Lyndon Johnson Told The Nation

(Tom Paxton)

Lyndon Johnson told the nation, Have no fear of escalation
I am trying everyone to please
Though it isn't really war, we're sending fifty thousand more
   (sixty)
   (seventy)
   (a hundred)
To help save Vietnam from Vietnamese

I got a letter from L.B.J., it said, This sure's your lucky day
Time to put your khaki trousers on
We've got a job for you to do, Dean Rusk has caught the Asian Flu
And we are sending you to Vietnam

We landed in a swampy hole, we went out on a night patrol
Just who was who was very hard to tell
With Martha Raye or thirteen mayors, half of Congress, six ball players
And Ronald Reagan yelling, Give 'em hell

Every night the local gentry slip out past the sleeping sentry
They go out and join the old V.C.
In their nightly little dramas they put on their black pajamas
And come lobbing hand grenades at me

So here I sit in this rice paddy and am wondering about Big Daddy
And I know that Lyndon loves me so
Yet, how sadly I remember, way back yonder in November
He told me that I'd never have to go