Woody Guthrie was such a powerful songwriter that people still talk about him even though he’s a folk musician who’s been dead for almost 50 years. He was known, first and foremost, for his overt politicism, and in particular for his progressive/liberal leanings. He attacked many an institution, and person, with his writings, and one of those people had a very prominent name: Trump.
Now, Guthrie was not writing about Home Alone 2 star Donald Trump, but instead his father Fred Trump. Like his son, ol’ Freddie made his bones in the real estate business. And, like, his son, Fred Trump was a total douchebag. In 1950, Guthrie moved into a housing project owned by Fred called Beach Haven, which, it turned out, was segregated, and did not allow black people to have residence there.
Naturally, this did not sit well with Guthrie, and in his notebooks, they found two poems that were written as polemics against Fred Trump and his policies. The first poem goes like this:
I suppose
Old Man Trump knows
Just how much
Racial Hate
he stirred up
In the bloodpot of human hearts
When he drawed
That color line
Here at his
Eighteen hundred family project ….
And the second one is as follows:
Beach Haven ain’t my home!
I just cain’t pay this rent!
My money’s down the drain!
And my soul is badly bent!
Beach Haven looks like heaven
Where no black ones come to roam!
No, no, no! Old Man Trump!
Old Beach Haven ain’t my home!
Well, based upon Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, it would seem the proverbial apple did not fall far from the tree. While Woody isn’t around to fire shots at Donald, his son Arlo, also a folk musician, is still kicking. Maybe he would like to write some poems like Woody did. You know, keep family traditions alive.
(Via Billboard)
