 kg per square meter. Since each wing has an area of 283 square meters, that means they can take a load of 175,460 kg, or 193 tons. At over 500 miles per hour, those wings could easily cut their way through a building, which is what you saw happening with your own eyes.

It’s clear to me that people hold opinions without spending even a second thinking about them. It reminds me of an interview I saw with an Afghan man years ago. Afghans are famous for their xenophobia. That’s what motivates most of them to fight. In this interview a young man was asked if he was grateful for all the help from western countries that were building schools and hospitals and providing medical care for the first time in these peoples’ lives.

“Oh, it’s wonderful,” he said with a smile. “And all foreigners should immediately leave our country.”

That’s how I view these wealthy, safe, coddled America haters in the mainstream media. They look around and see that their moronic, Third World view of the US isn’t accurate, but they repeat it anyway. And then they try to shape the news to reflect a nation that exists only in their minds. But not even there either.

The New York Times knew full well that their version of the Kitty Genovese murder wasn’t true, but they ran with it because…

Actually there’s no rational reason for running with it. If a culture isn’t full of uncaring slobs, what’s the purpose of presenting it that way? If people are already caring for their fellow citizens, why lie about it?

When I prove to people that the crime rate is dropping dramatically, they get angry at me. How insane is that? You people claim to care about crime victims, so I tell you that our society is actually doing what you say you want—reducing crime—and that makes you pissed off.

Screw it. You’re hopeless. And deeply mentally ill.

I interviewed Joe Burcaw to talk about his music. That’s it, except for the one question about the IRA.

Thanks, Joe. For no particular reason, here’s my mommy in 1969.

Mom was a musical prodigy, a jazzer, and deeply interested in the hippie movement. She didn’t drink.

Now, Joe, you don’t think she would’ve…?

Would she? Looking pretty baked, Mom. Just saying.