With God On Our Side?

By David Steffen

Oh, my name it means nothing, 

and my age it means less

For the country I come from, 

is called the Midwest

I was taught and brought up that, 

the laws to abide

And that the land that I live in, 

has God on its side

     I was heading up the Sales Department at A&M Records in the 1980s, traveling across the country and internationally. I visited almost all of the 50 United States, plus Canada, Japan, England, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Hong Kong, Singapore and others. Engaging in conversations with my counterparts from around the world, between 1980 and 1990 I learned a great deal, including the simple fact that over time, the more I interacted with my international friends, the more I learned what the world really thinks about many issues, and America. Don’t jump to conclusions. These managers from other countries didn’t open up and tell me how much they hated America (they didn’t) or how much they liked America (they did). The most direct question I consistently heard was “Why are you—the United States—doing “this” or “that”.

Oh, the history books tell it,

 they tell it so well

The Cavalries charged,

 the Indians fell

The Cavalries charged, 

the Indians died

Oh, the country was young, 

with God on its side

     My friend Tony in London once asked about racism in America. The context wasn’t ‘shame on you’. Instead it was to talk about racism in general. After all, the British have their own long history with race, given the diversity of their conquests: Australia, India, Africa, China, et al. Recall one of the most—now infamous—phrases from 19th century Britain: “The sun never sets on the British Empire."

The Spanish-American, 

war had its days.

And the civil war too was, 

soon laid away

And the names of the heroes, 

I was made to memorize

With guns in their hands, 

and God on their side

     My friend Thomas in Hamburg inquired about freedom of speech. He thought that it was curious—his form of understatement—that there was so much hate speech in America. “Why”, this thoughtful German asked, “would you allow people to talk so disparagingly [his word] about foreign-born citizens living in America?” I told him about the 1st Amendment. You know, that amendment inspired by our European forefathers, the one that prevents the government from making laws regulating the establishment of religion, or that would prohibit the free exercise of religion, or abridge the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, the freedom of assembly, or the right to petition the government for redress of grievances?

The first world war, boys, 

it came and it went

The reason for fighting, 

I never did get

But I learned to accept it, 

accept it with pride

For you don't count the dead 

when God's on your side

The Second World War, 

Came to an end

We forgave the Germans, 

and then we were friends

Though they murdered six million, 

in the ovens they fried,

The Germans now, too, 

have God on their side

     My friend Kuni in Tokyo asked me one evening “why did America wage war with Vietnam?” While clearly not defending the war, I attempted to explain about people like Robert McNamara who used the “Domino Theory” to make their point. The “theory” actually dated back to the Eisenhower administration when he espoused the “falling domino” principle. In short, the loss of Vietnam to communist control would lead to similar communist victories in neighboring Southeast Asian countries like Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, and then, perhaps, India, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand. It was a global version of “well, there goes the neighborhood.”

In the nineteen-sixties

came the Vietnam war

Can someone tell me, 

what we were fighting for?

So many young men died, 

so many mothers cried

Now I ask the question, 

was God on our side?

     I shared many a dinner with my friends Gerry and Joe at A&M Canada. Gerry was born in Canada, while Joe was an American ex-pat, recruited to leave Detroit and move to Toronto to work for A&M. Joe adopted Canada as his home country. One evening Gerry wondered aloud why we Americans were so opposed to universal healthcare. We know that the simple answer is that healthcare, writ large, includes hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and almost every peripheral business and, as such, wields heavy political clout. It’s viewed by most conservative politicians as “simply” another business category. 40 million Americans have a different view, as they have little or no healthcare.

I learned to hate the Russians 

all through my whole life

If another war comes, 

it's them we must fight

And to hate them and fear them, 

to run and to hide

And accept it all bravely, 

with God on my side

     With the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991 (and the subsequent light-hearted relationship between President Boris Yeltsin and President Bill Clinton,) some believed that the cold war, the domino theory, the East vs. West antagonism might disappear. If current events in February 2022 in Europe offer any evidence, it appears we still have a cold war which could turn very hot.

Through many dark hour, 

I've been thinking about this

That Jesus Christ 

was betrayed by a kiss

But I can't think for you, 

you'll have to decide

Whether Judas Iscariot 

had God on his side.

     I was raised a Lutheran in the midwest, in Milwaukee. I regularly attended Sunday services, went through the confirmation process and generally accepted the teachings. Dolly and I were married in a Lutheran church in suburban Chicago, and later joined a Lutheran church in Santa Monica when we moved to southern California. There’s much about the Bible and formal Christianity that are worth thinking about, worth embracing. I must add that, like the domino theory, all of this must be thought through and not simply adopted as fact or law because one of our influencers—Lutheran, Roman Catholic, Jewish, Presbyterian, Methodist, Seventh Day Adventist, Latter Day Saints, Islamic or other learned person—tells us “this is it!”

So, now as I'm leaving, 

I'm weary as hell

The confusion I'm feeling, 

ain't no tongue can tell

The words fill my head and 

they fall to the floor

That if God's on our side, 

He'll stop the next war.

     This all came front and center in my brain today. While listening to a terrific weekend music program (“Backroads”) on Grass Valley’s KVMR, I heard host Larry Hillberg play the Neville Brothers’ recording of Bob Dylan’s “With God On Our Side”. I immediately thought back to my days at A&M, and one of the albums I worked on: “Yellow Moon”, a 1989 release by the Nevilles. One track on that marvelous recording was Dylan’s song, sung by Aaron Neville with a very delicate, acoustic rhythm track. 

Jayne Simon, Aaron Neville and David Steffen at Tipitina’s in New Orleans, 1989

     If you don’t know by now, I’ve interspersed my thoughts with some of the verses from Dylan’s 1963/64 masterpiece. As I look at current events in February and March 2022, I’m dumbfounded that America’s religious right is committed to eviscerating a woman’s right to control her own body. I’m unable to understand just why—aside from raw power—the political right has decided to embrace an ignorant, spiteful, twice-impeached and indicted former president. I find it appalling that voting rights are being trashed. It’s abhorrent that a Supreme Court nominee is talked about as a “quota hire”. Trans families are abused, attacked, prosecuted, torn apart. Russia’s Putin is lauded and America’s president is vilified. There’s more but, perhaps, that’s enough for today. I still have hope, but it will take all of us to defend the Constitution and embrace the idea that we are all equal under the law. That we are all equal. Period.

With deep appreciation to Bob Dylan for the amazing “With God On Our Side”.