While I’m off with Mike today, terrorising WizardWorld attendees, I’ll let you argue about what this song puts me in mind of some days.

So, I’ve been thinking about Phil Ochs quite a bit lately. This shouldn’t be any particular surprise, as he’s probably my favorite singer/songwriter. He had a gift for both biting satire and metaphor that I find strongly appeals to my own sensibilities. And although he could often be highly political and topical, he lacked the narrow focus of vision that gives so much music of that nature a limited shelf-life. And he was hardly one to play the political dogma card. If you were on “his side” but you were still doing what he felt was wrong, he’d call you out on it. But there’s something about the last couple of months that has been bringing me back to some of Phil’s more overtly political songs. I think it’s the cylcical nature of politics. Although the songs were mostly written about forty years ago, they still seem frighteningly topical and current.

I mean, let’s look briefly at Draft Dodger Rag‘s closing verse:

… One thing you gotta see

I mean, not only does that aptly summarize what so many of today’s chicken-hawks were doing back then, it also nicely applies to a lot of the arm-chair generals of today.

And did I mention that he wasn’t content to let his side bask in the glow of their supposed moral superiority? He once famously defined a liberal as someone who is “ten degrees to the left of center in good times, ten degree to the right if it affects them personally.” Which, again, in Love Me, I’m a Liberal worked then, and still works for those members of the Democratic party who have abandoned the progressive cause, or like Nader only ape the speech of progressive causes to feed their own egos.

Once I was young and impulsive

So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal

Outside of a Small Circle of Friends still stands as one of the most stinging indictments of the casual cruelty Americans are capable of inflicting upon one another.

Oh look outside the window, there’s a woman being grabbed

Which isn’t to say that he was always critical. He wrote what is probably one of the most patriotic songs I’ve ever heard, Power and Glory, which, ironically enough, was once co-opted by Anita Bryant’s anti-gay crusades in Florida.

Here is a land full of power and glory

Her glory shall rest on us all

Yet she’s only as rich as the poorest of her poor

Only as tall as we stand

But the song I keep coming back to the most, the song that I haven’t been able to get out of my head for weeks, is the song that most describes how I feel about my country right now, and the people leading it. And it’s the song I’m going to be humming to myself when I go into the voting booth tomorrow. So here it is, in it’s entirety.

The War is Over by Phil Ochs

Silent Soldiers on a silver screen

And what’s this got to do with me

I declare the war is over

It’s over, it’s over

Drums are drizzling on a grain of sand

And they’re afraid that I’m afraid

I’m afraid the war is over

It’s over, it’s over

Angry artists painting angry signs

Pardon me if I refrain

I declare the war is over

It’s over, it’s over

So do your duty, boys, and join with pride

This country is too young to die

I declare the war is over

It’s over, it’s over

One-legged veterans will greet the dawn

You only are what you believe

I believe the war is over