Monday, July 29, 2002

Ah, the National Review, clueless as always.

While Born in the USA may well have been swept up in the "morning in America" sentiment of the Reagan years, The Rising is equally likely to capture the hearts and minds of an America still shaken by the events of last fall — as well as an America ready to move beyond boy bands and Britney Spears.

Though the reviewer is perhaps correct about Born in the USA being "swept up in the... sentiment of the Reagan years" methinks he doesn't actually mean it that way.


Let's punch up the lyrics to "Born in the USA."

Born down in a dead man's town
The first kick I took was when I hit the ground
You end up like a dog that's been beat too much
Till you spend half your life just covering up

Born in the U.S.A., I was born in the U.S.A.
I was born in the U.S.A., born in the U.S.A.

Got in a little hometown jam
So they put a rifle in my hand
Sent me off to a foreign land
To go and kill the yellow man

Born in the U.S.A....

Come back home to the refinery
Hiring man said Son if it was up to me
Went down to see my V.A. man
He said Son, don't you understand

I had a brother at Khe Sahn
Fighting off the Viet Cong
They're still there, he's all gone

He had a woman he loved in Saigon
I got a picture of him in her arms now

Down in the shadow of the penitentiary
Out by the gas fires of the refinery
I'm ten years burning down the road
Nowhere to run ain't got nowhere to go

Born in the U.S.A., I was born in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A., I'm a long gone Daddy in the U.S.A.

Born in the U.S.A., Born in the U.S.A.
Born in the U.S.A., I'm a cool rocking Daddy in the U.S.A