"And I learned the truth from Lenny Bruce"

It occurred to me last night that 2006 marks 40 years since the death of Lenny Bruce. Forty years! I was 12 at the time and didn’t know about Lenny. Never heard of him until, oh, four years later or so, when I was in high school. My friend Bob and I would sit in his bedroom after school and listen to his old man’s Bruce comedy LPs and laugh our damnfool heads off. I got a good chunk of my political education from Lenny Bruce.

Communism doesn’t make it at all. Not for me. Cause it’s complete government control. The capitalist system is the best, cause we can barter, we can go somewhere else. Communism is one big phone company. That’s it, man. Can’t go nowhere else, Jim. Tell the phone company,

“I want a phone put in Monday at 9:30.”

“You’ll have it at the end of the week.”

“I want it at 9:30!”

“Alright, schmuck! Go to the May Company for a phone.”

That’s right, I’m screwed. Where’m I going to go? There’s one desk to go to. That’s what communism is. But a capitalist system is beautiful, man, cause we can go here, there, and that’s the barter system, you know. And I want to keep my system.