August 14, 2009

'''What is your name, sir?' the officer asked. 'Bob Dylan,' Dylan said."

"'OK, what are you doing here?' the officer asked. 'I'm on tour,' the singer replied.... The officers asked Dylan for identification. The singer... said that he didn't have any ID with him, that he was just walking around looking at houses to pass some time before that night's show. The officers asked Dylan, 68, to accompany them back to the Ocean Place Resort and Spa, where the performers were staying. Once there, tour staff vouched for Dylan. The officers thanked him for his cooperation. 'He couldn't have been any nicer to them.'"

So that's real-life Bob. In songs, he's more...
They asked me my name
And I said, "Captain Kidd"
They believed me but
They wanted to know
What exactly that I did
I said for the Pope of Eruke
I was employed
They let me go right away
They were very paranoid

IN THE COMMENTS: Drew W said:
And yet Dylan didn't yell at the cops that he was being hassled only because he's a Jewish man in America.

AND: Actually, it looks like he was hassled because of his skin color:
He was strolling along a residential street in the Latin Quarter of the seaside town when police received a call reporting an “eccentric looking old man"....

Two patrol officers were dispatched to investigate and stopped Dylan...

Sergeant Craig Spencer from Long Branch police station said: "Residents called to complain there was an old scruffy man acting suspiciously.

"It was an odd request because it was mid-afternoon, but it’s an ethnic Latin area and the residents felt the man didn’t fit in. Lets just say he looked eccentric."

28 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Let me go

Once there was a day
We were together all the way
An endless path unbroken
But now there is a time
A torture less sublime
Our souls are locked and frozen

Once we were years ahead but now those thoughts are dead
Let me go
All hopeless fantasies are making fools of me
Let me go
I walk alone and yet I never say goodbye
Let me go
A change of heart a change of mind and heaven fell that night
Let me go

I tried but could not bring
The best of everything
Too breathless then to wonder
I died a thousand times
Found guilty of no crime
Now everything is thunder

Daytime all I want is
Nighttime I dont need the
Daytime all I want is
Nighttime I dont need the

The best years of our lives
The hope of it survives
The facts of life unspoken
The only game in town
Ill turn the last card down
And now the bank is broken

Found guilty of no crime
They were the best years of our lives
Ill turn the last card down
.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

the idea that a poet and an intellectual would chose different paths should not be a surprise.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I would argue that both men, from ther vantage point, looked foward to the arrest. But their ideas differ as to what to make of it as to day is to night.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Is this a learning moment or waht?

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

dont mess with a poet!

Drew W said...

And yet Dylan didn't yell at the cops that he was being hassled only because he's a Jewish man in America.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

don't mess with a poet!

in case i have not been clear.

I meant that the poet showed the high road.

I didnt think it needed spelling!

Chase said...

Just glad Dylan didn't say "Yo Mama".


List of other celebrities not likely to be as nice as Dylan in a similar situation:

- Madonna (imagine an older officer who never heard of her)
- Lindsay Lohan
- Paris Hilton
- Nancy Pelosi

George Wallace said...

Since this happened near the Jersey shore I have to think Springsteen is somehow behind it, no doubt exacting vengeance at last for the way Dylan sent him up in "Tweeter and the Monkey Man."

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I for one, wellcome the idea that some celebrities are getting the Lem treatment.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The entitlement of royalty makes for Lazy Lovers.

Nobody ever called Dylan a Lazy Lover.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Nobody ever seems available for a decent Mea Culpa.

Synova said...

My daughter went to his concert here in Albuquerque last week.

I figure good, he's got to die soon, or at least not tour! And then she can say she did.

I didn't go, which I suppose shows how much it mattered to me. :-)

I'm glad to hear he's a nice guy. Always glad to hear that about celebs.

Simon Hawkin said...

A celebrity behaving humbly and decently is now newsworthy!

Well, anyway, good to know Bob Dylan is a real gentleman.

Bob said...

Wow, you don't act like an insufferable prick to a police officer and he doesn't lock you up or Tase you. Hoodah Thunkit?

Bob said...

I like how the UK Sun newspaper headlined the story:

Cops Treat Bob Like a Complete Unknown.

Wince said...

I shudder to think what Dylan would sound like being tazed.

Oh, mama!

Laura(southernxyl) said...

OK, so if you're walking around on the public streets - not driving, not trespassing - the police can demand that you show them your ID (papers)?

I don't think I like that.

Anonymous said...

Drew W: And yet Dylan didn't yell at the cops that he was being hassled only because he's a Jewish man in America.

Maybe it's because Bob is Jewish—no, wait; Christian—er, sorry, no, Jewish. :-)

Wince said...

The incident began at 5 p.m. when a resident said a man was wandering around a low-income, predominantly minority neighborhood several blocks from the oceanfront looking at houses.

Seems like a case of what would otherwise be considered a case of racial profiling, no?

Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that.
In [Long Branch] that's just the way things go.
If you're [white] you might as well not show up on the street
'Less you wanna draw the heat.

John Althouse Cohen said...

He's still Jewish, in the sense that Jesus was Jewish.

Fred4Pres said...

And yet Dylan didn't yell at the cops that he was being hassled only because he's a Jewish man in America.

He was Christian for a couple of months, but whatev...

As for Jersey Shore summer cops, they tend to be over active. Still, if the neighbors complained it does not rise to a major incident of police overreach.

Anonymous said...

"OK, so if you're walking around on the public streets - not driving, not trespassing - the police can demand that you show them your ID (papers)?

I don't think I like that.
"

That could have been a legitimate issue discussed in relation to the Gates case, exactly how far does a policeman's authority extend and what are the reasonable expectations someone should have who isn't breaking the law, but of course it got drowned out by the fake racism charges. It was an opportunity lost for constructive civic education.

Unknown said...

Dylan should be jailed for touring with John Mellencamp.

Amexpat said...

OK, so if you're walking around on the public streets - not driving, not trespassing - the police can demand that you show them your ID (papers)?

From the ABC report, not sure if this constitutes probable cause?

"It was pouring rain, Dylan was soaked and wandering alone, ....

When Dylan wandered into the yard of a home that had a "For Sale" sign on it, the home's occupants became spooked by his appearance and called police with a report of an "eccentric-looking old man" in their yard, Long Branch Police said. One of the occupants even went so far as to follow Dylan as he continued on down the street."

Laura(southernxyl) said...

Kcom, in the Gates case, the police received a report that two men appeared to be breaking into a house. If true, this would be a crime, and in fact, that very house had had the door damaged by a previous breakin attempt, so the possibility was not far-fetched. They needed to know that Gates belonged there before they walked away possibly leaving a burglary or home invasion in progress.

In this case, there was no apparent crime in progress, the man was just walking down the street.

Do you really not see a difference here?

I walked to the corner grocery store in the rain yesterday evening (had an umbrella) to get strawberries to put on my cottage cheese for a snack. I didn't have ID on me, just a few bucks for the strawberries and my door key. Thank God the cops didn't stop me.

It's not illegal to walk around in the rain, even without an umbrella.

Wince said...

I suppose it's a sign of the economic times when looking at a house for sale is enough to arouse suspicion.

sierra said...

Elderly Jewish man wandering around peeking into houses in the pouring rain? There's gotta be a comedy bit in here somewhere. "That's alright, I'm okay. I'll stand out here in the rain. No, I don't have to come inside. I'm comfortable being soaking wet. I get this kind of treatment all the time from my children. I'm used to it. Thank you, though. I'll be alright."