Political Quotes

“Madam President, on November 5, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame honored Dolly Parton as part of their 2022 class of inductees. Anyone familiar with Dolly's path to official ``rock star'' status will remember that, when she discovered the Rock Hall was considering her for a nomination, she declined. She told them she felt she hadn't earned the right to say yes. Never has such universal outrage sprung from such universal admiration. Country fans had no time for humility. Rock fans weren't having it either--although, to be fair, humility and rock `n' roll go together like oil and water. Even people who aren't fans of Dolly's music said that surely she was worthy of any honor bestowed by an organization whose mission is to ``engage, teach, and inspire through the power of rock & roll.'' By my estimation, this may have been the first time in history that a debate over a nominee to the Rock Hall has not devolved into a debate over what rock and roll is and who should and should not attempt to create it. I will not attempt to define it here today, but suffice it to say that, in six decades and over the course of more than 50 studio albums and 3,000 songs, Dolly discovered the genre's secrets and mastered them all. Twenty years ago, Dolly famously mused, ``If somebody said, `You're going to have to do one or the other. You're going to have to give up your music or you're going to go back to being poor,' I would go poor, totally broke, and start over and do my music.…”