After Saturday’s nationwide wave of protest, it’s time for a new Woodstock to unite America

I would be a fool to anticipate that I might soon encounter a genie able to grant me three wishes. Apparently, only one person in this country is allowed to have the world conform to his every whim and impulse. 

But, just in case that genie might be reading this, in the immediate afterglow of the coast-to-coast protests against kingly tyranny, I’ve been pondering one question: What now?

Now that millions of Americans have stood up prominently against authoritarian overreach in their cities and hometowns, it’s time for another segment of the population to step up.

What I’m proposing is such a logistical quagmire of scheduling and planning that it would take nothing short of a genie to accomplish. So, if I’m going to fantasize about something that will, for 10,000 reasons, never happen, why not ask for the moon?

To keep the momentum of nationwide protests going, we’re going to need an event — not just another date on the calendar, but something game-changing, something they’ll still be talking about 50 years from now. Something Live Aid big, something Woodstock big. It needs to be an inclusive, ornate, cross-cultural event that will in the end create a new story of what it means to be an American, something that is not so much about embracing demographic diversity as it is about creating a commonality of values. 

And it should be a buttload of fun.

Here’s the vision: An all-day concert, free of charge. Free is key. The demand will be so great you’ll have to give tickets and then shut the door once capacity is reached. But that’s OK. We’ll livestream the whole thing, also for free. 

Where? That’s easy. The entire country is looking at Los Angeles right now. Make it some enormous roomy old venue, like the Rose Bowl, or the grand old Los Angeles Coliseum. 

And the headliner: Bruce Springsteen.

Here’s the thing though, Boss. You’re going to have to write a couple of new songs, and good ones, maybe the best you’ve ever written. Something that will fit in the tradition of Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan and, duh, yourself. It needs to be a “This Land is Your Land” or “The Times They are A-Changin’” for the 2020s. You can do this. The future of your country is at stake. 

You won’t be on stage that long anyway, because the lineup will be intense. Green Day will be there. Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World,” can’t you hear it? Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine. PJ Harvey, Metallica, Sleater-Kinney, wherever Chuck D from Public Enemy is these days, find him. 

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Remember Ice Cube last fall performing at the Dodgers-Yankees World Series? That. That’s the energy we need. 

But defiance isn’t the only flavor at this ice cream stand. We want to get people pumped about the privilege of being American. Lump in the throat? Yes, please. Several, in fact. Give me the Lumineers doing Leonard Cohen’s masterpiec “Democracy.” Give me Norah Jones singing “American Anthem,” and see 100,000 people go silent in awe. Give me Lana Del Rey’s “God Bless America (and All the Beautiful Women In It),” and watch the Rose Bowl levitate with feminine power. And hey, Los Lobos, think you guys can tweak your classic “One Time, One Night” with a 2025 vibe? Sure you can. 

Let’s take a few songs that we all know, and turn them into something we’ve never heard before, like when Ray Charles took “America the Beautiful” and turned into his own signature song. Imagine, for example, what Father John Misty would do to that song. Or Alicia Keys doing Sam Cooke’s “A Change is Gonna Come.” Or John Legend doing Paul Simon’s “American Tune.”

And we’re going to punctuate all these great songs with non-singers, politicos as interstitial entertainment. Bernie and AOC, sure. Gavin Newsom, maybe he’s the emcee, if he can channel that simmering rage of the past week. Alex Padilla, come on up. Chris Murphy, Pete Buttigieg, Adam Kinzinger, Ro Khanna. But keep it tight. Don’t make this look like a political convention.

That means you need to get movie stars up on stage too. Keanu Reeves introducing Neil Young? That’s the stuff. And not just the leading-men types, either. Anyone that can arouse a crowd, the weirder the better — Nick Offerman needs some face time at this gig. Mark “Luke Skywalker” Hamill will draw a crowd. Lin-Manuel Miranda’s gotta come. 

And yes, we’re getting Arnold Schwarzenegger up on that stage, too.

You still with me, genie. Because here’s where we get weird. I say we put to use the best in holographic technology and AI, and re-create — I mean, bring back to vivid life — Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton and George Washington. And not just the famous white men. Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth as well. Have them remind us of our special responsibility to our ancestors, to preserve what they gave their lives to, and put in their mouths their own words.

The end result? Everyone who attends or watches this amazing event would not be able to tolerate this slow slide into cheesy Papa Doc dictatorship any longer. It’ll break them out of the cycle of just laughing at the clown-car governance and understand that what’s at stake is not just political stances, but everything we’re all used to. The way we eat, work, talk, love, relax, vote, worship and behave as citizens and neighbors. It’s all at stake.

So, genie, there’s my one wish, that famous people will pick up what we plebes have started. You grant me this one, and I’ll let the other two slide.

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