Christine Lavin

When Cary Grant made movies
men wanted to be like him
when Esther Williams made movies
we all lined up to learn how to swim

when Fred Astaire made movies
the whole world learned to dance

when Catherine Denueve made movies

we wanted to move to France

When Julia Child was on TV
we all learned how to cook
when “I Love Lucy” was a hit
so was that red headed look
yet when Tom Cruise makes a movie

and his co-star is a gun

we’re supposed to believe that violent images

don’t influence anyone

Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me?

There’s 315 million Americans (now 329 million)

4 million in the NRA (now 5.5 million)
that’s 1.26 percent of us (now 1.52 percent)

who bully to get their way

they want everybody packin’ pistols

in churches, bars, and schools
but if everybody carries weapons

everybody is a fool

98.74% of us (now 98.48%)
are not in the NRA
311,000,000 of us (323,000,000 today)

want to live to see another day

but in the last 24 hours
82 more Americans were killed with a gun (now 100)

In homicides how to we compare to the world?

We’re Number One We’re Number One

Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me?

Whoever thought we’d see the day
you couldn’t smoke in restaurants?
we put limits on behaviors
that sometimes curb our personal wants

We do it for the greater good what is best for ALL
this is a civilized democracy not a Wild West barroom brawl

There’s 300 million firearms

(now higher - one estimate is 393 million)

(I now sing “there’s more than 300 million firearms”)

from sea to shining sea
some say it’s too late to do anything
but I disagree

When they do gun buybacks in California
They run out of money before they run out of guns

History has taught us
Some wrongs can be undone

So please don’t sit there silently
tell everybody how you feel
let’s strengthen our collective backbones

we can be that squeaky wheel

We’ll do it for the children of Newtown

Aurora Colorado, too
we do it for Columbine and Virginia Tech

and for you and you and you and you

We can do this
together we can do this
together we can do this