On Memorial Day 2006: Listening to Neil Young's "Living with War"

I've been listening to Neil Young's awesome, heartfelt, and rocking album, "Living with War" today, and thinking about the sacrifice that has been made by American men and women in Iraq over the course of the last three years. (For Memorial Day Neil is running a video of America the Beautiful the closing song from the album.)

Some might find it odd to listen to what amounts to an album-length protest of the war and the actions of the Bush administration as a tribute on Memorial Day, but it seems appropriate to me to stop and reflect on how these lives have been spent. Was it worth it? Did we do the right thing? Or did those young men and women die for something other than what was in the best interest of our nation? Did they die for an American ideal, or did they die to support the theories of a group of ideologues who had a theory on how to bring democracy to the Middle East?

History will judge, if it hasn't done so already, and not only will our leaders be judged, but we as a people will be judged as well. I see a time in the future when our children and grandchildren will look at us and ask, "How were you so easily misled? Why didn't you ask more questions? Why didn't you demand more from your leaders?"

I'm not sure how I'll answer those questions. But I'm glad that Neil Young has given voice to my doubts and my anger. While "Let's Impeach the President" has gotten the most press, there are many terrific songs on that album. My personal favorite is the impeccable "Shock and Awe":

Back in the days of shock and awe
We came to liberate them all
History was the cruel judge of overconfidence
Back in the days of shock and awe

Back in the days of "mission accomplished"
Our chief was landing on the deck
The sun was setting on a golden photo op
Back in the days of "mission accomplished"

Thousands of bodies in the ground
Brought home in boxes to a trumpet's sound
No one sees them coming home that way
Thousands buried in the ground

Thousands of children scarred for life
Millions of tears for a soldier's wife
Both sides are losing now
Heaven takes them in
Thousands of children scarred for life

We had a chance to change our mind
But somehow wisdom was hard to find
We went with what we knew and now we can't go back
But we had a chance to change our mind.

We'll likely see more aggrieved parents and wives and brothers and sisters and girlfriends honoring the sacrifice that their loved ones made when the Memorial Day 2007 rolls around. My hope is that those memorials and those sacrifices stay with us, and before another American President stands before his nation and says that we must spend the lives of our young people we all do our duty and question whether it is the right thing to do. Because if there is one lesson that we should take away from the war in Iraq, it's that we were all too quick to send someone else's kid to war. That we all should have done more to be responsible citizens and question authority.

Thanks, Neil, for the reminder.

(For more on this album see this interview of Neil Young posted at YouTube.)

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