I’ve Waited 40 Years to Dunk on Phil Collins About This

The wheels of justice grind slow, but they grind exceedingly fine. In this case, it’s been forty years since British establishment-pop workhorse Phil Collins incurred a young Athena’s wrath with his band Genesis’s mockery of the greatest president (up until then, anyway) of modern times.

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If you’re Gen X like me, your adolescence was happily enhanced by the heyday of old-school MTV. The concept was brand-new then: music videos by the hottest pop stars, 24/7, hosted by the original veejays — Alan Hunter, Nina Blackwood, Martha Quinn, Mark Goodman, and of course, “Triple J” J.J. Jackson. It was innovation, novelty, hormonal giddiness, and rock-n-roll!

I was not really keyed into politics at that age — I still loved America in a general way,