Clash – "Clampdown" (1979)

But you grow up and you calm down

And you're workin' for the clampdown

After I chose today’s featured record to be one of the inaugural members of the 2 OR 3 LINES “SILVER DECADE” HALL OF FAME, I learned that Robert “Beto” O'Rourke had quoted its lyrics in a debate with Ted Cruz in 2018, accusing Cruz of “working for the clampdown.” 

(For those of you who don’t follow politics, Cruz – who’s a Republican – is the junior U.S. Senator from Texas.  O’Rourke – a Democrat – is a former congressman from El Paso who unsuccessfully challenged Cruz that year.)

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Beto O’Rourke is the son of a politician – his father Pat was the El Paso County Commissioner before becoming the co-chair of Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign.  ("I like the guy. He's entertaining, and he has some magic in him," the elder O’Rourke later said about Jackson.)  But a couple of years later, Pat switched parties and ran for Congress as a Republican – he was obviously quite flexible when it came to political principles.

In eighth grade, O'Rourke became a fan of punk rock after hearing the Clash's 1979 double album, London Calling, which includes “Clampdown.”  O’Rourke later called that album “a revelation.”  

Maybe it was today’s featured song – which is as anti-establishment as all get-out – that inspired O’Rourke to become a member of a computer hacker group called Cult of the Dead Cow, which became famous “for releasing tools that allowed ordinary people to hack computers running Microsoft's Windows.”  (Thanks to O’Rourke’s fierce anti-sexist principles, the group’s members included females – making it perhaps the only hacker group of that era to contain any female hackers.)  

O’Rourke further burnished his anti-establishment rep by stealing long-distance phone service during his teen years in order to use his dial-up modem without paying.  

(I didn't join the cult,
but I did buy the t-shirt.)

Beto also wrote poems and short stories for Cult of the Dead Cow under the pseudonym “Psychedelic Warlord,” a name inspired by a 1974 record by the English “space rock” band Hawkwind.  O'Rourke later apologized that some of his stories were “hateful” – in fact, one was a fantasy about driving down a street and running over children.  “I have to look long and hard at my action, at the language that I have used, and I have to constantly try to do better,” he told reporters.

One of his fans defended O’Rourke, writing that “a lot of people wrote embarrassing stuff when they were 15 and, by the mercy of God, it’s not available on the internet."  

(I didn’t write any stories about murdering children by intentionally hitting them with my car, but I certainly wrote some pretty embarrassing stuff when I was 15 – all in the forlorn hope of getting the attention of one or more cute babes I had my eye on.  Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose . . . )

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Beto seems to have cleaned up his act after his Cult of the Dead Cow days.  

He went to a very posh Virginia boarding school, then attended Columbia University – where he majored in English literature and co-captained the crew team.

O’Rourke stayed in New York City for a few years after graduation, working as a nanny, as an art mover, and as a proofreader for a publisher of reference books before taking a job with an internet service provider owned by his uncle.

After moving back to El Paso, Beto continued to rely on family connections for his livelihood.  He moved into an apartment building owned by his father and got a job at his mother’s high-end furniture store.  He wanted to start a tech company a couple of years later, but couldn’t get financing – so his father took out a loan on his behalf, enabling Beto to get his company up and running.

In 2005, O’Rourke won a seat on the El Paso City Council.  A few years later, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

After three terms in Congress, O’Rourke took on Ted Cruz, who was heavily favored.  Beto made the incumbent sweat a little, but ended up losing.

Cruz and O'Rourke after the 2018 debate

He then ran for the 2020 Democratic nomination for the presidency, but his campaign went nowhere – he ended up dropping out of the race well before the Iowa caucuses.

Now Beto wants to become the governor of Texas.  He’s an underdog, and 2022 doesn’t look like it will be a good year for Democrats – but stranger things have happened. 

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Is it fair to say that Beto O’Rourke grew up, and Beto O’Rourke calmed down, and Beto O’Rourke is “working for the clampdown”?  I think so.  

Of course, he’s not the first privileged child of wealthy and powerful parents to pass through a phase as a wild-eyed radical and then settle down and take advantage of his family’s wealth and power.  And he won’t be the last.

Click here to listen to “Clampdown,” which is only one of the great songs on London Calling – truly one of the all-time great albums.

Click on the link below to buy the song from Amazon: