New Fox News Anchor

In last night’s Jazz History class, I showed videos of extraordinary musicians that lifted everyone’s hearts and minds into the stratosphere. These included an Indian tabla player, British guitarist, Bengali Indian bass player, a German gypsy (Sinti) guitarist, a Spanish jazz pianist accompanying a flamenco dancer and black American tap dancer, a Brazilian percussionist, a Cuban trumpet player, a Swedish bagpipe player, Moroccan musicians and dancers. We continued to enjoy a fabulous trio of three American black women, a 12-year old Indonesian pianist, a disabled French pianist, a Russian pianist. Then came a duet between an American gay white man and an Israeli woman clarinetist. Are you getting the picture? 

 

Not only was this the healing antidote to Marjorie Taylor Greene comparing mask-wearing to the Holocaust, but it also was the obvious solution to the devastating effect of Fox News on the American psyche. So I have a proposal. 

 

After every news segment, I demand equal time by showing videos of extraordinary jazz musicians who represent the groups that the other anchors have just tried to make you afraid of. The groups they trick you into thinking that they’re to blame and if only you’ll keep voting for the guys who want to keep the world a uniform good-ole-boys club of white males in charge while the others serve them, clean for them, make money for them, offer them sex, etc., everything will just be fine. All the time driving their Japanese cars with the oil from Saudi Arabia while listening to music from the African diaspora, drinking their Russian vodka, French wine or German beer, Brazilian coffee or Thai iced tea, eating Italian pizza, Turkish kebabs, Chinese noodles, Native American corn, working on computers made in China, fixed by phone services in India and enjoying all the benefits of a democracy that came from Greece and the Iroquois Confederacy while trying to convince you that the problems we face are because your neighbor is an immigrant. (Ironically, the only groups who can rightfully claim that last phrase are the Native Americans.)

 

If they hire me, then they can rightfully claim their old slogan “ A Fair and Balanced Look at the News.” If not, the same lies keep rolling on fed by the same ignorance of people like the above list of jazz musicians. While I’m waiting for the call, how about you Fox News viewers taking a break and joining my next Jazz History class? You have nothing to lose but your illusions and you just might win back your Soul.