Goin' rogue, 1964-style

Whence the feral elephant? Well -- this is why I love my job. Sometimes I actually have to go to the library, and to get to JK and JQ, you have to go through the music section, and because it's a library and not a way station in the intertubes, it actually rewards the occasional browse.

As is the case with Purnell, F., and Wells, H. (1964). The Republican song book. New York: Bobbs-Merrill. Strike up "Let's Forget that Medicare," maestro:

Now Mister President, forget that Medicare
We got troubles enough, don't you think?
With the taxes goin' up and the dollar goin' down
You're gonna drive us all to drink

We will never know just how the pioneers
Ever got across the great Divide
But we know for sure it wasn't a subsidy
That put 'em on the other side

So Mister President, I wanta emphasize
That two and two make four
Tho' there's lots of folks down there in Washington
Who think that ain't true anymore

I know we got the doctors, we got the wealth
But there's too danged many people who enjoy ill health!
So Mister President, forget that Medicare
We got troubles enough as it is!

This is hardly a breakthrough in American politics. Check out "The Democratic Donkey (Is In His Stall Again)" here,* or go enjoy the cover by Norman and Nancy Blake. And for that matter, one of the fun things about summer teaching is spending a little time on the Good Old Days of pre-mass-literacy political communication (knock yourselves out, Maddy Prior fans). But it's certainly a nice chance to look back at what was going on around the campfire at another turning point in the mass-mediated creation of meaning.

* It's really annoying to find out that there's a copy of "Democratic songs, poems and jokes for the 1936 campaign" as close as Central, but it's listed as library use only.