I've just heard it announced that one of the "highlights" of the New Year's Eve celebration in NYC's Times Square will be a performance of John Lennon's "Imagine," this time by one Bebe Rexha.  I'll admit to being "culturally deprived"; I've never heard of that person.  And it turns out that "Imagine" has been performed at other Times Square New Year's Eve celebrations since 2005 (2012 and 2016, for example, by other performers of whom I'd never heard), with videos of the crowds enthusiastically waving their arms and singing along.

Now, I'm a big fan of The Beatles, and I happen to think John Lennon was a musical genius, and I'm still sad and angry at his having been murdered in front of his home on Central Park West in December of 1980.  And I've even visited "Strawberry Fields," the shrine to him just inside Central Park from the spot where he was gunned down.

And I think "Imagine" is a great song, musically speaking.  Content-wise, I'm not that crazy about it.  For anyone unfamiliar with the lyrics, they are as follows:

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky

Imagine all the people living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too

Imagine all the people living life in peace

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one.           

That second verse in particular seems to advocate for not only "open borders," but an end to national sovereignty and patriotism, and for an end to religion as well.

And, in general, the song seems to be right in line with the globalist, "one-world" Marxist agenda that has lately seemed to be far less shy about showing itself.

Lennon even admitted that the song was "virtually the Communist Manifesto" set to music, although he claimed to not be "particularly a Communist," nor to "belong to any movement."  While he (rather naïvely, I think) stated that "there is no real Communist state in the world," he did advocate for a "British Socialism."  He admitted that the song is "anti-religious, anti-nationalistic, anti-conventional, anti-capitalistic, but because it is sugarcoated it is accepted."  As to its anti-religious aspect, the late highly assertive atheist Richard Dawkins called the song an "atheist anthem"!

Clearly, the 1971 song's message is in large part a reflection of the politics of Yoko Ono, now listed as a co-writer of the lyrics (and thought by many to be the force that ruined The Beatles).  Lennon's 1968 "Revolution" stands in contrast, with lyrics that can resonate with conservatives, like:

You say you'll change the constitution
Well you know
We'd all love to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well you know
You better free your mind instead
But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao

You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow

But it won't be "Revolution" with which 1,000,000-plus people (some estimate the number in attendance at 2,000,000) will be singing along in Times Square on Monday night.  Instead, it'll be "imagine there's no countries..."  If there are no countries, then there's no need to get all exercised over people sneaking across a border, is there?  In fact, there's no need for borders.

It'll be a big event in NYC, and on the Left Coast, and for the networks that cover it, and for the Democrat leadership, for everyone who opposes building a wall to secure our southern border, for everyone who thinks nationalism and patriotism are bad things, and for the propaganda masters who determine the political messages we get from "entertainment."

But I don't think it'll be that big a deal in "flyover country."

Stu Tarlowe has contributed over 150 pieces to American Thinker.