Funny Songs: Political Science

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A new week, with the same old theme: songs that I personally find humorous. Today’s song really was funny once upon a time. The king of sarcasm had to show up on this list…the problem was picking a song. In the end, it wasn’t that hard. Here’s today’s song. Political Science - Randy Newman Today’s word, boys and girls, is JINGOISM. Nothing to do with misspelling Ringo’s name. Collin’s online dictionary defines the word as a “strong and unreasonable belief in the superiority of your own country.” Sound familiar? When Randy Newman recorded this in 1972, we weren’t in the throes of nationalism. In fact, we were feeling pretty “down” about ourselves, as were other countries. The year after this was released Canadian broadcaster Gordon Sinclair recorded an opinion piece called “The Americans (a Canadian’s Opinion),” which pointed out how America was the country that ran to help other nations after a disaster but, in contrast, received no help from other countries when facing their own natural calamities. (It’s a pretty powerful piece, if you’ve never heard it, I suggest listening to it….hopefully before this song, so as to make this song funnier.) There’s a live clip of Newman doing the song from a dozen years ago, saying that “nobody laughs at this song anymore.” That’s the problem with satire: too many people take it literally. (I can think of a couple of politicians who’d probably use this for their political theme, except Newman most likely wouldn’t let them…I can see him sending them a letter: “Dear (whomever): IT’S. A. JOKE.”) Can you believe the guy who wrote all those sweet songs in Toy Story did this?! That’s the beauty of Randy Newman. Political Science Written by Randy Newman Recorded by Randy Newman From Sail Away, 1972 Italian shoes for me: