In a message dated 11/24/2002 5:54:35 PM Eastern Standard Time, sixties@lists.village.virginia.edu writes:
[Quoting the article by Alexander Cockburn]
> When it comes to the big themes of love and war
> and history, nothing concentrates the mind like a
> few songs by Merle, whose 1969 pro-war country
> anthem "Okie from Muskogee" lambasted the
> dope-smoking hippie peaceniks
Now, let's take a good look at what the author calls Merle Haggard's "pro-war" ballad really says:
OKIE FROM MUSKOGEE
We don't smoke marijuana in Muskogee;
We don't take our trips on LSD
We don't burn our draft cards down on Main Street;
We like livin' right, and bein' free.
I'm proud to be an Okie from Muskogee,
A place where even squares can have a ball
We still wave Old Glory down at the courthouse,
And white lightnin's still the biggest thrill of all
We don't make a party out of lovin';
We like holdin' hands and pitchin' woo;
We don't let our hair grow long and shaggy,
Like the hippies out in San Francisco do.
And I'm proud to be an Okie from Muskogee,
A place where even squares can have a ball.
We still wave Old Glory down at the courthouse,
And white lightnin's still the biggest thrill of all.
Leather boots are still in style for manly footwear;
Beads and Roman sandals won't be seen.
Football's still the roughest thing on campus,
And the kids here still respect the college dean.
We still wave Old Glory down at the courthouse,
In Muskogee, Oklahoma, USA.
-- end of song --
There's only one line which could possibly be called
"pro-war." That's the one about burning draft cards
down on Main Street.
The rest of the song is a denunciation of what I would
call CULTURAL radicalism. Merle doesn't like pot-smokin,
long-haired, acid-brained, unpatriotic, beads'n'sandle-
wearin HIPPIES.
Get out your history books some time and take a look at
what the wobblies wore to their public demonstrations.
They were in SUITS with TIES. They wanted to look like
NORMAL people. The cultural radicals of the 60s and
their freaky ring-nosed purple-haired progeny of the
present ought to take a lesson from this.
Check out this photo of Joe Hill supporters. Do they look
like a bunch of freaks?
http://www.pbs.org/joehill/faces/index.html
-- Michael Wright
Norman, Oklahoma
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