Song For Today

After the far right continually come to downtown Portland and attack people while the police do nothing, someone was bound to be killed, and someone was.  And then, as if in retribution, police executed Michael Reinoehl in a hail of bullets, with no body cams on, outside of Lacey, Washington.

I got an email yesterday from someone in the Hague named Ben Fraters, who described in prose and in rhyme what he had just witnessed.  A few emails back and forth as we both rewrote verses and added new ones, and, voila.

On September 3rd, 1991, one of the worst industrial accidents in US history took place in Hamlet, North Carolina, at a chicken processing plant that had never been inspected by any regulatory authorities, after 11 years of operation.  25 workers died, mostly Black women.

The mayor in Portland, Oregon is also the police commissioner.  His police are completely out of control, and have been since long before he took office.  In any case, he has failed to change the situation, when it needed changing most.  "Resign" is a call that gets louder every day around here.

On September 2nd, 2015, the limp body of refugee toddler, Aylan Kurdi, was found on a beach in Turkey.

On August 29th, 1921, ten thousand armed men were on one side of a valley, defending a prison, and over ten thousand union miners were besieging the town with the aim of freeing the prisoners.  West Virginia, during the Coal Mine Wars.

At this time in 2005, a hurricane was bearing down on the Gulf coast that would overwhelm the crumbling levees of the city of New Orleans.  A government response that vacillated between racist fear-mongering and criminal incompetence followed, as did a lot of mutual aid.

#Kenosha

A song about a few of those murdered by criminal police, with a very simple chorus.  Note to anyone performing the song anywhere:  there is intentionally room in the chorus to say a name in between every time you sing "say their names."  The last chorus can go on for a very, very long time.

On August 24th, 1814, in the course of the war that later became known as The War of 1812 (sic), the British Navy landed in Washington, DC.  Retaliating against the US Army's complete destruction of the Canadian city of York (later called Toronto), troops led by General Robert Ross set fire to a number of prominent US government buildings.  It was a great day for the construction industry.