George Carlin Crosses Out - 16 Years Later
May 12, 1937 — June 22, 2008
YES, YOU WERE A PROPHET, our long-haired bard, our poet with an out-fucking-standing command of the English language. A rare bird.
The Times called him "irreverent," in their obit headline. Patronizing. If we're going to call George a "rev" anything, it would be a revolutionary.
Carlin, born in 1937, was prescient. What he said fifty years ago about the War Machine, the crucifixion of the First Amendment, the abuses of the Church, industrial pollution, the corporate indifference to. . . well, everything— his speeches could have been written yesterday.
His most radical satire, his decision to take off the suit, grow out his beard, and damn the establishment torpedoes, was his enduring contribution to American democracy.
I've been looking at a lot of my "Carlin Archives" on this anniversary, grieving him, and thinking how influential he's been on my thinking since I first heard him, when I was in 7th grade.
I remember playing "Class Clown" for my mother— a…