Charlie Daniels Pulls Plug On TV Appearance After Song Banned

06/19/2002 5:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
Mark Armstrong

(6/19/02, 5 p.m. ET) -- Charlie Daniels recently pulled out of a scheduled appearance on PBS's A Capitol Fourth in Washington, D.C. after one of the songs he wanted to perform was banned from the show's lineup. Daniels wrote "The Last Fallen Hero" as a tribute to the victims of the September 11 attacks, and felt it was an especially appropriate holiday to remember those Americans whose lives were taken. The show's producers, however, did not agree, so Daniels canceled his performance.

"I'm not on a star trip," Daniels tells LAUNCH. "I'm not being egotistical or petulant. I'm not trying to hold up this TV show or anything like that. It's just that, doggone it, Fourth Of July in the United States of America should be a flag-waving time. That's what it's all about. It's not about 'everything's fine, I'm fine, you're fine' touchy-feely 'I'm okay, you're okay, we have nothing to worry about'-type situation. We're involved in a very, very dangerous war and we gotta start realizing it or we're gonna be in big trouble."

Daniels was particularly outraged by the fact that a public television network was censoring his music. "You know, PBS really is kind of a left-wing organization anyway, but what aggravates me...I just did a thing with them a while back called 'Speaking Freely,' which is about free speech, but now here they come with, 'You can't do this.' For a publicly funded television network, I just think it's ridiculous. They're not willing to stand up for the country who funds them," he says. "America is not a politically correct country. We have some very high up people in the American hierarchy and in the media who are, but the people out here are not."

The legendary entertainer noted that he isn't the only victim of political-correctness this July 4 holiday. Daniels referred to fellow singer Toby Keith's controversial removal from the ABC In Search Of America: A July 4th Musical Celebration lineup.

"The people in this country would love to see Toby Keith do his song," he says. "They would love to have a flag-waving song on the Fourth Of July. They would think it was great, but Peter Jennings, because he's whatever he is, he don't want to see it done. If he's worried about the word 'ass,' how many times a day does it get said on ABC? How many times do worse things get shown on ABC? How many times do they have things that are really detrimental to people--to kids and stuff--which they don't care about, but if it's something that's totally American and flag-waving, they don't want it."

Daniels adds that "sugar-coating" and downplaying the seriousness of this war is of no advantage to Americans. The key is staying angry. "It's time to rub salt in the wound," he says. "That's the whole situation. I mean, that's just not something we need to sidestep. We need to stay mad. We've gotta stay mad. We're involved in something like we have never been involved in before. I mean, it's like, 'Hey, it's okay. We don't wanna make nobody mad. We don't wanna offend anybody. We don't wanna do this...' We better damn well get started offending some people. We better stay vigilant."

-- Margy Holland, Nashville

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