Tom Morello: Rebel Without A Dinner Reservation

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Tom Morello, former guitarist with 90s novelty act Rage Against The Machine, raged against a kicky little shabby-chic Seattle bistro this week called the Five Points something or other.

When he and his party were denied entry due to overcrowding, a verbal altercation ensued with the doorman—who would be by most people’s definition a "worker"—after which Morello took to the Internet to accuse the restaurant of being "anti-worker."

Work with Tom Morello on his anti-worker accusations, no pun intended.

He twatted, roughly: "Blah blah blah workers, man!"

To which the restaurant responded: "Oh yeah? Blah blah blah YOU, dude!"

I’m paraphrasing.

As a graduate of Harvard University—an institution known to employ custodians and groundskeepers—Morello knows of what he speaks when it comes to workers.

Teddy Roosevelt and Ralph Waldo Emerson went there.

Not one to embarrass easily, Morello has since accused the restaurant of being "anti-Kenyan" because there was someone from Kenya in his party.

Translation: "I know someone from Kenya. That’s in Africa!"

Probably someone he met on the mean streets of Harvard, where the racial diversity is off the charts. Not a place you’re going to run into the "privileged elite," for example.

Remember what happened when Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan announced he was a Rage Against the Machine fan? You guessed it: What he really meant was that he hates workers.

That, that Tom Morello again:

Don’t mistake me, I clearly see that Ryan has a whole lotta "rage" in him: a rage against women, a rage against immigrants, a rage against workers, a rage against gays, a rage against the poor, a rage against the environment. Basically the only thing he’s not raging against is the privileged elite he’s groveling in front of for campaign contributions.

I’m reminded of the words of Firesign Theater regarding Georgie Tirebiter: "This is just a bag of shit!"

It’s fine to be a rage-filled simple-minded hypocrite and hysterical demonizing poser who sees causes as fashion statements and mere opportunities for self-aggrandizing personal attacks while living in a safe cocoon-ish vacuum of your own device surrounded by likeminded sycophants who aren’t going to challenge you in any way due to your modicum of dubious "fame" among the undiscerning, but leave the Teamsters out of it.

And word to politicians seeking to expand their constituency by quoting Jello Biafra or claiming to like the Circle Jerks—has that ever worked out?

You’re just going to rattle their cages and send them falling all over themselves to tell us their "beliefs" and what have you, which are more predictable than Rush Limbaugh’s or Paul Ryan’s. There’s enough pain and suffering in the world.

You guys really don’t need them telling voters you hate women and trees or, worse, laboring gay immigrants.

The entire matter with the restaurant could have been avoided if handled in a more convivial and good-natured manner. When the doorman asked them if they had reservations, a member of their party could have replied, "Not about you" and patted him on the rump.

Everyone would have enjoyed a hearty chuckle.

Tom would have repaired to Twitter than night: "Gentle readers, tonight I met the nicest doorman…I could tell he liked workers…"

But humor is not a strong suit among the machine-ragers-againsters. The Seattle restaurant in question has apparently added a new menu item to commemorate the band called "Eggs Against the Machine."

I don’t know what that consists of, but my guess is: plain old scrambled eggs, albeit with a painfully provocative-sounding name.

And just a dash of agitprop.