It’s been a long time since I was a Springsteen fan. Back in 1974 (April 29) at my alma mater, the University of Connecticut, there was a spring concert. Three bands were featured: a local band called Fairport Convention, a relatively unknown called Aerosmith and another largely unknown named Bruce Springsteen. It was quite the concert.
Then, as happens so often, Springsteen became wealthy and the wealthier he became the more liberal he became. And the more hypocritical he became and the less I liked him. Today I find him intolerable. He’s become a complete asshat.
Springsteen canceled a concert in North Carolina over a “bathroom law”
The legendary musician announced Friday that his upcoming show in Greensboro, North Carolina, has been canceled in “solidarity” with those protesting the measure.
Springsteen and his E Street Band were slated to perform at the Greensboro Coliseum this Sunday. The roughly 15,000 ticketholders will all be eligible for a refund.
The newly enacted law requires individuals to use bathrooms that correspond to the gender on their birth certificate, and has drawn fierce criticism for excluding legal protections from gay and transgender people.
Matt Vespa at Townhall:
Bruce Springsteen has refused to perform a concert in North Carolina after the state legislature passed a bill that some consider to be anti-LGBT, which mostly relates to who can use a bathroom. No seriously, liberals feel this strongly about who can relieve themselves in a restroom–and apparently this is the new hill to take a stand in the progressive fight. Does it take away existing protection to North Carolina residents? No. Can businesses and private entities offer transgender people bathroom facilities? Yes. So, what’s the controversy? There is none.
Here are 18 myths about the law:
1. Does the new bill limit or prohibit private sector companies from adopting their own nondiscrimination policies or practices?
- Answer: No. Businesses are not limited by this bill. Private individuals, companies and universities can adopt new or keep existing nondiscrimination policies.
2. Does this bill take away existing protections for individuals in North Carolina?
- Answer: No. In fact, for the first time in state history, this law establishes a statewide anti-discrimination policy in North Carolina which is tougher than the federal government’s. This also means that the law in North Carolina is not different when you go city to city.
3. Can businesses and private facilities still offer reasonable accommodations for transgender people, like single occupancy bathrooms for instance?
- Answer: Yes. This bill allows and does nothing to prevent businesses, and public or private facilities from providing single use bathrooms.
4. Can private businesses, if they choose, continue to allow transgender individuals to use the bathroom, locker room or other facilities of the gender they identify with, or provide other accommodations?
- Answer: Yes. That is the prerogative of private businesses under this new law. For instance, if a privately-owned sporting facility wants allow attendees of sporting events to use the restroom of their choice, or install unisex bathrooms, they can. The law neither requires nor prohibits them from doing so.
5. Does this law prohibit towns, cities or counties in North Carolina from setting their own nondiscrimination policies in employment that go beyond state law?
- Answer: No. Town, cities and counties in North Carolina are still allowed to set stricter non-discrimination policies for their own employees if they choose.
6. Does this bill mean transgender people will always have to use the restroom of the sex of their birth, even if they have undergone a sex change?
- Answer: No. This law simply says people must use the bathroom of the sex listed on their birth certificate. Anyone who has undergone a sex change can change their sex on their birth certificate.
7. I’m worried about how this new law affects transgender children or students in North Carolina. Does this bill allow bullying against transgender children in schools?
- Answer: Absolutely not. North Carolina law specifically prohibits bullying and harassing behavior against children on the basis of sexual identity.
8. Does this bill affect people with disabilities?
- Answer: No. Statewide law also bans discrimination based on disability.
9. Why did North Carolina pass this law in the first place?
- Answer: The bill was passed after the Charlotte City Council voted to impose a regulation requiring businesses to allow a man into a women’s restroom, shower, or locker room if they choose. This ordinance would have eliminated the basic expectations of privacy people have when using the rest room by allowing people to use the restroom of their choice. This new local regulation brought up serious privacy concerns by parents, businesses and others across the state, as well as safety concerns that this new local rule could be used by people who would take advantage of this to do harm to others.
In fact, the Charlotte City Council tried to pass this ordinance before but failed, and passed the same ordinance in February of 2016 despite serious concerns from state officials, business leaders and other concerned citizens.
10. What about parents or caregivers bringing children into the restroom?
- Answer: The law provides exceptions to young children accompanied by parents or care givers.
11. Will this bill threaten federal funding for public schools under Title IX?
- Answer: No, according to a federal court which has looked at a similar issue.
12. Will this bill prevent people from receiving medical attention in an emergency.
- Answer: Absolutely not. Nothing will prevent people from receiving medical attention in public or private accommodations.
13. Will this bill affect North Carolina’s ability to create or recruit jobs?
- Answer: This bill does not affect companies in North Carolina. North Carolina was one of the top states to do business in the country before this law was passed, and preventing Charlotte’s bathroom ordinance from going into effect on April 1 won’t change that.
14. Why is the state telling cities and towns what it can and can’t do by repealing an ordinance the elected members of the Charlotte City Council passed?
- Answer: North Carolina is one of at least 37 states like Virginia where cities and towns cannot pass rules or regulations that exceed the authority given to them by the state. In passing the bathroom ordinance, Charlotte was exceeding its authority and setting rules that had ramifications beyond the City of Charlotte. The legislature acted to address privacy and safety concerns if this ordinance was allowed to go into effect on April 1.
15. Do any other regulations in North Carolina cities, towns or counties come close to what Charlotte was recommending?
- Answer: No. Not that we are aware of. Therefore, nothing changes in North Carolina cities, towns and counties, including in Charlotte, regarding discrimination practices and protections now that this law has passed.
16. Did only Republicans vote for this bill?
- Answer: No. 11 Democrats voted for this bill in the N.C. House of Representatives and no Democratic Senators voted against it. In fact, Democratic Senators walked out to avoid voting on the issue at all because many were going to vote for it and they did not want show their division.
17. Why did the Legislature call a special session to overturn the bathroom ordinance?
- Answer: The new Charlotte ordinance, which would have required all businesses to change their restroom policies and take away the expectation of privacy people have when using the restroom, was going to go into effect on April 1 if no action was taken.
18. Is North Carolina at a disadvantage when it comes to recruiting jobs because it does not have ordinances like the one Charlotte was proposing?
- Answer: No. In fact in the last 3 years without an ordinance like this, North Carolina has created the 6th most jobs in the country – over 260,000 net new jobs. We know of no examples of companies being recruited to North Carolina that have asked if the state has an ordinance like the one Charlotte was proposing.
Bruce seems offended that he can’t pee next to little girls. There’s more. Did you know he’s a farmer? Well, he’s not. He just pretends to be one for tax season:
Bruce Springsteen is a man of the people. He stands up for the little guy. A regular blue-collar Joe. A union man. A bona fide working-class hero.
And, when he’s not busy being all that… he’s a tax-dodging liberal hypocrite worth over $200 million who pretends to be a farmer to save hundreds of thousands of dollars on his property taxes that would have otherwise funded the welfare programs he pretends to care about.
Springsteen wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper:
Consider the following.
In 2011, perhaps wanting some local free press, Springsteen decided to write a letter to the editor of his town’s newspaper. In response to an article about tax cuts and aid to entitlement programs, the Boss wrote in to praise the piece for being “one of the few that highlights the contradictions between a policy of large tax cuts, on the one hand, and cuts in services to those in the most dire conditions, on the other.”
Furthermore, Springsteen wrote, “your article shows that the cuts are eating away at the lower edges of the middle class, not just those already classified as in poverty, and are likely to continue to get worse over the next few years.” Then, with his well-honed “everyman” touch, he signed the letter along with his oh‑so-common-man-sounding town name, “Colts Neck.”
The 200 million dollar man adds this:
“The biggest problem we have now is almost 10 percent unemployment, but we also have the disparity of wealth,” Springsteen told London’s Sunday Times. “You can’t have an American civilization with the kind of disparity of wealth we have. It will eat away at the country’s heart and soul and spirit.”
But this noblesse oblige is meant only for the bourgeois:
Bruce Springsteen pays over $138,000 a year in taxes for his three-acre home in Colts Neck, New Jersey. He owns another 200 adjoining acres. But because he has a part-time farmer come and grow a few tomatoes (organic, of course) and has horses, his tax bill on the remaining 200 acres is just $4,639 bucks. Do the math. By being a fake farmer, the working-class zero Springsteen is making a mint by robbing New Jersey of the antipoverty program funds he says they desperately need.
There is no end to the list of wealthy celebrities dodging their fair share:
Wealthy celebrities including Bruce Springsteen, Jon Bon Jovi, Quincy Jones and Ted Turner have received federal subsidies, according to “Subsidies of the Rich and Famous,” a new report from the office of Oklahoma Republican Senator Tom Coburn.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) identified several individuals receiving farm payments “whose professions had nothing to do with farming or agricultur[e],” says the report. These individuals include real-estate developer Maurice Wilder, a “part-owner of a professional sports franchise [who] received total of more than $200,000 in farm program payments in 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006.”
The report also says millionaires Jon Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen and Ted Turner have collected farm subsidies.
“These individuals include Scottie Pippen and Ted Turner, respectively. Millionaires also receive state tax breaks on farm land. For example, Jon Bon Jovi paid property taxes of only $100 last year on his extensive real estate holdings in New Jersey that he uses to raise bees. At the same time, Bruce Springsteen received farm subsidies because he leases his property to an organic farmer,” the report explains.
These gluttons suck up $30 BILLION in tax breaks. But they’ll support the hundreds of million dollars-worth Hillary when she says YOU need to pay more taxes and they’ll cry for ending tax loopholes for corporations.
A petition has been issued from Change.org in support of Springsteen. Here’s the money line:
“Bruce Springsteen has a right to his deeply held beliefs. He has a right to control his business and refuse to do business with those he disagrees with,”
He does, does he? Apparently that right is granted to uber–wealthy rock stars but not bakers.Then, compounding the idiocy, the petition says this:
Finally, Burgard urges readers to “support the right of Bruce Springsteen and ALL Americans in their right to control their own business,” by signing the petition.
Tell it to the Klein’s.
It’s hard to overstate the stupidity of liberals. About impossible.
I am inclined to help Bruce rename some of his songs to make them more appropriate for his character.
No Retreat, Baby, No Taxes, No Surrender
Tax Avoidance at the Edge of Town
Tax Dodging in the USA
Born to Avoid Taxes
Cheating this American Land
I Pay No Taxes in My Hometown
I Don’t Have To Pay
Don’t Be ashamed Of Your Tax Shelter
Realistically, who does Springsteen hurt? The answer is his own fans- who likely mostly agree with him. The cynic in me tends to think the audience wasn’t big enough to bother appearing. Either way, Springsteen is an asshat. I can’t stand him. He should have shut up and sang.
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.