The Pop Corporation

You don’t even have to start stories about the USA with “imagine a scenario, where…” because frankly, they’re already there. The country is broken, and a good chunk of Americans already know it. They’ve gone beyond farce.

Look at the recent spat between Bruce Springsteen and Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters. Springsteen hit out at the current culture in the United States and, obviously, with America’s alt right being the most thin-skinned people on the planet currently, they took the bait.

At his shows in Manchester, Bruce hit out at the current iteration of American Republicans, saying: “In my home, the America I love, the America I’ve written about, that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, and treasonous administration. Tonight, we ask all who believe in democracy and the best of our American experiment to rise with us, raise your voices against authoritarianism and let freedom ring!”

Fair enough, even though there’s a bit of you that should wonder if there’s some US exceptionalism at play, moaning about the American government to a bunch of English people. At least The Boss is criticising Trump with his whole chest, rather than vaguely offering coded asides and worrying about cross-community sales.

However, Trump has responded in kind, throwing his toys out of the pram, and is dutiful followers followed suit with depressing regularity.

To the point where a cover band called ‘No Surrender’ (did anyone else raise their eyebrows just now?) who play Springsteen covers have said it’s “too risky” to play shows, one in particular in New Jersey.

The cover band were to play at a venue in Toms River, New Jersey, but were advised that the show wouldn’t be taking place because the owner thought it’d be too dangerous. Speaking to a local NJ rag, singer Brad Hobicorn said that venue owner Tony Rivoli messaged him to tell him the show was off, as his punters are of a conservative bent, and would disapprove of Springsteen’s Trump rant.

Rivoli reportedly said the gig would have been great, “but now because Bruce can’t keep his mouth shut we’re screwed.” He added, speaking to another band memeber, that “whenever the national anthem plays, my bar stands and is in total silence, that’s our clientele. Toms River is red and won’t stand for his bullshit.”

Obviously, these greasy bozos haven’t been listening to the lyrics of Springsteen very keenly, if any of this left-leaning stuff is news to them. We know that ‘Born In The USA’ is one of the most roundly misunderstood songs ever recorded, but still.

Hobicorn added: “This is not political for us at all – we’re just a cover band that’s trying to make some money and people rely on it financially. We’re the ones really getting hurt.”

Look at this whole mess of a pie – a band feeling hurt, performing songs they didn’t write, hurt by comments that are absolutely in-line with everything Springsteen as been for decades, avoiding a show for an imagined reaction from a slight not-yet-received by some thin-skinned numbskulls who have the listening comprehension of a toddler, led by a man who can’t take any criticism without complaining about it on social media.

Farcical. The land of the free, indeed.

Trump himself said: “I see that Highly Overrated Bruce Springsteen goes to a Foreign Country to speak badly about the President of the United States. Never liked him, never liked his music, or his Radical Left Politics and, importantly, he’s not a talented guy — Just a pushy, obnoxious JERK.”

“This dried out ‘prune’ of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied!) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back into the Country, that’s just ‘standard fare.’ Then we’ll all see how it goes for him!”

Look at the absolute state of it. America is looking pretty cooked right now, and while Springsteen’s claim that the United States of America has been “a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years” is a stretch, you imagine that this idiocy will pass at some point. For now, we all have to suffer the overly amplified noise as American deals with its own reckoning.