These governments killing their own?
With the blood in the ink of the headlines

Or the people who finally can't take any more
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us the president the same way
On the radio talk shows and the TV
There are children at the cannons
Of the men who fan the flames
There's a shadow on the faces
But they're never the ones to fight or to die
And we come to the aid of a friend
When you know that you've seen it before
There are children at the cannons
To the wars that are fought in places

How the U.S.A. stands for freedom
You might ask what it takes to remember
There are lives in the balance
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone

And there is blood on the wire
But who are the ones that we call our friends
Where their business interest runs

Where a government lies to a people

And there's a shadow on the faces
The same time they sell us our wars
I want to know who the men in the shadows are
There are people under fire
And there are lives in the balance
They sell us every thing from youth to religion
There are people under fire
Of the men who send the guns
Of the wars that are fought in places
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You hear one thing again and again
I want to hear somebody asking them why
Where we can't even say the names
And there is blood on the wire
And a country is drifting to war