Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts

Friday 19 April 2019

This Land Is YOUR Land


Tonight I caught a bit of a program I was recording about the great Woody Guthrie , Three Chords and The Truth which will be available on BBC iPlayer for the next month. While it is a great song and applies to any country, but is geographically situated in the USA stating that the land belongs to the people , not to governments and not to corporations.

I didn't know it had been used at Barack Obama's Inauguration as while it was sung in schools as an almost national anthem, only the first three verses were sung because the next three were deemed offensive.

At the Inauguration all six verses were sung, and it was very uplifting and moving and I am glad to be able to share it with you on this post thanks to Youtube. The documentary is very revealing but I just had to share this with you. Here are those words:

This Land Is Your Land
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
As I went walkin', I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said : 'No trespassing'
But on the other side it didn't say nothin'
That side was made for you and me.
In the shadow of the steeple, I saw my people
By the relief office, I'd seen my people
As they stood hungry, I stood there askin'
If this land made for you and me ?
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
Nobody living can ever stop me
As I go walking that freedom highway
Nobody living can ever make me turn back
This land was made for you and me.
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
As I went walkin', I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said: 'No trespassing'
But on the other side it didn't say nothin'
That side was made for you and me.
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
Songwriters: Woody Guthrie
This Land Is Your Land lyrics © S.I.A.E. Direzione Generale, Ludlow Music Inc., Woody Guthrie Publications Inc, LUDLOW MUSIC OBO WOODY GUTHRIE PUBLICATION INC, LUDLOW MUSIC INC OBO WOODY GUTHRIE PUBLICATIONS
Enjoy , digest and remember This Land is YOUR Land
I suggest you watch and enjoy

The documentary features Billy Bragg now a UK music elder statesman (though he's younger than me), but I was surprised that I couldn't track  down a Springsteen recording of the song on Amazon as I am sure he has recorded the song, but maybe not.

Tuesday 24 September 2013

It's Dark Now ... But The Dawn Will Soon Be Here




The Strypes do make a brilliant wake up call!

 One of the problems in getting up really early (4:30 am today) , is that it's dark and you know in a couple of hours you need to be in work. There's not enough time to go back to sleep (I had six hours which is enough for me) so you sort of are awake and wanting to do things.

The Sun Will Rise
My minds abuzz with thoughts and ideas and I'm looking forward to my my train journey south. I still need to take drugs and stuff, but it means I can do things at a leisurely pace instead of rushing around.

I can be sure everything will be on time and work perfectly for me, and I have a small but very interesting problem to solve at work. It's one of those things that's annoying and boring, but I want to get my head round it and understand what is happening.

These are the sort of things that keep us thinking and stop life from being boring. Yes it's a challenge , and yes I will find a solution , but at the moment I am still trying to work things out.

I also need to devote some more time to my book in order to get it up to maybe 10K words a week. Because I work during the day I am going to have to restructure my none work time , but ,that's life. It's what we all do.

I also have to prepare an answer for some anti Barack Obama people (this isn't work) but it is amazing how people pluck figures out of the air and wave them around like it's actually true. There are some figures for you here.

Anyway, feeling very positive about today , so you all go out and enjoy yourself, I know I am going to.

Sunday 28 October 2012

The Repulican Christian Way

Was worried to see today that Mitt Romney was seeing no reason why the 350,000 Christian Churches in the USA could not be mobilised to bet the black man out of the the Whitehouse and put the rich white man back in the driving seat. Some details here .

The thing about this is that Christianity is getting hijacked for private gain , to make the rich richer and anyone else an ignorant slave underclass .

Let's assume that God exists , and the Bible is reasonably believable. Now the Jesuits were the first people to point out to me that Jesus was not a long haired white man , but middle eastern and at least very sun tanned. Also he taught love for your fellow man and to help people who were worse off than you .






There's a lot of good moral lessons in The Bible that hold true whatever your religion or non religion. I bet Richard Dawkins find big chunks of it that contains common sense.

People like Romney , just like the Taliban with the Koran cherry pick bits to suit their purposes , and amazingly people then believe it's true when they sauy "The Bible says ...."  , whether it's stone a woman to death or nuke Iran.

One of Romney's kids says he want to punch Obama . Well Obama is black and has a name that sounds like Osama Bin Laden. Remeber just after the twin towers attack George made sure the Bin Laden family were flown out of the USA before the FBI could question them.

Romney doesnt believe that the rich should be taxed. Quotes like "The problem with $40 million dollars is that it becomes $20 million after tax" are not funny , when a lot of the American underclas have the problem that "$400 after tax and living expenses becomes - $200 ".


I have no problem with economies being run efficiently but the benefits should be for all , not just a select few.