Governor Jerry Brown Blames Climate Change for California Wildfires

Governor Moonbeam is back.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Gov. Jerry Brown presses message on climate change."

The Left's 'White Privilege' Attack: 'An Attempt to Shut Down Argument...'

I looked for this clip earlier, but found it at the left-wing racist sites Crooks and Liars and Raw Story.

But it's up now at Independent Journal Review, "‘Fantastic!’: Watch This Army Colonel’s Takedown of ‘White Privilege’ Leave Fox Anchor Speechless."

“All of us have worked, all of us have achieved something. That is how we measure character, that’s how we measure what the value of a person is, not some arbitrary category imposed by some ponytailed grad students who have taken too many gender study seminars.”

PREVIOUSLY: "Harvard's Kennedy School Adds 'Checking Your Privilege 101' to New Student Orientation," and "Stephanie M. Baran: 'White Privilege' Speaker Pushes #Marxism to Defeat Racism in America."

A Dishonest Rewrite of the Duke Lacrosse Case

From Dorothy Rabinowitz, at the Wall Street Journal:

In the outpouring of praise for William D. Cohan's new book "The Price of Silence"—a work, remarkably enough, being celebrated as a model of evenhandedness, scrupulous objectivity, etc.—one essential has gone overlooked. Namely, the central point of this tale about the Duke lacrosse case and accusations against three players of rape and assault at a house party. It takes no close reading to see that the book is meant to recast the story so as to nullify the outcome Americans thought they knew—that the players were exonerated and had been falsely accused. In Mr. Cohan's portrayal, the workings of decency and justice were undone by malign forces—among them, it would seem, the ability to hire defense attorneys.

The book's pro forma declarations that the accused were, yes, exonerated come surrounded by a far stronger drumbeat of doubt that their exoneration could conceivably have been just. No surprise the accused beat the charges, Mr. Cohan is regularly at pains to make clear: These were white sons of privilege, from families who could pay for their excellent defense lawyers.

In Mr. Cohan's revisionist history we find a new moral hero—none other than Mr. Nifong, the prosecutor who brought the case and was disbarred for his actions during the investigation. "The Price of Silence" gives us a man mistreated and misunderstood, ruined for his efforts to do justice.

Such is the book's view of the prosecutor whose prime activity, upon taking the case, consisted of nonstop media interviews in which he denounced the evil of this racist sex assault by the lacrosse players—"hoodlums," as he referred to them—whose guilt, he emphasized, was unquestionable.

That this protracted pretrial outpouring might be unwise—in addition to being a clear violation of the requirement that prosecutors make no statements prejudicial to a fair trial—did not apparently trouble Mr. Nifong, who relished his turn on the national stage. Mr. Cohan rationalizes this bizarre prosecutorial behavior as a strategy to pressure members of the lacrosse team who had attended the party to tell what they knew—to break their "wall of silence."

In Mr. Cohan's interviews as he promotes his book, we hear much the same. Along with the author's repeated dark assertions that "something happened in that bathroom," we also hear, ominously, that "we will never know" the facts because "nobody in that bathroom is talking." District Attorney Nifong's career may have been undone but its spirit lives on...

Keep reading.

Rabinowitz is a national treasure. Here's one of her pieces from back in 2007, "The Michael Nifong Scandal."

More at KC Johnson's blog, "Rabinowitz Eviscerates Author Cohan."

Catholic School Boys Compete for Up-Skirt Photos of Hot Teachers

Boys will be boys, as they say.

Via EBL, at Batshit Crazy News, "Teenage boys take #upskirt photos of female teachers at California Catholic High School School."

It's wrong. It's humiliating and harassment. But it's the kind of misbehavior the generations grew up with. Indeed, I'm surprised this is news, considering it's not some politically incorrect attack on LGBTQ rights, or something.

The Audacity of Protesting Anti-Semitism

From Tom Wilson, at Commentary.

Read it at the link.

An astounding statement on leftist anti-Jewish eliminationist ideology.

Irina Shayk Topless for #BringBackOurGirls

Now this is interesting, at BroBible, "Irina Shayk Posts Topless #BringBackOurGirls Selfie, Pisses The Entire World Off":

Hashtag activism is fucking annoying, but even more annoying is when celebrities use them as a platform to heighten their own self image. What about when they use it as an excuse to take their clothes off?

Well, I'd be less annoyed with Selma Hayek topless.

That would be something, heh.

Former Princeton President Blasts Haverford College Students in Commencement Address

I would have loved to have been there.

At NBC 10 Philadelphia, "Haverford Graduation Speaker Calls Students 'Immature'."

And at the Philadelphia Enquirer, "Haverford commencement speaker's rebuke of graduates draws criticism, praise":

The stunning move by a commencement speaker at Haverford College on Sunday to use the celebratory occasion to lambaste students who had protested against another speaker drew a standing ovation but also sharp criticism.

William G. Bowen, former president of Princeton, called the protestors’ approach both “immature” and “arrogant” and the subsequent withdrawal as a speaker of Robert J. Birgeneau, former chancellor of the University of California Berkeley, a “defeat” for the Quaker college and its ideals.

Bowen’s remarks to an audience of about 2,800, plus nearly 300 graduates, added a new twist to commencement speaker controversies playing out increasingly on college campuses. Bowen — one of three speakers who received an honorary degree — faced no opposition, but chose to address the issue, calling it “sad” and “troubling.”

The controversy arose over Birgeneau’s leadership during a 2011 incident in which UC Berkeley police used force on students protesting college costs. A group of more than 40 students and three Haverford professors — all Berkeley alums — objected to Birgeneau’s appearance, noting that many of them had participated in Occupy protests as well and wanted to stand in solidarity with Berkeley students.

They wrote a letter to Birgeneau, urging him to meet nine conditions, including publicly apologizing, supporting reparations for victims, and writing a letter to Haverford students explaining his position on the events and “what you learned from them.” Birgeneau declined and withdrew.

“I am disappointed that those who wanted to criticize Birgeneau’s handling of events at Berkeley chose to send him such an intemperate list of “demands,” said Bowen, who led Princeton from 1972 to 1988 and last year received the National Humanities Medal from President Obama. “In my view, they should have encouraged him to come and engage in a genuine discussion, not to come, tail between his legs, to respond to an indictment that a self-chosen jury had reached without hearing counter-arguments.”

Bowen’s remarks stung some students and professors, who criticized his decision to chide graduates on their day in a forum where they had no opportunity to respond.

More.

The piece quotes Haverford English Professor Maud McInerney, one of the faculty members who attacked Birgeneau (and a Berkeley Ph.D. recipient), who moans, "It was an ambush."

Oh, those poor babies.

'Public Mistreatment'

At Neo-Neocon, "More on the Abramson story: what’s this “public mistreatment” bit?":

To me, the most curious phrase in the newest Sulzberger statement about Jill Abramson is this one [italics mine]:

During [Abramson's] tenure, I heard repeatedly from her newsroom colleagues, women and men, about a series of issues, including arbitrary decision-making, a failure to consult and bring colleagues with her, inadequate communication and the public mistreatment of colleagues…

So, did Abramson put some writer or editor in the stocks? Institute public floggings at the Times? Did she administer a series of public tongue-lashings? Or just criticisms? Is there a rule at the Times that, in order to avoid offending egos and tender sensibilities, an executive can only say negative things about an employee in private? And if this “mistreatment” perpetrated by Abramson was indeed, “public,” could Sulzberger mention more specifically (without naming the recipient of the mistreatment) what she allegedly said or did, so we could get an idea of what sort of offense he might be talking about? ...

Kinda funny, but the notion of "public mistreatment" isn't obscure on college campuses. Indeed, if a professor wants to discipline a student, it's best to do it away from the rest of the class, because any "public" humiliation could be grounds for a civil rights complaint. Some of my white male colleagues have totally given up on the idea of classroom discipline at all, lest they be attacked as "racist."

It's out of control.

PREVIOUSLY: "Why Student Behavior Matters."

Black Flag Settles Ownership Lawsuit

The band members from various iterations of Black Flag have settled a trademark lawsuit.

At the O.C. Weekly, "Black Flag Refuse to Surrender Their Ideals":

The dust has settled in the ongoing Black Flag legal beef, and the lawyers have demarcated the remnants of what was once called the best punk band on the West Coast, if not the entire universe.

The long and short of the settlement announced April 21 is that Black Flag's name and four black bars logo belong exclusively to Greg Ginn, the band's founder, guitarist and main songwriter. This all stems from a trademark-infringement suit filed last year by Ginn against his former band mates—Keith Morris, Chuck Dukowski, Dez Cadena and Bill Stevenson—who had begun touring as FLAG last year, performing the band's classics and peddling Black Flag merchandise. Henry Rollins was lumped into the legal action as well; according to the lawsuit, Rollins colluded with FLAG members to "fraudulently" trademark Black Flag under his name after discovering Ginn's trademark period had lapsed.

"The problem with FLAG was they didn't come in the front door, and they used slandering Greg to promote themselves to drive up ticket sales," explains Black Flag's current lead singer, Mike Vallely, an '80s skate-mag celebrity and longtime Greg Ginn collaborator who fronted the band for 2003 reunion shows, then went on to manage them....

As it stands now, when Black Flag are on the bill, it's Ginn on guitar, Vallely out front, and a pair of session players from Ginn's north Texas hometown filling in on bass and drums. They will play a "classics" set, with the songs arranged to allow Greg to roam instrumentally. FLAG can tour as FLAG, though there are no plans for them to do so at press time. Nobody other than Ginn will see a dime from authentic Black Flag merch.

Here's "Flag" doing the Goldenvoice 30th anniversary show, "Black Flag -- Nervous Breakdown, Fix Me, I've Had It, Wasted @ GV30."

I love Keith Morris, but Black Flag isn't Black Flag without Greg Ginn.

Los Angeles @Dodgers: Out of Sight Is Out of Mind

The Dodgers have never been my favorite home team, but they had a very enjoyable season last year and I was looking forward to 2014. And then along came that cursed Time-Warner cable contract. Now 70 percent of the greater L.A. market can't get the Dodgers on their cable box. It's definitely hurting the team.

Here's Jim Peltz, at the Los Angeles Times, "Dodgers have faded from view on TV; will they fade from fans' hearts?"

And from Bill Plaschke, there's plenty of blame to go around, "Dodgers are out of sight, could become out of mind":

This is the worst season to be a Dodgers fan thanks to Time Warner #SportsNetFaiLA

— Taryn L (@InTransit74) May 12, 2014

The issue has been well-documented and there is clearly enough blame for everyone, greed by some, gluttony by others, villains everywhere.

The Dodgers are the biggest bad guys because, by taking $8.35 billion from Time Warner Cable and insisting on starting their own channel — SportsNet LA — they made it nearly impossible for that channel to find distribution at a price that Time Warner Cable could accept. The Dodgers could have signed a new deal with Prime Ticket for slightly less money but with a much higher probability that pay-TV operators would have continued carrying the existing channel. They would not have had their own channel, but at least that channel would have been seen.

The next villain is Time Warner Cable, which seriously overpaid, perhaps because it seriously misjudged the Los Angeles fan culture and thought this transition would be similar to the quick implementation of the Lakers channel a couple of years ago. Wrong. The Dodgers are not as big as the Lakers, and the Dodgers fans are not the Lakers fans, who lost their minds and used their wallets and essentially forced the pay-TV operators to carry the channel after only a few missed games. There is no such mass fleeing from the likes of DirecTV. The onus is now on Time Warner Cable to sell what is essentially an overpriced product.

"We sold the rights to a gigantic corporation, it's their job to market the rights and get the distribution," Guber said in the recent interview. "We are not happy that they haven't been able to get the full distribution in our own market that they promised. That's their job. They made the bet."

The final villains are the pay-TV operators who have shunned the Dodgers, if only because they are still charging consumers the same prices as last season when they carried the Dodgers. The contracts are surely murky and complicated but, bottom line, I no longer receive the Dodgers on my television yet my pay-TV operator has yet to give me a refund.

"It's unfortunate most providers have not yet decided to give it to our fans even though they're still charging them for last year's Dodgers coverage," said Stan Kasten, Dodgers president, in an interview Saturday.

It's all unfortunate, such that during the last month I heard several respected local sports authorities wonder whether the Clippers had actually become bigger than the Dodgers. It sounds crazy. It will never happen. But right now, which team has more buzz? There was also fallout felt when Magic Johnson surfaced as a possible new owner of the Clippers. A year ago, the support for his Guggenheim group would have been unquestioned. Now, not so much, with people wondering if that would mean the Clippers would also soon disappear.

If you own a sports team in Southern California, you can refurbish a lineup and a stadium and championship hopes, but none of that matters if that team is not on television. Period.

Or so it would seem.

Salma Hayek Stages Mini-Protest at Cannes to #BringBackOurGirls

Well, it's makes for good copy, I guess.

At Fox News, "Salma Hayek supports kidnapped Nigerian girls on red carpet."



As always, I'm with Staff Sergeant Old School.

Vile at Vassar? Typical Leftist Racist Hatred, Actually

Here's the editorial at the New York Daily News, "Vile at Vassar (via Legal Insurrection).

The whole piece is vital, so read it all at the link.

Here's the vile Nazi propaganda poster posted by SJP Vassar:



More at the Times of Israel, "Vassar’s SJP sort of apologizes for anti-Israel, Nazi cartoon."

Here's the cowardly and dishonest "apology" from the group, "An Apology from the SJP Vassar General Body."

And back over to Legal Insurrection, "Vassar removes Wall of Truth raised to protest anti-Israel campus climate (Updates)."

Events at Vassar tell you all you need to know about the ideological left today. Note that 39 Vassar professors backed the Israel boycott on campus, and the cowards they are, none of them would stand up for their beliefs when called out by William Jacobson.

Leftism is pure evil, deceit and cowardice. That's all they have. Well, that and ignorance too. Our job is to fight the ignorance, since leftists will always fail when confronted with truth.

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."



Also at Randy's Roundtable, "Friday Nite Funnies," and Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's SUNDAY FUNNIES."

BONUS: At Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Checkmate."

Cartoon Credit: Theo Spark.

Stephanie M. Baran: 'White Privilege' Speaker Pushes #Marxism to Defeat Racism in America

At Progs Today, "CAUGHT ON TAPE: WPC14 Speaker Promotes Marxism As a Way to Defeat Racism in America (Video)."

She calls for a "full-scale revolution" as the "only way" to beat racism.

Oh brother. This chick's a bleedin' loon, a "fun person, adjunct, Ph.D candidate, fiery intersectional feminist, marxist, cat/animal lover, vegetarian" (via Twitter).



And she's got a publication apparently based on her Master's thesis from DePaul University, "Parsing White Supremacy: An Exploratory Study of Political Thought and Beliefs." (Unimpressive. She's dredging up and recycling some really old political science research there, on "symbolic racism," for example.)

I would just love --- love! --- for this shrinking Marxist violet to go face-to-face with Kurt Schlichter. Man would that be delicious.

PREVIOUSLY: "Harvard's Kennedy School Adds 'Checking Your Privilege 101' to New Student Orientation."

BONUS: She blogs at Feministing?

Oh my goodness. Robert Stacy McCain would make Marxist mincemeat out of her, lol. See, "Feminism: Love as Oppression and Heterosexuality as Subordination."

California Chrome Wins #Preakness Stakes

Here's the full video, on YouTube, "2014 Preakness Stakes + Post Race."

And at the Los Angeles Times, "California Chrome wins Preakness; one victory from Triple Crown," and "California Chrome does it again in Preakness."

A great story, and more at the New York Times, "Top Horse, From a Place Winners Aren’t Made: Favorite for Preakness Was Bred on a California Ranch."

Pinch Sulzberger Responds to Backlash Over Jill Abramson's Ouster

In denial.

At NYT, "After Criticism, Times Publisher Details Decision to Oust Top Editor":

Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the publisher of The New York Times, released a statement Saturday afternoon detailing his decision to fire the newspaper’s executive editor, Jill Abramson. He was responding to a growing controversy over accusations by Ms. Abramson’s supporters that gender played a role in her dismissal.

The decision to remove her, announced on Wednesday, “has been cast by many as an example of the unequal treatment of women in the workplace,” Mr. Sulzberger wrote. Instead, the statement said, it “was a situation involving a specific individual who, as we all do, has strengths and weaknesses.”

The statement by Mr. Sulzberger came three days after he told a shocked newsroom that Ms. Abramson had been replaced by her No. 2, Dean Baquet. During the announcement, Mr. Sulzberger delivered brief remarks and said, “There is nothing more that I want to say about this.” But Saturday’s statement, which was about 500 words long, is the second public comment that he has made since her ouster.

Driving Mr. Sulzberger’s increasingly public posture has been an escalating debate over pay equality and the treatment of women. Two articles in The New Yorker have said that Ms. Abramson’s base salary when she took the job in 2011 was lower than that of her male predecessor, Bill Keller. On Sunday, NBC’s “Meet the Press” is scheduled to have a round table on “the equal pay debate” and is expected to discuss Ms. Abramson.

On Saturday, Mr. Sulzberger said, as he did in an earlier public statement, that Ms. Abramson’s pay package in her last year in the job was 10 percent higher than Mr. Keller’s.

“Equal pay for women is an important issue in our country — one that The New York Times often covers,” Mr. Sulzberger wrote. “But it doesn’t help to advance the goal of pay equality to cite the case of a female executive whose compensation was not in fact unequal.”

Ms. Abramson has not made any public statement since her dismissal, and has not responded to messages and emails seeking comment. Her first remarks on her dismissal could come on Monday, when she is scheduled to give the commencement address at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, N.C.

Whatever. It was handled badly.

ICYMI, see Jonathan Tobin's response earlier, at Commentary, "Judge the Times the Way It Judges Others":

It is a terrible thing to see any veteran journalist get turned out on the street in this kind of manner and I don’t think anyone—except perhaps for Thomas—would be justified in exulting about has happened to Abramson. But for the Times itself, I have no compassion or sympathy. The Times deserves to be judged and condemned as the classic example of liberal hypocrisy.

Ain't it the truth.

The Atlantic Takes Down Racist Photoshop of Antonin Scalia — #LiberalRacism

Following-up from my post earlier today, "Racism at @TheAtlantic: Leftist Hypocrisy in Action."

The editors took down Robinson Meyer's racist Photoshop, although the dude's tweet is still live:

You Should Read Antonin Scalia’s Opinions On Net Neutrality But Also I Made You This Photoshop http://t.co/ZOxLGWprKX pic.twitter.com/1X9gva9mpH
— Robinson Meyer (@yayitsrob) May 16, 2014

I called him out and tweeted the editors. Damned idiots finally wised up to their hypocrisy.

.@yayitsrob Are you racist? http://t.co/ONX4AoZbRi
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob I mean really? You're RTing posts about "Euro masculinity"? https://t.co/PjoU3Tl5TQ
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob You made the Photoshop yourself? Racist much? https://t.co/kVGahAM8Nh
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

@AmPowerBlog Did you read the post? Scalia sets up an extended (and very useful, I think) analogy between Internet service & pizza delivery.
— Robinson Meyer (@yayitsrob) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob You idiot. What if Sotomayor compared the offerings of a Mexican restaurant? Would you P-shop her with menudo and tacos?
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@Instapundit Robinson Meyer (@yayitsrob) bragging about creating his racist Photoshop: https://t.co/kVGahAM8Nh
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@Instapundit @MichelleMalkin @DLoesch Racism at @TheAtlantic: Leftist Hypocrisy in Action http://t.co/yrWxLRZOdq cc. @yayitsrob
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob Yes, I read it. And there's still no excuse for your disgusting racism: http://t.co/ONX4AoZbRi @MichelleMalkin @TwitchyTeam
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob If you decide to leave up your P-shop you know that's a badge of racist shame, right? http://t.co/ONX4AoZbRi @TwitchyTeam
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

@AmPowerBlog Thanks for the comments. I’ll talk to my editor about it.
— Robinson Meyer (@yayitsrob) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob Okay. Tell him if Sotomayor had "an extended discussion" comparing Mexican restaurants to telecommunications, you'd be attacked.
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

.@yayitsrob That is, you'd be attacked if you P-shopped her like you did Scalia, regardless of the "extended discussion" in the dissent.
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

I'm tweeting to all @TheAtlantic editors to see if they have a response to this racism: http://t.co/ego7zQQVjA @BigFurHat @BlazingCatFur
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 17, 2014

I did tweet all the editors.

Then, while out with my family I noticed they'd taken down their racist image. I didn't know that Sotomayor is of Puerto Rican descent (Jeanette Victoria mentioned it in the comments at the post). Had I known I'd have tweeted some Puerto Rican dishes she could've been daydreaming about in a racist Atlantic Photoshop of the first Latina Supreme Court justice. It's amazing to me that Robinson Meyer and the Atlantic editors never gave their racism a second thought. Must be white privilege, or something. Whatever. You've got to hold 'em to their own standards. Go Alinsky on the bastards. If you don't they'll continue to get away with the most disgusting racist hypocrisy imaginable. Seriously. Their leftist hypocrisy is genuinely evil. I'm sick of these scumbags. Sheesh.

Maite Perroni for GQ Mexico.

She's lovely.

At Egotastic!, "Maite Perroni is Super Sexy in GQ Mexico May 2014."

'The audiences have also been mostly elderly. The theater comes equipped with a defibrillator, and managers used to keep a supply of disposable underwear, in case of accidents...'

What a story, at the Los Angeles Times, "THE FABULOUS PALM SPRINGS FOLLIES NEARS LAST HURRAH IN PRIME FORM":

It was 10 minutes before showtime and Joni Naber was putting the final touches on her costume — a blue explosion of tassels and sequins that wasn't doing a very good job of covering her body.

"Come here and feel this!" she called out, grabbing a reporter's hand and placing it squarely on her midriff.

Her abdominals felt tight and smooth, like a piece of molded plastic.

"It's a corset," the 77-year-old former USO dancer explained with a grin.

In the cramped dressing room of the Plaza Theatre, 10 other showgirls were prepping for a matinee show. "Stop flirting with the reporter," one called out.

Naber is a dancer in the Fabulous Palm Springs Follies, the musical revue and local institution that for the last 23 years has featured performers who could all claim AARP membership. The current cast ranges in age from 55 to 84...

The crowds have been streaming back in since the end of the run was announced. Alas, sounds a bit too late.

Did Led Zeppelin Filch the Opening Notes of 'Stairway to Heaven' from Relatively Forgotten California Band?

Posted the song here, "'Stairway to Heaven'."

And here's Business Week, "Stairway to Heaven: The Song Remains Pretty Similar":

Weary from touring, Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page retreated in 1970 to a stone cottage in Wales, called Bron-Yr-Aur, with no power or running water. Legend has it King Arthur fought his last battle nearby. Not far off is the mountain Cader Idris where, it’s said, those who spend a night at its summit are fated to die, go mad, or become poets. At Bron-Yr-Aur, by candlelight, Page constructed the bones of what may well be the most popular, and valuable, rock ’n’ roll song of all time, Stairway to Heaven. This included the introductory finger-picked section that launched a million guitar lessons.

Back in England that winter, Page laid out the budding epic for the band at another house, Headley Grange, where the magic continued around a fire fueled on one occasion by a section of stairway banister. As Page plucked, singer Robert Plant seemed to channel another world as he wrote the lyrics. To Page, who has referred to the song as “my baby,” it was Zeppelin’s crowning achievement. “Stairway crystallized the essence of the band,” he told then-teenage rock writer Cameron Crowe in a March 13, 1975, Rolling Stone interview. “It was a milestone for us. Every musician wants to do something of lasting quality, something which will hold up for a long time, and I guess we did it with Stairway.”

For generations of middle-class youth, the song is the 8-minute soundtrack of adolescent romance—or at least the anticipation of it. Stairway is slow dancing, the last song played at high school proms, sweet-16 parties, and summer camp mixers across a broad swath of the late 20th century.

Stairway’s stature—financially, culturally, and musically—is towering. By 2008, when Conde Nast Portfolio magazine published an estimate that included royalties and record sales, the song had earned at least $562 million. It was so profitable in part because Led Zeppelin refused to release the song as a single, forcing fans to shell out for the entire album, which is untitled but known as Led Zeppelin IV. In the U.S., the album has sold more copies (23 million, according to the Recording Industry Association of America) than any save Michael Jackson’s Thriller and the Eagles’ Their Greatest Hits (1971-75). To this day, Warner Music Group cites the song in its annual reports as an example of its publishing portfolio.

For live audiences, Stairway’s power starts with its introductory notes. “Can you think of another song, any song, for which, when its first chord is played, an entire audience of 20,000 rise spontaneously to their feet, not just to cheer or clap hands, but in acknowledgment of an event that is crucial for all of them?” Observer critic Tony Palmer wrote in a 1975 profile. Dave Lewis writes in Led Zeppelin: The Complete Guide to Their Music that “Stairway has a pastoral opening cadence that is classical in feel and which has ensured its immortality.”

But what if those opening notes weren’t actually written by Jimmy Page or any member of Led Zeppelin? What if the foundation of the band’s immortality had been lifted from another song by a relatively forgotten California band?

You’d need to rewrite the history of rock ’n’ roll...

Yeah, well, a little late now, don't you think?

But keep reading, in any case.