Rush Limbaugh of Rock and Roll

This tribute to one of rock's greatest guitarist/musicians goes out a little late. You see, on Sept.16/2004 at the young age of 55, John Cummings aka Johnny Ramone lost his battle with prostate cancer and died in his sleep.

Were you aware that John Cummings aka Johnny Ramone was a die hard Republican? In a punk scene where left wing propaganda was and is the norm, this may come as a shock to many however, the synonymity of left wing politics with punk is probably not as common as one is led to believe because....*" marketing it that way helped get the bands' names in the papers and establish "street cred.""


Just goes to show, you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover.




The Washington Times
Johnny went worldwide public with his partisanship in 2002, when the Ramones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. At the microphone to give props to the people who made it all possible, he offered his own version of a Michael Moore moment.

"God bless President Bush, and God bless America," he said, clad in his trademark T-shirt, ripped blue jeans and leather jacket. "I said that to counter those other speeches at the other awards," Mr. Ramone says in a phone interview. "Republicans let this happen over and over, and there is never anyone to stick up for them. They spend too much time defending themselves."

(snip)

Johnny was driven right by a youthful revulsion against, um, face-ism. "It was in 1960, the Nixon-Kennedy election," he says, recalling his first inclination toward the right. He was an only child of Irish heritage in a working-class neighborhood. Families on his block voted left, pro-union. "People around me were saying, 'Oh, Kennedy's so handsome,' and I thought, 'Well, if these people are going to vote for someone based on how he looks, I don't want to be party to that.' "

(snip)

"I try to make a dent in people when I can," he says. "I figure people drift toward liberalism at a young age, and I always hope that they change when they see how the world really is."

(snip)

Like so many other right-wingers. who are fed up with the media establishment, Johnny tunes in to the radio every day for some roiling rhetoric and to the Web for some news that doesn't seem to make the local newspaper. "Hey," he says, perusing Newsmax.com as he speaks on the phone, "what's going on with these illegal aliens now?"

These are just a few snips of the entire article.

"We didn't sell a lot of records, but somehow we left an impression." Johnny Ramone

Rest in Peace, Johnny.


~Jeff