Trump's America

I wasn't able to get to the University of Illinois at Chicago on Friday to "greet" Donald Trump, because I was stuck taking a deposition that had been scheduled weeks earlier.

By the time I made it home, I was able to catch the tail-end of the UIC event on CNN. I was happy to see that thousands of my fellow Chicagoans had turned out to let Trump know that his hate-filled rhetoric wasn't going to fly in this city.

An hour later, I began recording a Trump song, which I had started writing earlier in the week. My good buddy and longtime music compadre Steve Doyle took time out of his busy Saturday morning to lay down his electric guitar track, and by Saturday afternoon our song and video were ready to go.

The spark for this tune came from Trump's tired slogan -- recycled from a Reagan campaign -- "Make America Great Again."

Whenever I hear that line, I ask myself what period of "greatness" Trump wants us to revisit? The Ozzie & Harriet years? The Reagan era? The Dred Scott days?

Depending on one's skin color, gender, ethnicity and/or sexual orientation, those were tough times for a lot of Americans. But what the hell, every candidate needs a slogan.

And Trump now has a song to go along with that slogan.

Trump's America
(M. Farmer)

In a Trump t-shirt and a bright red hat
He stopped me outside of the laundromat
And said, "Howdy, brother, would you like to join our fight?"

He said, "We need to take this country back
From those godless gays and the brown and the black,
Can you help Mr. Trump as he tries to make things right?

"He's gonna build our nation a great big wall
And get Mexico to pay for it all
'Cause he's a businessman who knows how to get things done

"He'll keep out the drugs and Mexican rapists
ISIS thugs and no-'count papists
And make America safe for everyone"

And then that man in the red hat looked me straight in the eye and said, "Are you with us, brother? Will you help Mr. Trump make America great again?"

Well, I could barely contain myself, but I paused, took a deep breath, gathered my thoughts . . . and then I asked him a couple of questions . . .

Before you make America great again
Can you take a moment and remind me when
That greatness stretched from sea to shining sea?

'Cause I know all about the Jim Crow years,
The Stonewall raid, and the Trail of Tears
And the strange fruit hanging from a poplar tree

Was our country really at its best
When internment camps filled the Great Northwest
Or when old man Daley busted heads back in '68?

This nation's always worked well for some
But it'll never be great for everyone
If it's run by a man who encourages fear and hate

Well, that threw him for a loop
But truth be told, I was just getting started . . .

I said your man's a bully and a carnival barker
Peddlin' fear of folks whose skin's a bit darker
Than that crazy shade of orange that he likes to wear

Sellin' Trump University class online
Along with steak, water, and vanity wine
And Lord don't even get me started on that yellow hair

And I won't even bother tryin' to hide my scorn
About his crazy claim that there's a Kenyan-born
Man in the office the he's now tryin' to win

So if two Corinthians ever walk in a bar
And ask how our nation has fallen so far
Tell 'em President Trump was the guy who did us in

Before you make America great again
Can you take a moment and remind me when
That greatness stretched from sea to shining sea?

'Cause I know all about Hoover's FBI
COINTELPRO and the need to spy
On folks who fought and died just to be free

Was our country really at its best
When you paid a poll tax and had to pass a test
If you were black and wanted to vote in a Southern state?

This nation's always worked well for some
But it'll never be great for everyone
If it's run by a man who encourages fear and hate

So go vote for someone else before it's too late