You forgive us and we'll forgive you

Saw John Prine in concert. Fun show...I'm not what you'd call a super, massive Prine fan; I only have a few CDs, so I didn't know a lot of the songs, but it was all good. He opened with "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore"--as appropriate now as it was for Vietnam, obviously--and the crowd exploded at the first "we're already overcrowded from your dirty little war." As we did at the part in his new song "Some Humans Ain't Human" that goes "you're feeling your freedom/and the world's off your back/some hotshot ["cowboy" in the studio version] from Texas/starts his own war in Iraq." And there was a very poignant rendition of "Sam Stone," also quite relevant: when they're calculating war costs, nobody ever factors in the deep and permanent fucked-upedness of soldiers who theoretically survive. But it wasn't all serious political stuff: he told amusing, goofy anectodes; "Fish and Whistle" was as fun as ever; and we all sang along to the chorus of "Illegal Smile." Fun times. Fun times indeed.