Brianland

Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy I spent the afternoon getting all gussied up in my black velvet tails and Ben Franklin knickers with knee-high socks topped off with a top hat, accented with colorful Obama buttons, and everything underneath my waving homemade Obama pennant flag with a little red & white Canadian one on top.  All […]

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. Here’s the first live show for the book — a Facebook live stream for an online Prankster reunion — featuring The Franken Fracas, Obama’s election night, Abbie Hoffman, the climactic Bernie rally in New Hampshire & lots of other gems . . . https://www.facebook.com/Brian.Hassett.Canada/videos/10163863488060261/ . David Amram — Jack Kerouac’s principal musical collaborator “Thanks […]

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Introduction to Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy (April 2020) . Sometimes you meet a person who thinks like you do, who views the world through a similar lens.  For me, Brian Hassett is one of those people. We’re all products of our times, and Brian, being slightly younger than me, came of age in a different decade […]

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Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy excerpt . . Following the climactic election eve rally of the 2020 New Hampshire primary with Bernie Sanders at a hockey arena  . . .  The most extraordinary thing happened when it was over.  As the thousands of kids streamed out of the arena, right next to it was a big […]

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FRIDAY NIGHT DEBATE NIGHT Friday February 7th was the big nationally televised Democratic debate from Manchester.  I tried every angle to get tickets, but even longtime plugged-in politicos told me they were shut out.  Made me feel a smidge better. The obvious thing was to go to the DoubleTree Hotel in Manchester. Manchester’s the main […]

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40 YEARS IN PRINT . A CHRONOLOGY OF THE PUBLISHED REAL-LIFE ADVENTURE TALES . . 1980 – April — John Anderson in San Diego – Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy – 1980–1984 chapter –  pp: 2–3 1980 – June — First Grateful Dead show – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Jack Kerouac – ch. 14;  pp: 156–159 […]

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Original Merry Prankster George Walker & author-performer Brian Hassett team up to make elections fun again. Soon to be joined by an unlimited cast of players and Pranksters crisscrossing the United States in a new version of Ken Kesey’s original psychedelic Furthur Bus — and this one is going to go even Farthur! After three […]

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. Al Franken is a great writer of our times.  When you read even just the first chapter of this book — “Why I’m A Democrat” — it’ll make you wanna throw every one of his sanctimonious accusatory quasi-republican Democrats off a cliff — not under a bus, like they did him. I really enjoyed […]

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Election Night 2016 in New York City . . It was such a beautiful fall Tuesday in New York. We were all in such a good mood. But in retrospect there were some early warning signs I’d rationalized and dismissed: The tollbooth clerk I had a happy election exchange with but when asked who she […]

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How Rock Concerts Led To Politics . For most of ’80s I lived in Phyllis & Eddie Condon’s palatial apartment on Washington Square North.  The NYU Program Board from where I ran the concerts was in the Loeb Student Center on Washington Square South — about a 3-minute walk away — if you didn’t dawdle […]

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