Not quite Let The Eagle Soar, but pretty awful, regardless:
I really liked the little additional “Next to you!” shout out to the crowd at 55 seconds. Real showmanship.
On second thought, maybe teahadists should stick to racism. At least they’re good at that.
BTW- when I was in the Middle East (20 years ago this year, actually), the only radio we got was AFN radio, and they played that god damned song at least a hundred times a day. I secretly think it was a plan to make us ready to kill. We would hear the first note and people would start in “Not that fucking song again” and the like.
Spaghetti Lee
After a 10-minute speech that The Las Vegas Sun said “channelled British Prime Minister Winston Churchill,”
Meaning what? She was drunk the whole time?
Triassic Sands
Thanks, John, I’ll just pretend I listened and it was horrible.
Villago Delenda Est
John, you will roast in Robot Hell for that.
I cannot tell you how much I utterly loathe that song. It was forced on my ears when I wore a uniform, and I’ve hated it, intently, ever since.
mr. whipple
So much awesome. I’m getting weepy. Anyone got a tissue?
MattR
From the song’s Wikipedia page (emphasis mine if WP will allow it)
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@Spaghetti Lee:
no she was cold salty wet and shallow.
Gus
Way off topic, but I had to share. I’m at an office building in Minneapolis, and I see something for a “Gary Snyder luncheon,” and sure enough there’s the old gent himself walking down the stairs. Looking frail, but good. Pretty cool.
Served
It’s like a Pentecostal Be-In.
This was before my time and I may be getting it wrong, but are the Teabaggers the right’s equivalent of Hippies in the 60s/70s? As in, a movement that begins to define its entire party and begins to spin itself further and further into crazy irrelevancy. And in 50 years, we’ll replace hippie punching with Teabagger punching, right?
Sko Hayes
Nothing could be worse than Let The Eagle Soar.
Nothing.
As an aside, it sounded like there were about 10 people at that rally.
New Yorker
Yeah, that song sucks. I sometimes think the Teabaggers just pretend to like it so they can scream “elitist!” at anyone who says it sucks.
And I love myself some good patriotic songs. “America the Beautiful”, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”, “This Land is Your Land”
I know, I know. The first suggests mending America’s flaws, while we all know Jesus made America perfect in all ways. The second was an anthem of the War of Northern Aggression, and the third was written by a soshulist.
batgirl
Be afraid, be very afraid, this is likely your next senator from Nevada unless the Nevada Democrats can come up with a credible candidate to run against her.
jl
“Not that fucking song again”
Sounds like all it did was lower morale.
freelancer
Lee Greenwood should die in a manner that is befitting considering what he unleashed with his song, beaten to death by every veteran who gets nauseous at 9/11ist patriot-boner, chest-thumping, keyboard kommando, nationalistic, pseudo-fascist nonsense that so embodies ignorant pride in this nation.
jimbob
Gah. Pass the brain bleach.
Spaghetti Lee
@batgirl:
I thought Dean Heller is pretty much the official Republican in that race. It seems like the Repubs wouldn’t let themselves get burned by Angle twice, especially in a year that’s going to be better for Dems than 2010.
Spaghetti Lee
From the Wiki:
Lee Greenwood also wrote a Canadian version of this song called God Bless Canada.
Uh, am I missing something? How does that work exactly? God Bless Can-a-da-uh-uh!
Omnes Omnibus
AFN seemed like it alternated that song and “Wind beneath my Wings” from August 1990 until sometime late in 1991.
transmaniacon
Has Redstate endorsed a candidate yet?
I’m afraid to look.
Culture of Truth
GLEE!!!
piratedan
@batgirl: what, no homeless Democrats are registered?
Culture of Truth
I think what they love about it is that it’s a song about hypothetically standing up and defending America, should the need arise, without actually doing anything but singshouting loudly.
kdaug
This… this actually amazes. So the looniest among us – and in power – fancy themselves entertainers as well?
Or is this the inverse corollary to Reagan having been a “film star”? It’s weird – there seems an almost pathological need to be part of “contemporary culture (TM)”, but they have no idea what it is.
It’s like my button-down, strict precisionist, mechanical-engineer grandfather suddenly deciding he wants to put on a tie-die and trip acid with the hippies.
Um, little too late, and I don’t think you’d be very good at it.
I mean, is this not reflective of how out of step they feel?
Kane
During the Bush years, you could walk from end to end of the local Army/VA hospital and hear the continuous buzz of Fox news coming from every department waiting room. I asked my doctor what was up with that. She rolled her eyes and said, Company policy.
Joey Giraud
Hey, this song is really educational! I had no idea my freedom was a gift from the military.
Thank goodness the military is so generous, giving us freedom and all..
harokin
What I never understood is what exactly they’re “proud” of. They didn’t earn American citizenship, they were just born with it. Why is that something to be “proud” of? They could say, “I’m grateful to be an American,” “Thank God I’m an American,” “It’s awesome to be American,” but “proud”? And isn’t pride a sin?
jl
A change of emphasis takes care of
“And I’m proud to be in Canada”
And an added word and epenthesis (a prosody word I just found in a poetry dictionary), takes are of
“God bless you Canada”
God Bless Canada
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2q_SLSMA9k
We snotty libs may be unfair to the song, since it could be used as a generic anthem to honor any country’s war dead.
In that sense you could have “God Bless Sverige”, or “God Bless Helvetia”, which would make the Angle’s and TeaGOPpers heads explode. Even for Helvetia, which has gone commie since it enslaved its private health care system with meddlesome government regulation, and now has life expectancies at birth, middle age and age 65 that are longer than those in the US, at lower cost.
Tax Analyst
@Spaghetti Lee:
You sing it aboot the same way.
Tax Analyst
@harokin:
You sure got alotta questions, Mr. Feder.
kdaug
@jl:
Especially bolded, with 2pt kearning, preferably left-justified.
ETA: I prefer at least a 12 point font (eyes are getting old), and with sharp anti-aliasing.
ETA2: Oh. I though you said Helvetica.
KyCole
My kids and I always referred to it as “the Wal-Mart song”. Not sure why, except maybe we heard it once too many times there while living in the sticks with nothing but Wally World near by.
joel hanes
During the ongoing horror that was Viet Nam / Nixon / Agnew, we had The Ballad of The Green Berets.
My favorite reaction was in Jaime Brockett’s “New Super Yellow Hydraulic Talkin’ Teeny-Bopper Blues” :
Tuned in my radio today,
to see what Spiro Agnew had to say
He said “If you don’t like The Ballad of the Green Berets,
you must be one o’ them long-haired dope-smoking living-in-a-commune filthy hippie Marxists”
I wrote him a letter:
“Dear Spiro
I dug it. It had a good beat; easy to dance to.
I gave it about an 89 —
the same as your IQ.”
Citizen_X
@jl: Now I want someone to do a Mandarin version for China, replete with waving red and gold flags. “And I’m proud to be Chinese/where at least I’m part of the oldest nation on Earrrrrrth–SUCK IT, EGYPT!”
Laura
That song deserves her.
My husband was in the Middle East 20 years ago and I lived in Japan. He was deployed there for a good long time, and I can’t tell you how much it warmed my heart (not) to hear this number over and over, especially when all those people in the NASCAR stands were doing their part by singing this, showing their support for the troops.
MattR
@Spaghetti Lee:
Can the Candians return that “gift”? (I don’t recommend clicking the link so I will tell you the answer is “God Bless You Can-a-da”)
@jl: And I see I am way late to the party.
joel hanes
@jl:
God Bless Vespucci-land
harokin
@Tax Analyst: I’m not even from New Jersey!
Davis X. Machina
Ancient tradition. Nero’s known to have spent months in Greece, playing the summer-festival circuit.
PurpleGirl
@joel hanes: I sort of remember it, half remember it… but I’m not going to click the link and be completely reminded of the earworm. I hated that song, still do. (And the John Wayne movie, which he was too old to do, really.)
joel hanes
@Served:
re the Teabaggers the right’s equivalent of Hippies in the 60s/70s? As in, a movement that begins to define its entire party and begins to spin itself further and further into crazy irrelevancy.
The difference is that ultimately, the hippies were right about many things: about Nixon, about Viet Nam, about the environment, about the empty lives engendered by unrestrained capitalism and consumer culture.
As nearly as I can tell, the tea partiers are wrong about nearly everything.
patroclus
We had joy. We had fun. We had seasons in the sun. But the wine and the song, like the seasons, are all gone.
MikeJ
Why do a separate song for Canada? Last time I checked they were in the Americas just like the USians are.
PIGL
@Served: not Hippies. Think “Up With (White) People.”
patroclus
Billy, don’t be a hero. Don’t be a fool with your life. Billy, don’t be a hero. Come back and make me your wife. And as he started to go, she said: “Billy, keep, your head low-oh-oh. Billy, don’t be a hero. Come back to me-e.”
trixie larue
Sometimes we sing Let the Eagle Soar when we are just starting on the road to drive from Philadelphia to New England. It’s probably a dangerous activity because we do try to channel Ashcroft to get thee truest feeling of the song and we have to stop because we are laughing way too hard. You should try it.
Davebo
Every freaking retirement ceremony you’ve ever attended!
What? You have never attended a military retirement ceremony?
Commie!
Citizen_X
Actually, as much as I denounce this song–and I do, along with Stalin–I think it speaks well of Greenwood that he would do a Canadian version. That’s realizing that other people love their countries, that their countries may be free as well, and that some of them are actually fighting and dying in our nasty little wars.
All of which being in direct violation of the American Exceptionalism we’re all supposed to have now.
Villago Delenda Est
“Feelings. Nothing more than Feelings.”
OK, I just self immolated for that.
russell
In 50 years, all the tea partiers will be dead.
PIGL
@patroclus: Terry Jacks: Canada’s secret shame. You may launch now. In my pathetic nation’s last 90 seconds on earth, I retaliate thus.
Southern Beale
I had never before heard the “I won’t forget the man that died and gave that life to me…” lyric before. Always knew it was jingoistic never realized it was Christian.
Every hockey game they play that song during this bit where they salute a member of the military, and everyone has to stand and clap while the song plays. A couple times Lee Greenwood himself has sung it in person (since this is Nashville after all). I find the whole thing just so gross … I find it hard to applaud someone “on their fourth tour of duty in Iraq!” That makes me want to cry, not cheer. I’ve called the hockey team and spoken to their military outreach person about these moments of recognition and asked if they can be more about supporting the troops but not supporting the war but they never do. I just find it really awkward and uncomfortable.
I’ve also asked them why we don’t support other people in the community — social workers, teachers, nurses, first responders. Of course the answer to that is simple: the U.S. Marines are a “corporate” sponsor of the hockey team! Your tax dollars at work. More pro-war indoctrination.
RAM
It occurs to me that Roger Ailes has pretty much completely lost his shit. He’s getting more and more like Dick Nixon, only with a trophy wife.
Litlebritdifrnt
I first heard that song in Hong Kong when the US Marine Band who were visiting for Outback 88 performed it at a pool party. I thought it was quite cool then. Once I moved to the US I began to loathe it, particularly when an entire HS Football stadium rose and placed their hands on their hearts when it was performed because they mistook it for the national anthem. The stupid. It burns.
joel hanes
@patroclus:
Damn you. I had forgotten that song.
cyntax
@Omnes Omnibus:
They were just trying to toughen us up in case we got captured and interrogated. Think of it as mass SERE training.
stuckinred
@cyntax: AFVN,
“We gotta get out of this place
If it’s the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there’s a better life for me and you
Somewhere baby, somehow I know it. . .”
patroclus
There’ll be bluebirds over…the white cliffs of Dover. Tomorrow. Just you wait and see.
Andrew Abshier
I used to attend airshows back in the 1990s and no matter what the lineup of aerial acts were, you could always count on at least one polot who chose to do their act to “God Bless the USA.” Turned up REAL LOUD, so you could hear it over the aircraft’s engine. One announcer, with no sense of irony whatsoever, said at the end of one rendition, “that sure puts a lump in your throat, doesn’t it?” In the press section, a lot of us nearly puked, and it wasn’t from the heat!
Last year the local municipal band did the song as part of their 4th of July show. I literally ran away from the bandstand as soon as they announced it. I got some strange looks, but didn’t care.
Sharron may actually be a decent singer, but I’m sure as hell NOT clicking the link to find out!
kdaug
@Davis X. Machina: Me like. Nero. Perfect.
Omnes Omnibus
@patroclus: In French.
srv
HEY JOHN!
Your favorite org, Standard & Poors, downgrades the misbehaving government and tells them to shape up or ship out:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110418/ap_on_sp_ot/us_debt_rating
Always on the ball, they are.
Fuzz
@Southern Beale:
There is something that bothers me about how militarized seemingly every public gathering has become in this country. I’ve been in Israel and even they would think the American military fetish is a little over the top. The troops themselves can see right through it too. We think we’re doing them good but if anything this generation of soldiers will resent those who stayed at home even more than the Nam vets and others did, because at least back then the ones who didn’t go to war didn’t go so out of their way to justify their cowardice/indifference/anti-war feelings/whatever other reason to themselves, the soldiers and everyone else. All this support the troops showmanship is really for ourselves as much as it’s for them.
cyntax
@stuckinred:
See, that’s what you want: military grade black humor.
On your radio, not just in your foxhole.
LittlePig
Shannon, is gone I heard. She’s drifting out to sea. She always loved to swim away.
Dennis SGMM
John Cole, you were in the wrong war. AFVN (Armed Forces Vietnam) radio would play the Animals’ “We Gotta’ Get Out of This Place” every morning rolled over. It was our anthem.
Then there was the time in Fall 1971 that “Sergeant Sunshine,” the always same-named morning DJ, announced that he was suffering from astronaut fatigue (Spaced out) and proceeded to play the absolutely forbidden Country Joe and the Fish’s “Feel Like I’m Fixing to Die Rag.” It was a moment because I was on the ICC of a helo traversing the crater pockmarked southern Mekong Delta in yet another futile attempt to make people love us by killing them.
Sly
Tim Robbins really should have released the soundtrack for Bob Roberts. He and his brother would be billionaires from all the copyright infringement suits.
j
Meh.
I give it 2 clucks, Dick. It’s a shitty song that the Bush family used to prop up Lee Greenwald’s flat “career”, outside of that, it had no beat and you can’t dance to it. (Although she did her best “Elaine”).
Jennifer
This is less shameful than my honest-to-God reaction on the morning of 9/11, which went like this:
1. Oh my god, those poor people.
2. We’re going to have to deal with THIS with that moron in the White House?
3. Shit, now I’m gonna have to hear that shitty Lee Greenwood song over and over and over again.
I was right on all counts, unfortunately.
patroclus
@PIGL:
Arrgh. And that French thang too.:-(
My opinion on Canada is that ever since that Diefenbacher terminated the Avro Arrow and every single Canadian ran Terry Fox off the road and spit on him, everything up there has pretty much turned to s**t.
Omnes Omnibus
@Fuzz:It is entirely for nonmilitary. It is so that war pimps who have no clue can feel like they are doing their part. Fuck them.
maya
Wait a minute! Isn’t that the National Anthem now for Cheney’s, Halliburton? With revised lyrics, of course.
We’re proud to be new Du-bai-ans’
No regs, no rules, for we,
we’ll frick and frack
and we won’t come back
It’s so great to be tax free,
Did you hear – tax free!
Allah, bless the Du-bai-yay!
Citizen_X
@Dennis SGMM: Here’s some lovely Mekong music for you and stuckinred. I think it’s lovely, anyway. Those guys are going on tour soon, keep an eye out for them.
kdaug
The casket is empty
Abandon ye all hope
They ran off with the money
And left us with the rope
Redshift
I was at the Salt Lake Olympics, and one night we were on a train with a mostly international crowd and one group of drunk ‘Muricans. These drunks decided they needed to sing patriotic songs to show them furriners that USA! USA! is #1.
They started with this one, and it quickly became clear that they didn’t know any of the words beyond the first two lines. Then they went on to some of the more traditional songs, and they didn’t know them either.
What could have been a truly annoying incident instead turned hilarious and awesome.
PIGL
@patroclus: yes, we suck. Luckily for Americans, this has been widely reported.
Omnes Omnibus
Palate cleanser.
tkogrumpy
@Served: You won’t have to wait 50 years.
Corner Stone
@Davis X. Machina:
I was unaware they enjoyed the fiddle. Huh. Something new everyday.
Tax Analyst
“Volunteers of America” Jefferson Airplane
“Up against the wall/Up against the wall, mother-fuckers”
Corner Stone
@patroclus:
“Don’t take your guns to town son
Leave your guns at home Bill
Don’t take your guns to town”
patroclus
@Corner Stone:
Lay down your head, Tom Dooley. Lay down your head and cry.
Dennis SGMM
@Citizen_X:
Thanks for the link. I gave it a listen and it seems that although the background musicians have moved beyond the pentatonic scale beloved in the orient, the vocalist hasn’t. OTOH, what do I know? I’m still enjoying Cheb Khaled and Midival Punditz.
Beta Magellan
@MattR:
The Canadian patriotic country song’s video montage features mass transit and modern architecture. Hm.
Calouste
I’ve never heard of this song, but is this Black Flag’s take on the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen? No?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
black47, this should get equal time, along side greenwood’s rightie realmurkin propaganda
livin in america
Oh, it’s 6 o’clock and it’s time to rock
And me head is beatin’ like a drum
In the cold grey light, ah I feel like shite
And I can’t remember last night’s fun
Then the foreman says “C’mon now boys,
Stick your fingers down your throat and get to work”
And I wish to Christ I’d stayed home last night
Instead of drinkin’ in America
Oh, I knock down walls with big iron balls
And I mix cement by the ton
With me tongue hangin’ out for a bottle of stout
Sweatin’ bullets in the Brooklyn sun
Then I think of her up on Kingsbridge Road
Did she mean what she said last night
Oh Mammy dear, we’re all mad over here…
Livin’ in America
On me way downtown, I think of that clown
And the things that he said last night
Did he mean ’em at all or was it just drink talk
Oh, I must look a terrible sight
Put me makeup on as I watch the sun rise high over Fordham Road
Oh Mammy dear, we’re all mad over here
Livin’ in America
Ah, the kids aren’t dressed and the house is a mess
And the yuppies are networkin’ again
Kiss their darlin’s goodbye – “oh, we’ll be late tonight
But we should be home by eleven”
Oh, me little dears dry up your tears
Your parents are too busy makin’ money
Oh Mammy dear, we’re all mad over here
Livin’ in America
Workin’ with the black man, Dominican and Greek
In the snows of January or the drenchin’ August heat
No sick days or benefits and for Christ sakes don’t get hurt
The quacks over here won’t patch you up unless they see the bucks upfront
Lookin’ after babies fron crack of dawn ’til dusk
Changin’ dirty nappies and cleanin’ up the house
Is this what I’ve been educated for
To wipe the arse of every baby in America
Now the day is done, take the subway home
Squashed up like some sardine in a a can
In the Blarney Stone, drink a gallon of foam
‘Til I’m feelin’ half meself again
If she comes tonight, I’ll ask her outright
Ah what the hell, nothin’ ventured nothin’ gained….
And if she takes a chance, she might find romance
Now she’s livin’ in America
See him standing there with the ring in his ear
And the grin on the side of his face
With the fag in his mouth, oh I should watch out
For they say that he’s a real hard case
Should I take me chance or say “no thanks”
Ah what the hell, nothin’ ventured nothin’ gained
Oh Mammy dear, we’re all mad over here
Livin’ in America
Southern Beale
@RAM:
I posted that earlier today. Can you imagine? And yet it makes SO MUCH SENSE. Nothing describes the conservative mind more than accute paranoia.
mr. whipple
@patroclus:
Ok, that’s over the line.
stuckinred
Dave Rabbit Pirate Radio in the Nam
Bet they ain’t got that shit in AFPAK.
piratedan
her name was Sharon, she was a showgirl…..
stuckinred
And the little known Devils and Dust by the Boss about Iraq.
I got my finger on the trigger
But I don’t know who to trust
When I look into your eyes
There’s just devils and dust
We’re a long, long way from home, Bobbie
Home’s a long, long way from us
I feel a dirty wind blowing
Devils and dust
darkmatter
@Jennifer:
I definitely laughed at reading that. Isn’t it amazing that a bunch of jackasses that can’t understand, comprehend, and or enjoy some good old-fashioned musical black humour.
Comrade Mary
Oh man, isn’t it time to pick on the Aussies yet?
(I think I had this on the same K-Tel collection with Terry Jacks and The Poppy Family. Faithless little already lapsed Catholic that I was, I actually liked it, except for the way she fucked up the lyrics at the end and slipped in the Protestant wording.)
Oh, and here’s your Belgian chaser. I liked this one, too, even before I knew about the double entendre in the chorus.
Aaron
I like David Cross’s take on this:
When the line “and i’ll proudly stand up, next to you, and defend her still today,” tell them to go through with an enlist. We have lots of wars now, they should have plenty of chance to show their patriotism
Omnes Omnibus
@Comrade Mary: i didn’t know that was Belgian. Figures.
stuckinred
@Aaron: “Still today” implies the motherfucker did something when he was eligible.
Mike G
@harokin:
Their concept of ‘Christian’ makes believing dogma a virtue in itself, while disdaining good works, helping the needy or the difficult task of self-examination and working on your own flaws.
Their concept of ‘patriotism’ involves waving flags, making bombastic statements and singing jingoistic songs (and judging and bullying people who don’t do these things as enthusiastically) rather than any real commitment to service.
Basically, they’re all about lip service and empty rhetoric. They want to be regarded as awesome just for existing, and will droolingly follow anyone who indulges this conceit.
Comrade Mary
Just checking now, it turns out that Soeur Sourire had a much more complex, sympathetic and tragic life than I ever knew. Wow.
billgerat
For two months after 9/11, in the Federal shipyard where I work, they played all sorts of patriotic songs over the public address system all day long (why is it that only country music-themed songs are deemed “patriotic”?) “God Bless The USA” was the one played the most, and I still have a hate for that tune that burns hotter than a thousand suns. I grew up on country-western, but after listening to that crap every day at work I can’t stand to hear it any more.
Actually, I would have paid good money if I could have got them to play the Hendrix version of the national anthem, but that would have melted all their little military minds.
phinky
Noooo, Rachel Maddow featured it on her show.
And yes, I hate that song too.
bk
@batgirl:
She’s not running for Senate; she’s running for the seat in the 2nd Congressional District.
Steaming Pile
@Served: Actually, most of them are the same hippies who claim to have gone to Woodstock. Their new motto – never trust anyone under 30.
Steaming Pile
@Jennifer: Great minds think alike. My first reaction after “oh my God” was “please, God, let George W. Bush not be the complete fucking idiot I know he is.”
sistermoon
@Gus: You should’ve shoved him down the stairs, screaming, “This is for Benton Harbor, you facist!!!”
Frank Lee Mideer
I’m moving to Las Vegas now, cuz I need the laffs.
opie jeanne
@Southern Beale: The lyric is “I won’t forget the MEN who died, etc.”
It’s not religious at all, but could probably be twisted that way.
Steve M.
Linda McCartney is gone, but her (alleged) vocal style lives!