My son and I watched Richard Attenborough's Gandhi last night, and it was as good as I remembered it from when I saw it in the theater 20 years ago. Basically, it's why Allah created Netflix, and remains the ultimate story of the ultimate man of peace -- a brilliant lawyer who changed the world by using nonviolence, fasting, and a vow of poverty to get Muslims, Christians, Hindus and the rest of the world to listen to his message of unconditional love.

It's timeless, and I could somehow see it showing up on a double bill with the symbiotic 'V' For Vendetta one of these strange days.

Anyway, as we watched, I learned anew the lesson of being, not doing. At one point, Gandhi (Sir Ben Kingsley, currently bit-parting as himself in The Sopranos) excuses himself from an important meeting about the future of India to help a child put a mudpack on a goat's sprained ankle. At another, he teaches Life magazine photographer Margaret Bourke-White how to spin fabric with the same attention to the moment as he would give to a speech or writing. Nothing else to report here; the simplicity of the acts themselves are the lesson.

In the background of all this last night was Thursday's installment of American Inventor, my son's favorite show. We have never once watched American Idol and we stopped watching Extreme Makeover: Home Edition when Ty became too obnoxious and the sponsor-saviors formula wore thin. I try to keep my curmudgeon comments to myself when it comes to American Inventor, though, because I generally think the idea of working hard and having a dream are important.

But I'll tell you what I hate it about it here. I hate the hat-in-hand please mastah can I have the big money dynamic that the show is built on. I can't decide which I hate more: the questions from the judges that go, "What would winning this round mean to you?" (i.e., "Get down on your knees your knees and beg") or the responses from the inventors, who well up and shake and sweat and say things like, "It would change my pathetic life and I would be indebted to you and your producers' purse strings for the rest of my humble horrible days").

And there I was, a willing participant, wondering who would get to the next round. And the next night, there I was, watching Gandhi, when it occurred to me that the most popular entertainment of our day encourages us not be satisfied with the achievement at hand, but to constantly crave the NEXT and the BETTER. It takes us out of the here and now and tucks us in at night with not a feeling of peace, but a false longing for what comes next. I'm all for what Joe Strummer said ("the future is unwritten"), but these shows are no celebrations of pull-up-your-bootstrap DIY hard work; this is mass ennui being sold as the American Dream.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but we are a nation so unsatisfied with the moment and ourselves that we are constantly looking to get to the next round. As a result, all this "winning" is rendered meaningless. What a stupid way to live.

Which brings us to We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, Bruce Springsteen's beautiful new album. I was skeptical, because I am no Kool-Aid drinker when it comes to Bruce. I didn't trust the genesis of The Rising, because it felt like Springsteen was taking requests from the cheap seats ("We need you now," said the post-9/11 guy, goes the fable; "We coulda used you all through the '90s, when materialism, boy bands, and corporate greed was already choking your beloved homeland," said I), and I don't even know if I own Devils and Dust. He kicked my ass at the John Kerry fundraiser in St. Paul, put me to sleep at the Xcel with Devils and Dust tour, and I skipped his last show here -- a first for me.

I'll be at the next one. I love this record, and the DVD that comes with it. Sure, I'd like a statement record of originals, but who's to say this isn't it? To me it's all about being here and now; the "playing of music versus the making of music," as Springsteen poignantly puts it in the DVD interview.

For the listener, it's an equally rich experience. More important than the organic folk music history lesson that never weighs it down, we hear chemistries between the players being forged on the spot, drinks being had, and love and happiness staving off darkness on the edge of town.

There's a great clip on YouTube making the rounds amongst some of the Twin Cities Springsteen faithful. It's "10th Avenue Freeze-Out" from the St. Paul Civic Center in 1980, back when Bruce would tear around the stage in a suit jacket and jeans, flapping like a complete nutcase, and it was only us, singing along, having a party, being in the moment, before he and the rest of the world turned him into Jesus With A Telecaster. I sent it to my sister, who replied, "I miss the jacket."

Hey, sis. The jacket's back. Dude's happy. Horny. Singing. Celebrating his roots and the moment with fiddles and acoustic guitars and joy to the world.

I gotta go. My son just popped his head in and told me the NFL draft is coming on. "O Mary Don't You Weep" is playing. He watched the DVD with my wife and I last night, and I kept waiting for him to say he hated it because it's not Eminem or Green Day, but he just said it's his favorite song.

Hell, yes.

Photo: Tony Nelson

(And the men who love them and the women who love men)

1. "I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone," Sleater-Kinney.

(And the women who love them and the women who love women).

1. "Jean Arthur," Robbie Fulks.

Dedicated to my fallen brethren in blurbage Robert Christgau and Chuck Eddy

"The audacity of hope."
--Amy Klobuchar

"Have you had it with the okey-doke?"
--Barack Obama

This is such a beautiful thing.

Photos courtesy of Clown Lounge Dave:

"Jesus Christ."

That's what I said to my friend Dennis, who'd bought me a ticket to see Rosie Thomas at the Turf Club earlier tonight, one song into her set. From the first notes it was apparent that Thomas was something like a descendent of Emily Dickinson whose sparse lyrics and angelic voice said more about love and the world we live in than any late-night beer-soddened blogger could ever hope to.