John Prine was on Stephen Colbert’s show last week (and a doff of the hat to my brother Ethan for alerting me to his appearance) and it was great to see the old boy again. The host is clearly a fan and gave one of America’s great singer-songwriters the respect (and time) he was due.
Prine returned at the height, or depths, of the Iraq war to remind us that some statements are timeless, as is some stupidity. In concert he trotted out one of his songs from his first album by saying, in his rusty twang, “Here’s a song George Bush requested. Well, he didn’t request it, but he’s sure been askin’ for it.” Then he sang “Your flag decal won’t get you into heaven anymore/It’s already overcrowded from your dirty little war…”
I found myself wishing Prine would bring his act to the White House now and sing another one of his Vietnam War era gems, “The Great Compromise” to our current president.
“The idea I had in mind was that America was this girl you used to take to drive-in movies,” he wrote of the tune years later. “And then when you went to get some popcorn, she turned around and screwed some guy in foreign sports car. I really love America. I just don’t know how to get there anymore.”
Prine’s narrator doesn’t react when his date ditches him, even though some call him a coward. “I’d druther have names thrown at me,” he sings, “than to fight for a thing that ain’t right.”
Now Obama seems to be betting on Syria agreeing to give up all their chemical weapons, a solution that Russia is pushing. (I don’t know why but when I think of our president in the company of Assad and Putin I recall Pinocchio in the company of the fox and the cat, headed off for Pleasure Island…) Until this morning, Obama seemed poised on the verge of launching Tomahawk missiles at Syria, while we were left to contemplate the meaning of the words “right” and even “fight,” in this case. His administration is downplaying the scope and potential of any US attack – an “unbelievably small, limited kind of effort,” Secretary of State John Kerry called it yesterday. Which is a little like the dentist saying, “You won’t feel a thing.” But the consequences of our actions can’t be predicted. Ask anyone in Iraq.
Then there’s the question of what’s right. The whole world should be condemning Assad’s use of chemical weapons. But the whole world is not. England, France, even the Arab nations are kind of mumbling about what to do. Kerry could not name the nations who stood with the US on attacking Syria yesterday, but he assured us they were there. This reminds me of Bush’s “Coalition of the Willing”—which included such army-less states as Palau and Micronesia. We are standing shoulder to shoulder with ghosts.
Obama is clearly a rather reluctant warrior. In his speech and his body language he reminds me of the kid going to fight in the parking lot because someone called him out, marching to battle (or at least to throw a few punches and maybe get his ass kicked) when he’d rather be in chess club, or reading poetry. Consider that next move carefully, o Commander in Chief. Listen to your inner poet. Or borrow a line from Martin Buber, whose songs are still in heavy rotation in my house: “When a man has made peace with himself he will be able to make peace in the world.”
And not before.