Greg himself has acknowledged that this one is about bio-fuels. It's not about American foreign policy, except insofar as it is affected by our relationship with energy and its production.
"Back in '83 a man came to me and he told me
"son, our way of life is done"
But I was only young"
'83 doesn't seem to have a specific connotation in this case, although it may. It's probably a reference to the increasing scholarship on Global Climate Change in that period (although, again, most of that starts in 1970, so it could be an arbitrary "past date"). The overall point, however, is that as climate change became more publicized, scientists told us: look, our way of life is done. We can't sustain it. But we covered our ears and refused to hear them.
"With an eye to the fields speculators and yields
rotten to the core
Monoculture whores entered the bidding wars
from distant shores"
So first, we should place a comma in here to offer some context: "With an eye to the fields speculators and yields, rotten to the core", which is to say that this group of monoculture (a planting technique which leads to soil erosion and and unhealthy crop yield) whores turns their eyes to the ways that money could be made. This is the "Green Revolution" in which pesticide, hormone, and GMO use increase exponentially in American farming. It's also the period in which American grain exports become critical throughout the world, thanks to a nasty little solution we put in almost all of our food, known as corn syrup.
The chorus is pretty straightforward: Greg, Brett, et al don't want to find themselves in a nation that has freed itself from one hydrocarbon source (oil) only to render itself impoverished on another source (bio-fuels). These are the "Grains of Wrath", although the source is largely corn.
"Oh the sinuous trails of concrete and rails and
exhausted roars
Population wars setting our future course"
Here, we see the confluence of transportation imagery and a future ruled by international conflict over resources for a growing population. The primary effect of the bio-fuel scam has been to drive up food prices and cause famine in developing nations. This is causing population pressure and conflict already, and as it worsens, we will see inter-group conflict in both the developing and developed world increase, as resources become scarcer.
"Is profit and greed the only conceit on a scale
between
Mere prosperity and inhumanity? It may well be"
Effectively: is making money the only reason we will turn our heads from a path to mere prosperity, which, although inefficient, won't bankrupt us (electrical cars, alternative energy), and to a world ruled by resource war and monoculture agricultural disaster?
Greg himself has acknowledged that this one is about bio-fuels. It's not about American foreign policy, except insofar as it is affected by our relationship with energy and its production.
"Back in '83 a man came to me and he told me "son, our way of life is done" But I was only young"
'83 doesn't seem to have a specific connotation in this case, although it may. It's probably a reference to the increasing scholarship on Global Climate Change in that period (although, again, most of that starts in 1970, so it could be an arbitrary "past date"). The overall point, however, is that as climate change became more publicized, scientists told us: look, our way of life is done. We can't sustain it. But we covered our ears and refused to hear them.
"With an eye to the fields speculators and yields rotten to the core Monoculture whores entered the bidding wars from distant shores"
So first, we should place a comma in here to offer some context: "With an eye to the fields speculators and yields, rotten to the core", which is to say that this group of monoculture (a planting technique which leads to soil erosion and and unhealthy crop yield) whores turns their eyes to the ways that money could be made. This is the "Green Revolution" in which pesticide, hormone, and GMO use increase exponentially in American farming. It's also the period in which American grain exports become critical throughout the world, thanks to a nasty little solution we put in almost all of our food, known as corn syrup.
The chorus is pretty straightforward: Greg, Brett, et al don't want to find themselves in a nation that has freed itself from one hydrocarbon source (oil) only to render itself impoverished on another source (bio-fuels). These are the "Grains of Wrath", although the source is largely corn.
"Oh the sinuous trails of concrete and rails and exhausted roars Population wars setting our future course"
Here, we see the confluence of transportation imagery and a future ruled by international conflict over resources for a growing population. The primary effect of the bio-fuel scam has been to drive up food prices and cause famine in developing nations. This is causing population pressure and conflict already, and as it worsens, we will see inter-group conflict in both the developing and developed world increase, as resources become scarcer.
"Is profit and greed the only conceit on a scale between Mere prosperity and inhumanity? It may well be"
Effectively: is making money the only reason we will turn our heads from a path to mere prosperity, which, although inefficient, won't bankrupt us (electrical cars, alternative energy), and to a world ruled by resource war and monoculture agricultural disaster?