What Are Their Names

Sadly, this lyric makes as much sense today, as it did in the seventies when it came. Crosby speculated who was the REAL power behind behind the scenes in our glorious White House. The lyric questions our democracy, in a way that was necessary in the seventies, and, SADLY, is still necessary today.

If I can comment the music, then I have to say it's fantastic. The way the song builds up, and in the end deliver the all-powerful verse; great! :)

I often have this text in mind, it's always evergreen in its substance.

So directly expressed and the lyric does have a certain power in its brevity, but now, with the informed perspective gained from having seen all the wars that followed the one in Vietnam, these words seem a bit naive. We can see that it's not necessarily a matter of having unknown and unseen people directing our engagements from the shadows. It's obvious that war is good for business, most especially for those who make military weapons and other equipment, so those businesses have powerful lobbyists who wield significant influence on the executive and legislative branches of government. All those parties combine to support ever-increasing "defense" (i.e., military) budgets and no matter what's going on in the world there's always some rationale given for needing more of it and more sophisticated weaponry. Even if you agree with that rationale what about the strong likelihood that some of these weapons will end up in the hands of the enemy? Not unlike the gun industry and its lobbying arm. OK, so it's a bit naive to think that if only we knew who the decision-making people are we could talk them out of their militaristic inclinations. But, naivete aside, the desire to have an opportunity to give those folks a piece of one's mind is still admirable., if somehow enacted,(as in street protests) it's much better to speak out than do nothing in the face of what often looks like everyone's-armed-to-the-teeth insanity. .