An elementary school around Boston was having the kids sing at an assembly. Pretty typical stuff. The motif was about the 50 states and they were going to sing some songs. But the final song was set to be Lee Greenwood’s anthemic “God Bless the USA.”
You know, I don’t even have to write anymore because you already know what happens next. Some jellyfish spined administrator decided that song was way to…uhm…God-y so they didn’t just cancel the song, they changed the lyrics from “God bless the USA” to “We love the USA.”
Now for the good news. Parents complained. That’s actually pretty impressive nowadays that parents actually complained. So what did the school do?
The school decided there would be no singing at the assembly at all.
That’s bizarre enough. But then it goes from bizarre to surreal. The songwriter and original singer of the song Lee Greenwood heard about the controversy and issued this statement, according to CBS:
“Maybe the school should have asked the parents their thoughts before changing the lyrics to the song. They could have even asked the writer of the song, which I of course would have said you can’t change the lyrics at all or any part of the song. The most important word in the whole piece of music is the word God, which is also in the title God Bless The USA. We can’t take God out of the song, we can’t take God out of The Pledge of Allegiance, we can’t take God off of the American currency. Let us also remember, the phrase God Bless the USA has a very important meaning for those in the military and their families, as well as new citizens coming to our Country. The song is played at every naturalization ceremony behind The National Anthem. If the song is good enough to played and performed in its original setting under those circumstances, it surely should be good enough for our children.”
Behold the awesomely awesomeness of Lee Greenwood who simply puts his words onto a statement and voila! Greenwood gets results.
Right after Greenwood spewed his verbiage, the Superintendent of the schools must have heard that Greenwood had released a statement, defecated all over himself, and issued a statement saying that the songs in their original form as Greenwood intended are back in and and they will sing Greenwood’s song the way it was written.
So you’ve got your happy ending. God is back in. Thanks to Lee Greenwood.
