Getting some Spirit of '76 into Live 8

New York Daily News: "The message of tomorrow's star-studded Live 8 rock 'n' roll extravaganza - a worldwide fund-raiser for poverty-stricken Africa - is all about human rights and equality. So it seemed like a good idea to concert organizer Bobby Shriver to have the Declaration of Independence on the stage in Philadelphia. Shriver, who's helping at the request of U2 front man Bono, asked a colleague to look into obtaining television mogul Norman Lear's $8.14 million version of the historic document - one of 25 remaining copies that were printed by the Founding Fathers on the night of July 4, 1776. 'I have good news and I have bad news,' the colleague told Shriver. 'What's the bad news?' 'The Declaration is going to be on display in a museum in Sacramento.' 'Oh no,' Shriver lamented. 'So what's the good news?' 'It's your sister's museum.' Turns out that California First Lady Maria Shriver, Bobby's younger sister, had persuaded Lear to lend his Declaration to her pet project, the California Museum for History, Women and the Arts. It's scheduled to go on display - the centerpiece of a patriotic ceremony to be conducted by Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger - from July 4 through Oct. 9. 'The negotiations were detailed and delicate, and finally the governor stepped in to arbitrate,' Shriver told me, half in jest but wholly in earnest. 'The Declaration will be flown from California to Philadelphia on Saturday - and it has to be back in Sacramento on Sunday.' Comic actor Chris Tucker and Academy Award nominee Djimon Hounsou - a native of Benin in West Africa - will accompany the Declaration on a Gulfstream jet lent by a computer mogul."

New York Daily News

New York Daily News: "Sir Bob Geldof is proud that tomorrow's Live 8 concerts will alleviate suffering in Africa. But get him alone and he'll admit his secret triumph: patching up Pink Floyd. 'It's all he talks about - 'Pink Floyd is reuniting!'' a well-placed source tells The News' Ken Bazinet. Geldof, who starred in the movie version of the band's rock opera 'The Wall,' was chief peacemaker in mending the feud between Floyd front men David Gilmour and Roger Waters for the simulcast on AOLmusic.com, MTV and XM ..."

What do pop stars know about the world?

"Pop and rock stars are nowadays as influential in government circles as they are among their teenage fans. Is this necessarily a good thing? There has always been a little bit of politics - as Ben Elton might say - in pop and rock music. Ever since a wild-haired Bob Dylan sang The Times They Are A-Changin' in 1963 - in which he warned senators and congressmen that "There's a battle outside and it's raging" - popular singers have ventured, with varying degrees of success, into the world of political protest and dissent. Some 40 years later, the times really have a-changed. Politically inclined pop stars no longer strum their frustrations in catchy three-minute tunes; they have become global statesmen instead. They no longer only play political songs but have become real political players. "