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Title : "Yes, it is overwrought and jingoistic. It glorifies war. It trumpets self-righteousness."
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"Yes, it is overwrought and jingoistic. It glorifies war. It trumpets self-righteousness."

Writes Arvin Temkar in a WaPo 4th-of-July-weekend column titled "My fellow liberals hate Lee Greenwood’s ‘God Bless the USA.’ I love it. On Independence Day, there’s always room for a syrupy salute."

Overwrought, jingoistic, self-righteousness, war-glorifying... really? Why does it make some people feel that's what it says when that's absolutely not in the words? Where does that extra-textualism come from?

Let's look at the words. It begins with a completely personal focus on the nuclear family:

If tomorrow all the things were gone I'd worked for all my life
And I had to start again with just my children and my wife

It then expresses appreciation for the country because of exactly one thing: freedom. If the man had to start again with nothing... Well, actually, he's not up for the hypothetical without keeping his wife and children. But if all that he'd worked for were lost, he still be "lucky" to be living in America because he'd have freedom. 

I'd thank my lucky stars to be livin' here today
'Cause the flag still stands for freedom and they can't take that away

I always wonder at this point: Yes, but what if you didn't have that foundation of wife and children, would freedom be enough to give you the nerve and the drive to start over again? And also: But they can take freedom away! However you want to interpret the flag — some might think it stands for the glorification of war — symbolism doesn't ensure that the thing symbolized will not be taken away. The problem with the song at this point is naivete, and one suspects faux naivete.

Next we get the chorus, which begins with an underscoring of the importance of freedom:

And I'm proud to be an American where at least I know I'm free

The clunker in there is "at least." We go from the idea that a man could rebuild his life if only he has freedom to pride about living in a country that might not offer anything else but freedom. (By the way, there's no antecedent for "where." Grammatically, it should be something like I'm proud to live in America where at least I know I'm free, but that would introduce the conceptual problem of non-Americans who live in America.  I'm proud to be a citizen of America where at least I know I'm free... too many syllables.)

The chorus then brings in the "men who died," but maintains the focus:

And I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me

Not all who fought for freedom died, not all who fought (whether they died or lived) were men, and these people did not give you the right to freedom. The Declaration of Independence — which we celebrate this weekend — says that the Creator gave us these rights and that the people institute government to protect the rights that God endowed us with. Our government sometimes goes to war, and when it does men (and women) may die, and sometimes the war — notably the Revolutionary War — is fought to protect our ability to exercise our rights, but the war dead haven't given us our rights.

That's a little sermon from me about rights and the meaning of The Declaration of Independence. But let's continue with the chorus:

And I'd gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today
'Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land
God bless the USA

That part is simple enthusiasm — love for country (which works for any country, free or not) — and a simple prayer addressed to the God who wasn't noticed in the first line of the chorus. Hopefully, he's used to weathering disrespect and isn't too irked at another demand for blessing.

Now, we get the other verse, the only other verse, and it's that from-the-mountains-to-the-prairies review of geography that we've come to expect in songs and speeches:

From the lakes of Minnesota, to the hills of Tennessee
Across the plains of Texas, from sea to shining sea
From Detroit down to Houston and New York to LA

The man who wrote the song — Lee Greenwood — was born in LA. I'm just reading his Wikipedia bio now. I see he's lived his life mostly in LA and Reno and Las Vegas. You might want to factor that into your understanding of the lyrics. As for how Tennessee got such pride of place in the song, Greenwood's wife is a former Miss Tennessee. She's his fourth wife. That makes me think of the first verse in a completely new way. My wondering is over. I think Greenwood would be just fine starting again even without his wife. Divorce still stands for freedom and they can't take that away.

The song's almost over. There's a couple of lines that seem to be written to set up another singing of the chorus. At first glance, they seem inconsequential, merely serviceable, but now that I reread them, I find them really very bad:

Well, there's pride in every American heart

That's plainly a lie, and it's a presumptuous lie that's out of keeping with his supposedly favorite value, freedom. It's not possible that every American is proud to be an American. Speak for yourself. Invite others to sing along if they agree. But don't purport to say how everyone else feels. Our freedom means that we are free to feel humility or even contempt for America. Your enthusiasm for freedom falls flat.

The final lead-in to the chorus is:

And it's time we stand and say that...

Don't tell me what to do. It's a free country.

But it's a song. As Bob Dylan said in his Nobel Prize speech, "songs are unlike literature." "They're meant to be sung, not read." They're "alive in the land of the living." And "God Bless the USA" is a big sing-along song that comes alive when people — free people — choose to stand up and sing, not because Greenwood dictates that "it's time" they stand up and sing, but because they feel inspired by something about the melody and the key words — flag, freedom, proud, love, USA. No one's parsing the words.

I've never parsed the words before just now, and I've heard the song many times and understood the spirit. I was surprised to find what I did in the lyrics. I was only motivated to look closely because of the WaPo column, because I didn't believe the lyrics would support Temkar's assertion that overwrought, jingoistic, self-righteousness, and war-glorifying. I was right, and Temkar is wrong. But Temkar and I share the opinion that the song delivers a real-time experience of expressing enthusiastic love for America. It's alive in the land of the free.

Thus articles "Yes, it is overwrought and jingoistic. It glorifies war. It trumpets self-righteousness."

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