The gloriously inappropriate and problematic “Blues Brothers” (1980) could never get made in today’s culture of woke fascism.

Under the belief it was the movie that would most offend today’s Woketards, last week I wrote about the gloriously inappropriate and problematic Animal House (1978). Finding myself in a Belushi mood, a few days later, I watched his next hit, 1980’s The Blues Brothers, and quickly realized today’s Hitler Youth would hate this one even more — a whole lot more.

You have no idea how blessed I was to come of age in the 70s and 80s, two of the freest decades, not only in our country’s history but in world history. By 1970, Hollywood’s self-censoring Production Code had been dismantled, the great Norman Lear had pushed the boundaries of television with his masterpiece All in the Family, and suddenly nothing and no one was off-limits. There were no more sacred cows. No limits on satire. No protected groups.

And do you want to know the best part? Almost all the satire was good-natured. When a Carlin, Pryor, Lear, and Saturday Night Live took a shot at you, you couldn’t help but laugh at yourself — which is the healthiest of medicines for the human spirit.

We were truly free then. So free… And like young people do, I took it all for granted — just assumed it would always be that way.

Well, look at us now… We live in a literal Woke Police State run by Big Corporations. Ironically, this was something Hollywood frequently warned us about — and now Hollywood is one of our most fascist enforcers. McCarthyism and blacklists have returned with a vengeance.

Well, as the (soon-to-be-blacklisted) Python boys famously suggested, you should “always look at the bright side of life.”

So, yes, there are some benefits to Woke McCarthyism… First off, it’s kind of fun to feel like an outlaw just for daring to enjoy a movie. Secondly, we certainly live in interesting times. Finally, now that movies like Animal House and The Blues Brothers have become the forbidden, like all things forbidden, you cherish and enjoy them all the more.

The Blues Brothers was always a terrific movie, a legitimately great musical-comedy. It’s aged into something even more beautiful, though, and not just because of Woketardism.

You see, in the 41 years since its release, we’ve lost all the legends the movie paid such affectionate tribute to: Aretha Franklin, Cab Calloway, Ray Charles, James Brown, and John Lee Hooker. They’re all gone now, and what a treat it is to watch them up on the screen strutting their magic. Each of their numbers, most especially Aretha’s “Think” and Calloway’s “Minnie the Moocher,” is a total show-stopper. You can’t help but sit with a big grin on your face mixed with an ache in your heart.

Yes, Giants once walked the earth … including John Belushi.

Best of all, you can sense the reverence John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd (who co-wrote the script with director John Landis) have for these giants. Not only are they eager to introduce their idols to a new audience, but during their respective musical numbers, Aykroyd and Belushi stay almost entirely out of the way. They generously (and appropriately) allow their musical heroes to shine alone in the spotlight.

Both the movie and musical history are better for it.

Before we get to listing all the woke sins, a quick rundown of the plot…

The Blues Brothers are Jake Blues (Belushi) and Elwood Blues (Aykroyd), two brothers who believe in only one thing: honoring, playing, and keeping the blues alive. Offstage and on, they wear the blues uniform of a black suit, black tie, black fedora, white shirt, and sunglasses.

Elwood: There’s 106 miles to Chicago, we’ve got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it’s dark out, and we’re wearing sunglasses.

Jake: Hit it.

After Jake’s release from prison, Elwood picks him up in the Bluesmobile (an old police car) and they pay a visit to “the penguin,” a Roman Catholic nun (Kathleen Freeman) who runs the orphanage the brothers were raised in. She needs $5,000 to pay the taxes or the city of Chicago (where the movie is set) will close her down.

Now that they’re on a mission from God, Jake and Elwood decide to get the band back together and put on a show to raise the money. Along the way, they’re hunted by the police, Nazis, rednecks, a crazed ex-girlfriend (Carrie Fisher), and their parole officer (John Candy).

Jake: We’re putting the band back together.
Mr. Fabulous: Forget it. No way.
Elwood: We’re on a mission from God.

Let me explain the rest of the plot this way… For nearly 20 years, The Blues Brothers held the record for the most cars crashed in a single movie (the record was broken by the uninspired 1998 sequel, Blues Brothers 2000).

Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration, don’t fail me now!

This plot might sound simple, but the heresies committed herein against the Religion of Woke are almost too many to count…

I’ll do my best.

1. A movie based entirely on cultural appropriation…

Jake and Elwood Blues are walking, talking, living, breathing sins of cultural appropriation — white guys who sing the blues. Woke heads would explode 20 minutes into this thing. But allow me to say this…

Cultural appropriation is, by any objective and moral measure, a good thing — a very good thing. The whole idea of America is culture appropriation or “out of many one” — which is our national motto (e pluribus unum). We should all be grabbing hold of the best from everyone else’s culture. On top of laughing at ourselves, cultural appropriation bridges differences and bring us together…

To keep us divided, however, the Hitler Youth of Woke have turned a moral and unifying thing into a sin.

2. Faith in God and America…

There’s no irony or anything tongue-in-cheek about Jake and Elwood’s mission. While Aykroyd’s dry recitation of “We’re on a mission from God” is hilarious, the brothers truly believe this and, most importantly, so does the movie. Belushi is literally hit with the Holy Spirit in a Christian church (how could he not with James Brown preaching?).

Yes. Yes. Jesus H. tap-dancing Christ… I have seen the light!

And it is also during this moment where Elwood — and again without irony — expresses his love for America.

Reverend Cleophus James [Brown]: Praise God!

Elwood: And God bless the United States of America.

3. Government is the villain…

Our heroes are out to save a Christian institution from being closed down by the government over property taxes.

4. The glory of “insensitivity” reigns supreme…

There are fat jokes, sex slave jokes, and at one point, Jake impersonates an Arab trader. Ray Charles repeatedly fires a gun at a kid, Carrie Fisher looks sexy as hell posing with an assault rifle, women run around in bikinis, and people look cool smoking cigarettes.

5. So much glorious “sexism”…

Carrie Fisher plays a crazed stalker, Aretha Franklin is a nagging wife, Twiggy is left outside a cheap motel waiting for Elwood…

That’s it. That’s all the women are allowed to do.

6. Nazis played for laughs…

The Nazis, or to be more precise, the “Illinois Nazis” (led by the great Henry Gibson), are played entirely for laughs. This, of course, is the smartest and most effective way to marginalize Nazis — you turn them into a joke. But if this were done today, the cries of That’s not funny! would never cease.

Oh, and there’s even a gay Nazi.

I’ve always loved you.

And now we come to the movie’s most unforgivable act of Woke Heresy….

7. Race is never mentioned… Not even once.

Although this is a movie populated with black and white characters and premised on the blues, never once is race raised as an issue. The Nazis aren’t even motivated by race. They’re just angry at the Blues Brothers for driving them off a bridge. The “rednecks” aren’t motivated by race. They’re angry over having their gig stolen. A centerpiece scene takes place in a honkytonk. Race is never mentioned.

Elwood: What kind of music do you usually have here?

Claire: Oh, we got both kinds. We got country and western.

Throughout, we see blacks and whites sing, dance, argue, joke, travel, and perform together, all in a spirit of brotherhood.

This is deliberate, one of the overriding themes of the movie, one Elwood dares to speak out loud when he tells a massive crowd of people from all walks of life:

We do sincerely hope that you all enjoy the show and please remember people, that no matter who you are and what you do to live, thrive, and survive, there are still some things that make us all the same: You, me, them! Everybody! Everybody!

Like Animal House, and despite its R-rating (only for the occasional F-word), The Blues Brothers is ultimately a very moral movie. This is a story about redemption, brotherhood, recognizing our shared humanity, ignoring skin color, thumbing your nose at authority, accepting responsibility, the futility of grudges, and pursuing a cause greater than self.

And because of all that, because of all that goodness and good humor and colorblindness and ennobling of the human spirit, The Blues Brothers could never get made today — at least not without everyone involved getting blacklisted by today’s Woke Nazis.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.

Source: Nolte: The Gloriously Inappropriate and Problematic ‘Blues Brothers’

Exclusive: Patrice Lewis sees parallel in alleged purging of Chinese explorers’ 15th century exploits

Last summer I read an engrossing book entitled “1421: The Year China Discovered America” by Gavin Menzies, a retired British submarine lieutenant commander turned amateur archeologist. The book documented his efforts to demonstrate how a Chinese fleet of hundreds (perhaps thousands) of ships set sail in 1421 and circumnavigated the world, touching base everywhere from the Americas (North and South), Australia, Africa, Greenland, Europe, and all points between. The purpose of the expeditions, according to Menzies, was to chart the waters of the globe, impress and intimidate foreign rulers, and bring the entire world into China’s “tribute system.”

The book was riveting. While COVID lockdowns and subsequent unemployment soared around America, I was lost in the voyages of these Chinese explorers. While cities burned around the nation, causing billions of dollars in damages and killing dozens of people, I was absorbed by the evidence of the expeditions found in California and the Caribbean. While BLM and Antifa toppled statues, defaced monuments and demanded history be rewritten, I was captivated by the evidence presented of the Chinese discovery of Australia and even Antarctica. While Portland, Seattle and other blue cities were torn apart by constant violence and anarchy, I was immersed in the phenomenal accomplishments of those Imperial Chinese fleets.

Some sources dismiss Menzies as a “pseudo-historian” because he doesn’t have academic credentials after his name (for the record, I’m not nearly as impressed by academic credentials as I used to be), but I found the book compelling and fascinating nonetheless. Whether or not Menzies’ conclusions are accurate is not the focus of this column. Instead, ponder this question: If the premise of the book is true – if evidence points to China being world explorers long before Europeans – why doesn’t history reflect this? Why aren’t the accomplishments of Imperial China known throughout the world?

The proposed answer, according to Menzies, is because during the years the voyagers were at sea and out of touch with their mother country, Imperial China’s tumultuous and controversial régime changed, and its leaders (who commissioned the fleet) were deposed. The new incoming régime was rigidly insular. All foreign goods, services and trade were forcibly suppressed and – here’s the critical part – expunged from the records. As with many cultural revolutions, the leaders wanted their reign to be “Year Zero” for history. The accomplishments of the previous rulers were not just unwelcome, they were downright dangerous to acknowledge.

Therefore, when the greatly diminished Chinese fleets finally limped home, these mariners found themselves irrelevant and their discoveries and adventures dismissed. “Not only was the priceless legacy of the greatest maritime expeditions of all time gone forever, foreign lands were to be banished from the minds of the Chinese people,” wrote Menzies. “The legacy of [the expedition leaders] and their great treasure fleets would be all but obliterated. What oceans they had sailed, what lands they had seen, what discoveries they had made, what settlement they had created were no longer of interest to the Chinese hierarchy. … The logs and records were destroyed, and the memory of them expunged so completely over the succeeding decades that they might never have existed.” [Emphasis added.]

When I read that last line, I was stunned. Absolutely floored. Why would any nation erase such a glorious legacy of world exploration? Why would they take second place behind European explorers in terms of historical accuracy and bragging rights?

As American anarchists (encouraged by Democratic leaders) burned and rioted and toppled statues and rewrote history during the last year, I pondered that question. Then it hit me. Oh wait …

America is doing the same thing.

America, too, has experienced a régime change in which the Five Evils (Big Tech, Hollywood, public education, mainstream media, politicians) are engaging in a long-term scrubbing of history, both past and modern. In a remarkably short period of time, our history – the good, the bad and the ugly – is being expunged from the records, leaving behind a sterilized and factually false account. Our founding documents are being dismissed as racist, and the intellectual giants who shaped the groundwork for a nation of freedom are being rebranded as white supremacists whose legacy is not just unimportant, but downright dangerous to acknowledge. America’s origins are being rewritten to fit the narrative of the extreme left agenda.

How long before the logs and records of our history are destroyed, and the memory of them expunged so completely over the succeeding decades that they might never have existed? Even now there are whole generations of children who have grown up completely ignorant of major world events, everything from the Holocaust to the democide (death by government) of hundreds of millions of people over the last 120 years due to socialism and communism. They are equally ignorant of American history except what reflects the extreme leftist narrative.

“As with most cultural revolutions that wish to start things over at ‘Year Zero,'” wrote historian and columnist Victor Davis Hanson last August, “the violence is aimed at America’s past in order to change its present and future. The targets are not just the old majority culture but also classical statues and buildings, hallowed institutions, religious icons, the renowned names of streets and plazas, and almost every representation of tradition and authority. … The point of the mob is to wipe out what it cannot create. It topples what it can neither match nor even comprehend. It would erode the very system that ensures it singular freedom, leisure, and historic affluence. The brand of the anarchist is not logic but envy-driven power: to take it, to keep it, and to use it against purported enemies – which would otherwise be impossible in times of calm or through the ballot box.” [Emphasis added.]

Even now, the left is trying to scrub President Trump from history. We’re watching it happen in real time.

We are witnessing a purge unprecedented in America, but widely repeated through world history during tyrannical régimes. Dissenting voices are silenced, religious expression is suppressed, statues are toppled, history is rewritten, and – most importantly – the education of children is strictly regulated. As Hitler so accurately observed, “When an opponent declares, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘Your child belongs to us already. … What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.”

And it’s all happening in less time than you think.

By Patrice Lewis
Published February 12, 2021 at 7:45pm on WND – World Net Daily

Source: They’re obliterating our history more quickly than you think

By Brian Sussman
Published February 10, 2021 at 7:12pm at WND – World Net Daily

Brian Sussman is the author of “Climategate: A Veteran Meteorologist Exposes the Global Warming Scam” and “Eco-Tyranny: How the Left’s Green Agenda Will Dismantle America,” both published by WND Books. You can learn more about Brian at briansussman.com.