Happy Birthday Uncle Sam!

[tugmoose]

"Maybe it's true that we are all descended from the restless, the nervous, the criminals, the arguers and brawlers, but also the brave and independent and generous. If our ancestors had not been that, they would have stayed in their home plots in the other world and starved over the squeezed-out soil...

 

"We all have that heritage, no matter what old land our fathers left. All colors and blends of Americans have somewhat the same tendencies. It's a breed - selected out by accident. And so we're overbrave and overfearful - we're kind and cruel as children. We're overfriendly and at the same time frightened of strangers. We boast and are impressed. We're oversentimental and realistic. We are mundane and materialistic - and do you know of any other nation that acts for ideals? We eat too much. We have no taste, no sense of proportion. We throw our energy around like waste. In the old lands they say of us that we go from barbarism to decadence without an intervening culture. Can it be that our critics have not the key or the language of our culture?" - John Steinbeck.

[aricandover]

[bjorn_skurj]

Liberty Belle is ringing out across the sea

And everyone sings along

Though she's singing way out of key

From the shores of Galilee

To the runways of Anglesey

You know we're digging to hell

Right past our oil wells

As the magpies fly from Tallahassee

To the sky

Memory Lane forgot her way after all this time

And she never learned from her mistakes

And all the crime

That caused the gulf of misery

That's separating you from me

You know we're digging to hell

Drowing in our oil wells

As the seagulls fly from Abu Dhabi

To the sky

 

The birds still sing their melodies

Songs of love and food and trees

Oh my, how they fly

So little do they know, yeah

Yet their days are numbered so

Alarms are ringing in the trees:

 

You know you're digging to hell

Drowning in your oil wells

As the ashes fly from New York City

Past the grimy clouds above New Jersey

Past the kids who like to smoke like chimneys

To the sky