[Dialogue] The Bailout Blues: final version

[W. J.]

Note: this topical song got written because it just had to be. I arise at 5 am every morning, look at the very latest news stories, and the lines practically jump off the page and write themselves. Or if I can't sleep, I get up in the middle of the night and write down another verse or two that's already in my head. Or I walk through my neighborhood, paying particular attention to marginalized people on the streets, and hear this song ringing in my ears.
In other words, this songwriting is not the result of idle activity, like maybe doing a crossword puzzle. It's a way of organizing and being present to a profound moment of global consciousness. If you're offended by any of this, just delete and create your own alternative by yourself, and then send your own creativity out on the internet! Or just go back to sleep until it's all over.
 
With special fondness for Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, and the power of music that protests injustice!
 
Marshall
 
Oh yeah, to get the full power of this, you gotta SING it! All eighteen verses. If you sing the refrain after each verse, it will take long enough that you might actually believe something, or have a conviction about something, or want to change something by the time you finally get yourself to the end of the song. And that would be good if it motivates you to do anything. Like, maybe sending it out on the internet, for starters!
The Bailout Blues
Tune: I’ve been working on the railroad
Lyrics: Marshall Jones
 
Verse 1:
I just really need a bailout, all the live long day.
I just gotta have my bailout, just to keep my blues away.
Can’t you see the whistle blowers rise up so early with the sun?
Can’t you hear the lawyers shouting: Something must be done!
 
Refrain:
 
Bush has gotta go, Cheney’s gotta go, Lehman’s gotta go to jail.
Little did they know, when they told us so, we won’t have to put up bail.
 
Someone’s in collusion with Paulson
Someone making millions I know.
Someone’s in collusion with Wall Street,
Strumming on the old banjo.
 
And singing,
 
Fee, fie, nothing I owe.
Fee, fie, nothing I owe, owe, owe, owe.
Fee, fie, bailout, you know!
Strumming on the old banjo!
 
Verse 2:
I don’t need the regulations, just to do my job.
Gotta have deregulation, to enrich the corporate mob.
Can’t you see the money flooding out our corporate door?
While the stockholders are wond’ring, what’s it going for?
 
(Repeat refrain after each verse)
 
Verse 3:
I’m afraid of going bankrupt, for the world to see! 
I’m afraid to be convicted of irresponsibility.
Now the stockholders are wiped out, now we’re in the red,
And the Feds have come to close us, and they’ll have my head!
 
Verse 4:
Now we really need our bailout to cover up our ass
Not to blame our chronic lying, we believe this too shall pass.
Can’t we see our real illusion: that we’d never be
Accountable for our collusion for all the world to see.
 
Verse 5:
Why, oh why can’t we have health care, all the live long day?
Why we gotta bail out Wall Street, and not make those bastards pay?
We’ve been working all the shit jobs, just to pay the bill
So the Congress now can tax us, by voting on the Hill.
 
Verse 6:
Gotta work to pay for Iraq, all the live long day.
Gotta work to pay the mortgage we can’t afford to pay!
Now we gotta pay for bailouts, larger than we know,
Why, oh why can’t we just holler: let my people go!

Verse 7:
Got my guns and my religion, to love and to obey,
Gonna vote McCain and Palin, just to make this go away.
Can’t vote Biden and Obama: there’d be no First Dude!
As we await the Second Coming, we will all get screwed!
 
Verse 8:
Gotta screw the earth’s envir’nment: just drilll, baby, drill!
Gotta vote McCain and Palin, no matter what they will.
Still a registered Republican, but wiser than before.
Now we’re stuck with Bush and Cheney: shoulda voted for Al Gore!
 
Verse 9:
Gotta privitize the profit, and socialize the loss
Even though we can’t afford it, but now you know who’s boss.
Bush and Cheney really screwed us, even though they know
No weapons of mass destruction ever wounded so.
 
Verse 10:
Now we gotta have a bailout to save us from our sin.
Yes, without a massive bailout, our economy’s done in!
To save us from our own excesses, the rich will tax the poor
So we can go on exploiting the world beyond our door.
 
Verse 11:
Now we own the troubled assets that we owned before.
Now we simply dump the mortgage on the nation’s poor.
Can’t you you hear the bankers cheering? They won’t have to be
Stuck with all their worthless assets for eternity!
 
Verse 12:
Now our banks are newly solvent, now they want to lend
All their borrowed federal money so we can spend and spend!
Can’t you hear them loudly shouting that we’ll have more fun
When we rachet up the ceiling of what we owe someone.
 
Verse 13:
Now our fate is finally woven into global finance.
While the rich are getting richer, we will lose our pants!
Now our nation’s finally busted, more bankrupt than before!
Now they know just how to pay for another frigging war.
 
Verse 14:
Now we finally see the payoff for the banks to be
Lobbying our nation’s Congress for the right to flee
Corporate guaranteed destruction at the courthouse door
While the rest of us are left to mopping up the floor.
 
Verse 15:
Now we’re working all together just to save our skin.
Now we’ve had to hear the bad news, just to know the fix we’re in.

Now we share the risks with Wall Street whose esoteric lies
Manipulate the housing market with profits to the skies.
 

Verse 16:
We’re colluding with the Congress that wants to pass the buck.
For we know our debt is toxic, and we know we’re out of luck,
Now we simply pass it on as the massive National Debt
To the coming generations that never can forget.

 
Verse 17:
First they sold a sub-prime mortgage, then gave us sub-prime life
To make us all indentured servants, in economic strife.
Astronomic compensation, bonuses galore!
They can have their golden payoffs! Just kick them out the door.
 
Verse 18:
Now the bailout will not save us from terrorist attack.
Un-foreclose our second mortgage, or get our money back.
Never will it make us richer: poorer than before!
Likely it will only leave us the poorest of the poor.
 
 
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