DESCRIPTION:
Read more about the performance in this playlist
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL28E357850AF8025F

"Breakthrough" is a moving and fascinating hourlong concert- documentary with Kris and his band, the Borderlords,
performing with amazingly heartfelt and honest feelings.
http://www.amazon.com/Breakthrough-Kris-Kristofferson/dp/B00027JYGC
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kris-Kristofferson-Breakthrough-Region-NTSC/dp/B00027JYGC

Don't let the Bastards get you down
Kris Kristofferson

They're killing babies in the name of Freedom
We've been down that sorry road before
They let us hang around a little longer than they should have
And it's too late to fool us anymore

We've seen the ones who killed the ones with vision
Cold-blooded murder right before your eyes
Today they hold the power and the money and the guns
It's getting hard to listen to their lies.

And I've just got to wonder what my Daddy would've done
If he'd seen the way they turned his dream around
I've got to go by what he told me, try to tell the truth
And stand your ground
DON'T LET THE BASTARDS GET YOU DOWN

Kris' album, "Freedom Song: Live from San Francisco", recorded on on July 19, 2002, also includes a version of the song, which criticizes US actions in the run-up to the invasion ("Bombing Baghdad back into a stone age round the clock, non-stop, 40 days, killin' them in their homes and on the highways, and now after a decade of crippling sanctions we're talking about going in there and do it all over again...").
Kris invokes his father, Henry Kristofferson, who was awarded in WWII for being the first to fly over the Himalayas at night (without instruments), taking supplies to the American soldiers fighting over there. He promoted to major general in the air force after his service in the Korean War where he had flown the wounded to hospitals in Japan.
Kris respected him a lot and he once wrote about his father, "He gave me some good words at some important times. He told me to 'toughen up' once when I was feeling sorry for myself. 'You'll feel better about yourself.' He was right."

"I identified so strongly with the Blake's poetry, because he believed in freedom...,
and so you have this weird combination of duty and obligation tied up with your freedom.
If you're free to be the person you're supposed to be you also have this obligation to be this person you're supposed to be and to communicate the messages of the spirit..."

Er identifizierte sich so stark mit Blakes Poesie (er hatte William Blakes Literatur in Oxford studiert) weil Blake an die Freiheit glaubte. „... und so muss man diese Kombination aus Dienst und Verpflichtung mit seiner eigenen Freiheit in Verbindung bringen. Wenn du die Freiheit hast, die Person zu sein, die du sein solltest, dann hast du auch diese Verpflichtung, diese Person zu sein, die du sein solltest und die Botschaften des Geistes mitzuteilen."

Don't let the bastards get you down

Sie töten Babys im Namen der Freiheit
Wir sind diese traurige Straße schon zuvor gefahren
Sie lassen uns ein bisschen länger warten als sie es sollten
Und es ist zu spät, uns wieder für dumm zu verkaufen

Wir haben die gesehen, die diejenigen töteten, die Visionen hatten
kaltblütiger Mord direkt vor unseren Augen
Heute halten sie die Macht und das Geld und die Gewehre fest
Es wird schwer, ihren Lügen zuzuhören

Und ich frage mich, was mein Daddy getan hätte
wenn er gesehen hätte, wie sie seine Träume umdrehen
Ich sollte mich führen lassen durch das, was er mir sagte:
"Versuch, die Wahrheit zu sagen und bleib standhaft,
Lass dich von den Bastarden nicht unterkriegen!"