made for you and me
The white cracker who wrote the national anthem knew what he was doing. He set the word “free” to a note so high that nobody could reach it. That was deliberate. Nothing on earth sounds less like freedom to me. (Tony Kushner, Angels In America)
Fuck “The Star-Spangled Banner.” The all-time best “patriotic song” is Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land.” And while I don’t get super-invested in nationalist displays (I don’t even remember the last time I’ve actually spoken the Pledge of Allegiance despite working in education), I got a little misty when I watched Pete Seegar and Bruce Springsteen play it (”subversive” lyrics included) on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
January 18th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
I caught Seeger/Springsteen singing This Land is Your Land live. What an amazing moment in Americana. I didn’t really understand Garth Brooks singing Miss American Pie… perhaps there’s a patriotic meaning in there other than Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper losing their lives in a plane crash and the loss of American innocence, that I just never got. On the whole, the event made me well up with pride. I’m a puss.