I'd love to change the world

It's Saturday morning in the Logical Household. We were listening to music (off of the Logical Husbands MP3 player) while preparing breakfast when the 1971 hippy classic "I'd love to change the world" came on. The lyrics include all the classic liberal jingo:

"Everywhere is freaks and hairies
Dykes and fairies, tell me where is sanity
Tax the rich, feed the poor
Till there are no rich no more

I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you

Population keeps on breeding
Nation bleeding, still more feeding economy
Life is funny, skies are sunny
Bees make honey, who needs money, Monopoly

I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you

World pollution, there’s no solution
Institution, electrocution
Just black and white, rich or poor
Them and us, stop the war

I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you"

Tax the rich, feed the poor, control population, stop pollution, end the war....it's all there. Given that, I'm really surprised that it has not made come back on the radio.

What struck me, some thirty years after I first heard and fell in love with the song (the harmonies are wonderful) was the naivete of the lyrics. "Tax the rich feed the poor 'til there are no rich no more" and what happens when all the rich are gone? Who pays to feed the poor then? "Who needs money" - we all do? Otherwise how are you going to pay for things you need that someone else has. Trade is a fact of life - we have seen that communism - as in living in a commune where all members work for the "greater good" only works in a utopian world where people are all perfect and perfectly good....something that this world sorely lacks. "World pollution - there's no solution"...no solution? Since the inception of the Clean Air Act (signed by a Republican President no less) the air and water quality in the US has improved greatly. Is there still room for improvement, yeah however, saying there is no solution at all is the dictionary defination of "defeatist".

However, it is the chorus that really says it all. "I'd love to change the world...but I don't know what to do. So I leave it up to you!" Liberals love to change the world....at someone else's expense. Al Gore wants us all to drive hybrid cars and use fluoroescent lights and turn our thermostats down...in the name of taming global warming - all the while flying around the world in his private jet and riding in big SUVs promoting his movie. John Edwards talks about the two Americas and how the middle class needs to sacrific more in order to help those less fortunate - all the while living his American dream in a 28,000 square foot home with a private lounge and basketball court! To quote Jay Leno - I guess we know which America he lives in. The list goes on and on.

Now I admit, I don't know what the thought process was when this song was written. It certainly could have been a satire of the prevailing thoughts of the movement at the time - along the lines of the song "The Trees" by Rush. However, it falls in line with the prevelant philosophy of the listeners that the band was targeting, so anything is possible.