President Liberace is selling off the museum again
To feed his fat dead father, whose unquiet spirit
Is possessed by Geronimo, for when stole this last Indian's bones
For his campus clubhouse, and so the blood of America
Is demanded in sacrifice.
Housing, health care, clean air, freedom, truth —
These are the trinkets he is pawning with his glitzy smile,
As if the buyer should be pleased with these luxuries.
"One should learn to live without such things," he says,
As he stashes the receipts in a secret bank account.
"There are things more important than these," he blinks,
As he stumbles to the keys, and plays the insane
Melodies of long-dead patronized and patronizing composers
Who not less than ten years ago were scorned with a rage
Now reserved for the cacophonous moderns.
He forgets some notes, glosses over archaic flourishes,
But the song comes out about the same:
"...The magnificent flag remembers magnificent wars,
When men thought with their guns on
And all women were whores,
When those who toiled for our liberty
Were not merely sores
We must fight so hard to ignore.
Recall when the truth served at the pleasure of kings,
Not the underfed press
And disinterested magazines,
When righteousness reigned all over the land,
There were no coup d'etats,
No dirtied hands.
When we picked and we chose and we made our demands,
There was no one to talk of the wounded or missing,
They were drowned by the brass of the band.
A tone of voice could open doors
(Not like now when the rich are subjected to scorn),
Goodness depended on how you adorned it,
The ones with nothing were the scoundrels.
The trains couldn't run if the rich went to jail,
Ministers could always open your mail,
The weak willed were in chains, not begging for meat,
The unjustly imprisoned could keep quiet and meek,
Because the free were better than the enslaved."
Amid this nostalgic revelry he paused —
"Ah, but things now are not that bad after all...
The streets can be cleaned by declaring a war.
Our friends have seen to it that we can't help the poor.
We've gouged and we've gouged and we've gouged some more,
And none of the people have anything to show,
And, as we predicted, the gold is back in good hands.
We've revved up the dream machines and plugged up the holes,
The price of admission is your dark-hearted soul,
It's what you have, not what you know,
There are better off than you who can't say no.
We've bribed the do-gooders, fine-printed the sentiment of compassion,
And shown everyone that wiping your ass with the Constitution aids the digestion.
Those who oppose our wars are unpatriotic...
Those who question our values are immoral...
The poor, not the rich, are the selfish ones..."
And on and on this broadcast went on,
Followed by opponents who said "Yes, but look at my hairdo"
And critics who noted how strong and finely tuned his tone,
Then back to Liberace, with songs that went out
To every home, and no one was sure if anyone was listening,
But they stayed still, as one by one, all the doors were sealed.
