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PHOENIX - Nearly two decades after Cree singer and songwriter
Buffy Sainte-Marie's song ''Universal Soldier'' was released and
shipments of her records mysteriously disappeared, the truth of
the censorship and suppression by the U.S. government became
public.
Now, in federal court, Charles August Schlund III stated he is a
covert operative and supports Sainte-Marie's assertions that the
United States took action to suppress rock music because of its
role in rallying opposition to the Vietnam War.
Sainte-Marie says she was blacklisted and, along with other
American Indians in the Red Power movements, was put out of
business in the 1970s.
''I found out 10 years later, in the 1980s, that [President]
Lyndon Johnson had been writing letters on White House
stationary praising radio stations for suppressing my music,''
Sainte-Marie said in a 1999 interview with Indian Country Today
at Dine' College.
''In the 1970s, not only was the protest movement put out of
business, but the Native American movement was attacked,''
Sainte-Marie said.
In an affidavit to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in a
Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act lawsuit
against President George W. Bush and others, Schlund alleged he
has been tortured in his attempts to reveal the truth about the
Bush family's manipulation of U.S. voting results and the Drug
Enforcement Agency's covert drug supplies to black communities.
Detailing the assassinations of the Kennedys and exposing the
''Don Bolles'' papers, named after the murdered Phoenix news
reporter, Schlund said he remains alive today because of FBI
protection.
Schlund, who said he previously worked in the covert drug
operations in Phoenix, said rock music posed a threat to the
United States and played a role in opposition to the Vietnam
War.
In his federal court affidavit, Schlund said he has knowledge of
''the detailed plans for the break-up and destruction of rock n'
roll music including the assassinations of many people to
achieve their goals. The detailed plans to replace rock n' roll
music with all-American music called country western.''
''This massive CIA and DEA covert operation was being conducted
to stop political overtones in the rock n' roll music and to
stop foreign influences on Americans caused by the exposure to
foreign music. This operation was conducted because the
Rockefellers had lost the Vietnam War because of the protest
that was in part directly linked with rock n' roll music. In
these files, the Rockefellers had needed the natural resources
of Vietnam for the expansion of their corporate empire and they
blamed the loss of the war in part on rock n' roll music.
''The assassinations started long before Vietnam but the plans
to replace rock n' roll with country western music started
during the Vietnam War and have continued to the present,''
Schlund stated to the court.
In his federal court affidavits filed in Maricopa County in
Arizona, Schlund also stated that singer Buddy Holly, killed in
an airplane crash in 1959, was considered a threat to the U.S.
government.
Meanwhile, Sainte-Marie said she cut a singular path as she was
being censored in the '60s and '70s.
''I usually didn't do what other people did. You didn't find me
at peace marches. I was out in Indian country.''
Earlier, a young Bob Dylan heard Sainte-Marie sing in Greenwich
Village and recommended she perform at the Gaslight, another
hangout of the avant garde. Janis Joplin, Elvis Presley and
Tracy Chapman were among those soon recording her lyrics. On the
road, she traveled the world and received a medal from Queen
Elizabeth II.
During this time, Sainte-Marie was selling more records than
ever in Canada and Asia. But in the United States, her records
were disappearing. Thousands of people at concerts wanted
records. Although the distributor said the records had been
shipped, no one seemed to know where they were. One thing was
for sure: They were not on record store shelves.
''I was put out of business in the United States.''
Later, Sainte-Marie discovered the censorship and pressure
applied to radio stations by Johnson during the Vietnam era,
particularly toward ''Universal Soldier'' during the anti-war
movement.
Sainte-Marie said Native people were put out of business, not
just because they were succeeding in Indian country, but because
they were succeeding in the broader community. She and others
were a threat to the moneymakers of concert halls, uranium and
oil, she said.
Then, fellow activist and Santee poet John Trudell's wife,
mother-in-law and children were burned to death in a mysterious
house fire shortly after Trudell burned an American flag in
Washington, D.C., Feb. 11, 1979.
''I was just one person put out of business. John Trudell is
just another person whose life was put out of business. Anna Mae
Aquash and Leonard Peltier were put out of the living business -
we were made ineffective,'' Sainte-Marie said of slain American
Indian Movement activist Aquash and imprisoned Peltier.
But Sainte-Marie continued with her music and efforts with
children after becoming a familiar face on ''Sesame Street.'' In
the 1990s, from her home in Hawaii, she created the Cradleboard
Teaching Project to link American Indian students with other
students online around the world.
Remembering the 1970s and Trudell, Sainte-Marie said, ''We just
kept chugging on. We kept coming to Indian country. We didn't
worry about the fortune and fame because we went with our
sincerity, our hearts and with our friends.''
Those years, however, were filled with pain.
''It was hard - seeing people hurt,'' she said.
Original article here.
Buffy Sainte-Marie's censored sounds
www.indiancountry.com
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