Streets Of Minneapolis

Bruce Springsteen wrote this song nine days ago, last Saturday, recorded it a few days later and released it the following day, Thursday 28th January. In that sense it is a protest song of the 60s tradition, topical folk protest articulating the issues of the day coupled with burning anger and righteousness, sent out to people quickly to support a movement. It names the dead, Alex Pretti and Renee Good. 

Bruce's song, Streets Of Minneapolis, is Dylan- esque, a rising tide of rage against a regime that has crossed the lines, building slowly with voice, guitar and drums, then backing vocals, 'In our home they killed and roamed/ In the winter of 26/ We'll remember the names of those who died/ On the streets of Minneapolis'. Bruce goes on to name the perpetrators, those who give the orders and sanction and excuse the murders- Trump, Miller, Noem- and he goes on, the song rising in a sea of raised voices- 

'In chants of ICE out now Our city’s heart and soul persists Through broken glass and bloody tears On the streets of Minneapolis

Oh our Minneapolis, I hear your voice Singing through the bloody mist Here in our home they killed and roamed In the winter of ’26 We’ll take our stand for this land And the stranger in our midst We’ll remember the names of those who died On the streets of Minneapolis'

Streets Of Minneapolis ends with the chants of the crowd, 'ICE out ICE out ICE out...' Bruce giving the people the final word...

I've not really ever been a fan of Bruce Springsteen. In the mid- 80s the whole stadium rock, saxophone solo, chest beating Bruce did nothing for me and although people said look beyond that, listen to Nebraska, I never did. In recent years I've tiptoed closer, found some songs I can enjoy and have appreciated him as an authentic voice and as a decent voice in US political life. I found myself singing along to Dancing In The Dark and Born To Run a while ago, hearing them in a pub, and actually enjoying them shorn of their 80s MTV major label rock sheen. I have always liked the 1993 song Streets Of Philadelphia and this new song has been something of an eye opener for me. Recently I heard this, a remix of Bruce's State Trooper by Trentemoller that I'd not heard before and it's given me another little opening into Bruce Springsteen's music.

Streets Of Minneapolis has gone to the top of the charts (streaming) in nineteen countries at the time of writing so Bruce has very much struck a chord. More power to you Bruce Springsteen. 

Something may have tipped in Trump's fascist USA in the last week, the murders of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in broad daylight by paramilitary thugs marking a change in the public mood, something that even Trump, the authoritarian with no controls or bounds on him other than his 'own morality', has had to back down from. I am teaching A Level History classes at the moment a unit on Germany 1918- 1945, a time and place where gangs of armed, uniformed paramilitaries stalked the streets and demanded to see the papers of people who looked different or who had an accent, to see if they were truly German. Those who could not pass that test were bundled off to camps. Some were killed in broad daylight. If only we could learn from the recent past. 

In November 2024, on the day of the presidential election, I wrote this at a post here. 

People sometimes shrink from using the word fascist. It's too extreme, it's student politics, it's an exaggeration. Perhaps the culture around the fascist dictators of the 20th century is partly the reason-  Hitler was a fascist and this blinds us to modern equivalents. No one can be as bad as Hitler can they? Therefore, no one else can be a fascist. But Trump's actions and words are fascist- the demonisation of minorities, the talk of genetics and purity, the desire to have unlimited and unchallengeable power, the cult of the leader, the assaults on democracy, the rampant nationalism, the cosy relationship between big business and power- all these things are fascist. I think we should call it what it is. 

A lot of you agreed. Elsewhere a friend countered that Trump's not a fascist, that the state planned economy of the 20th century fascist states is absent in the USA, that it's an exaggeration to throw the word around. I still don't think so. I think it's entirely apt and describes Trump's second term exactly- the use of violence, the shutting down of critical voices in the media, the state sanctioned lying by government mouthpieces, the racist language and policies, the use of paramilitary organisations to abduct and kill in the streets, the kidnapping of foreign leaders, the bullying and threats to sovereign states, the belief that might gives right- it's fascism. 

Over here in the UK we have our own problems at the moment, political, social and economic. It'd be nice to ignore a country thousands of miles away and say it's nothing to do with us but unfortunately what Trump and the US does affects us all. We are all drawn into this fascism. 

I feel for those Americans who are anti- Trump, who are appalled by their government and the failure of the Constitution to provide a check on Trump's power, on his fascism. I take some small comfort in the knowledge that at some point in the future (and three years away does feel like along time I know) he will be gone- by his term of office ending and by democratic process (fingers crossed) or by nature taking its course- and that something better comes in his place. I hope that the anti- Trump and anti- ICE feelings of the last week provide some glimmer of hope and that Bruce Springsteen adds a little more.