THEATER: AC-CENT-TCHU-ATE THE POSITIVE

WAR IS HELL, BUT THE MUSIC IS BREEZY IN SWINGTIME CANTEEN

Fifty years from now, will anyone be singing those fabulous songs from the Gulf War? Oh, that's right, there weren't any. And we'd guess that few families gather round the piano to sing of the invasions of Grenada and Panama. Vietnam is pretty much an angry face-off between Staff Sergeant Barry Sadler (The Ballad of the Green Berets) and Country Joe & the Fish (I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag). The Korean War has a memorial now, but still no memorable songs. It's as if, after World War II, Americans decided that internationally sanctioned slaughter was no longer something to sing about.

Ah, but WWII!...

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