Jackson Browne - Lives In The Balance Lyrics

I’ve listened to this song hundreds of times though many years but today it hits home as we once again start another war.

Holy shit these lyrics are incredible. I sit around all day trying to come up with lyrics about this kind of stuff but I’m not sure I’ve come up with anything nearly as solid as this. I’m honestly not that crazy about the overly dramatic 80’s production (it doesnt really age as well as more stripped down styles do imho) but the lyrics are so good I can’t really knock it.

'I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
But they're never the ones to fight or to die'


Applies to every organised military force, from the small terror organisation to large scale military

Brilliant song. I would never have known about it if not for "Miami Vice."

From a modern British perspective, we are abandoning our friends in Hong Kong and allowing the Chinese gov(in the name of trade and money) to trash the rules Hong Kong have lived by since 1997, Screw XI Jinping, Trump and Johnson

true today as it ever was, in some respects more so ! :(

Miami Vice brings me here, Miami Vice.S03E02

Nice that people aren't sheep in this part of YouTube

Now they want to go to war with Iran for Saudi butchers who they call friends.

anyone miami vice ?

Been listening to this since I was a child. Side A and B on the old record player. Thank you for posting. Great Album. Man I was like 5 years old first time I heard this. Tough times back then. Kinda like today.

Just as true and relevant now as it was then. People know it too. Not as much when this album first arrived, but today? Might be another story yet to be written and I'd love to write it too since it requires no blood be shed! Maybe some prison time for the war criminals, but otherwise, there is no reason why we can't have peace in our lifetimes.

Im trying to start a movement soon FUCK THE GOVERNMENT IM TRYNNA LEAVE THE usa fuck you pieces of shit i hope you get what you did to people

Has anyone considered the fact that President Trump the Military the Secret Service and Interpol are stopping wars world wide! Any Questions?

Yea, so true.

One of the greatest songs ever written and performed, in one of the best albums ever produced :) Great, very thought provoking. Reminds me of the suffering that is hoisted, like a yolk, around every human neck upon birth, on the Earth, defacto-slavery dictated by all our interlocking, laced systems being based on scarcity instead of nature's abundance; "...We(e),..." need to abolish the use of non-renewable fuel sources now. Walking nature's balance, in the Cosmos' abundance and giving back to it, you, illimitable potential and indivisible as life, can do anything. Also, please: Spread support of the Puerto Rico Nutrition Assistance Program. The week of March 11, before leaving for a week-long congressional recess, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) filed cloture on the House-passed bill for disaster assistance. It includes $600 million for Puerto Rico’s Nutrition Assistance Program (NAP) as well as other critical disaster relief. Leader McConnell could bring this bill to the floor for a vote as early as today. Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) is expected to introduce a substitute amendment to include funding for Alabama towns impacted by the recent tornadoes. Please, Senator vote for $600 million in nutrition for Puerto Rico. Thanx for the great worx :) reality

Powerfully enigmatic and poetic.

❤❤❤❤❤

Trump is going to bring "freedom and democracy" to Venezuela soon because of this guy Guilio who no-one ever heard of, even not the people in Venezuela.

BTW check out news article today 4/25/2019 Pompeo laughing about being a 'Terrorist' in the faces of the students in Texas

Of course.

More and more relevant every single day...

this song nails it....its the truth..

Great List...Thank You!

i want to know who the men in the shadows are = THE JESUITS they come from the Vatican

artist some times get assassinated for writing songs like this that is what happend to John Lennon i am glad Jackson is still alive

George H.W. Bush died today, the son of a bitch

JUST say IT, HELL NO WE WON'T GOOOOOO....PS...CAN I GET A WITNESS......

What a fantastic song for the Vietnam War era. It fits for current activities of our country today. I am a Vietnam Era veteran. Look at the additional wars in the Middle East! When will mankind ever learn. Today a unworthy person is put into the supreme court position that should not be put there. What frustration I find as a veteran who put his ass on the line for four year to help protect this country. I just don't understand this country anymore.

i just had the honor to watch Jackson receive the Gandhi Peace Award , in New haven Ct form Robert Kennedy , Jr. This song played on a video screen So compelling.

*Gaddafi Did Nothing Wrong!*

So, this song written long time before the Trump, I hope USA come to scenses! I wonder how they ever chose him?

In a nation of 330 million souls, how did it end up with those two candidates?

Now more than ever..

One of the awrsome songs from Miami Vice......Stones War......an yep fits as well now as it did then......more so.....totally sad

30 years later, still the same story-different players

rock8814 Yes, indeed. It's relevant today.

Its happening ..it's CNN fake news and sheeps

no one cares it is all about the money

and the power it brings.

Jackson is a Total Genus

A very redpilled song.

The flute on this song is great.

No matter how many years pass by, this song still keeps on rocking and telling the facts how they are

Forget being "just as true". It's MORE true!

And, that cover image of the statue being refurbished - it's really a euphemism for liberty being overturned.

Beautiful lyrics and music ...

these are great songs and although written many years ago and still they are taking about now, we must stop being continually at war

https://thinkprogress.org/9-terrifying-things-donald-trump-has-publicly-said-about-nuclear-weapons-99f6290bc32a

This is nothing to play with. When it comes to lives in the balance this is reference to the entire world not just America. That's something that these upper class fools don't understand. And I fear the worse when that slimy Trump takes Oath, mark my words there's gonna be dozens of Boycotts all over.

Sussa . boby brown

in hindsight (4/25/19) not enough boycotts. People are so traumatized and zoned in the endorphin rush society they are possibly really incapable of recognizing anymore that we have a problem...unless it is localized in their face. As we know things are completely buggered up in Washington, probably beyond repair.

No choice is still no voice:
The younger Dems seem to stand for real issues while maintaining the fiction of Rus interference as excuse for everything (Fake conjured up dis info by FBI) I mean even Beto and Tulsi Gabbard wha what? Trump is a complete free wheeling swamp slug him own self but..Putin really? too smart to trust King O range for a minute. The King is unpredictable (asset in covert activity) but also completely controlled (de-asset) in the world of discourse, cards on the table..pulling no punches arena Foreign Policy etc. All America got with T was a collapsing house of cards

gotta run they're after me

I was hacked by a Redly colored dit (directed integrated transmitter) on the hood of my VW, mechanic concurred, of Rus origin. He discovered a small sickle, viewed under electron microscope but I was too paranoid to report it, because the serial numbers didn't match up to Red Flag but to 'Ruder gaff' ( = a shoddy NSA counterfeit )

trump this up your demokrazy

I'd love to play this at a Killary Clinton rally. This song sure stands the test of time. Every year our Government is more and more Corrupt.

+ginmar, if you actually knew sh*t, then Killary would actually be an appropriate title, stay stupid my friend

So much for corruption, Trumptard

You're all fucking stupid.

The only two final candidates in a population of 330 million?

another incredible artist bring light to important subjects a great sorty teller one of truth. one that writes his own songs iam so glad that an artist likes this made it into the hall of fame!!!!!! well deserved over andover thank u

"Where their business interests run."
"But who are the ones that we call our friends-- These governments killing their own? Or the people who finally can't take any more - And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone?"
"They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are - But they're never the ones to fight or to die."
^ These are quotes that still apply in many places, I'm thinking the current Turkish president and his vassals.

Looks like we are witnessing death rattles of the democratic hologram, yet it was never intended for Us, we the people. The commons have always suffered and people lied to then led to slaughter by war lords of the age in the name of some God, Guns Guts and Glory. The Constitution was written by & for White English men protecting ' to be landowners' sic grabbers of the New World. Only the Bill of Rights begins to demand some equality for the 99% but as always it's effects will be neutralized before it can blossom by powers that really shouldn't be. Just apply the rule of reversing NewSpeak and voila, understanding! meaning of dis info...like " We're pulling out of ...so and so a country 'x" and then 24 hrs later (as predicted) rockets of democracy rain down! So yes means no and in is out with the thee and thou politicos' cabal framers of the English language and KJV Bible.

youtube. - all wars are bankers wars. see the truth

Right the poor fight and die and the rich get richer we know who the men in the shadows are the big Banks the big defense contractors the billionaires and politicians they don't have to get their hands dirty they just rake in the cash when are we going to learn Let Them Fight their Wars that they start and we die in

What if they gave a war and nobody came - a saying I remember from the 60's - don't know who to attribute it to. That's what it's going to take.

As usual you can never get to the one .  Just the highest profile  . Good song .

"isms" kill- communism, fascism, socialism. our founding forefathers had ethics, virtue and the desire to eventually see all persons empowered with personal liberty. all wars are bankers wars... you Tuesday this. all wars are bankers wars.

I don't like ism's of any sort

America is already somewhat socialism. We citizens dont downright own ANY property at all. What happens if you "own" your house, outright, but refuse to pay your property tax. the government can, and will come to take their property back, first with a lien, then they can foreclose. to me that is not owning property, that is quasi-ownership. i OWN my clothes and furniture, thats about it, everything else i have to pay to play. dont pay registration on your car long enough, it gets towed and eventually will be auctioned. i have a feeling you are going to bring up taxes, and if you do, so be it. thanks for your time. and on a last note, i agree with you that all wars (at least the last 100 years +/-) are bankers wars.

😢great song

He's still alive?

yeah I saw him yesterday

Wow, I have been trying to remember the name of this song for at least 5 years.
My dad would love to play this song on the old cassette tape on the 2 hour drive he made every weekend to visit his mom.

Such a old song, but it's still completely relevant in this day and age.

sadly, yeah....

Imperialism kills. I have been following crisis with water at Flint, Michigan. Unbelievable, simply unbelievable that public officials allowed this to happen. Indeed it is true Imperialism abroad equal tyranny at home!

The water is so unhealthy to drink in my Muni undated letter from our Water Dept arrives every 3 or 4 months with even worse than previous readings...must filter (ClearlyFiltered rocks) water for health and safety of myself, pets and plants.

This song still gets me!

The more things change the more they stay the same.

Yes, I'm a loon, and you're a brilliant scientist! Enjoy your version of reality... while it lasts. 

+gyarurabaa I don't think I will, but thanks for heads up re: the complete loon.

+Light Dancing I wish i could be like 99% of the population alive right now. To busy to notice or care what is happening. What is all this shit for man? Is this the purpose of our universe? Pain, poverty, misery, and war. I refuse to believe that is why we exist. The people pulling the strings, have been doing it for thousands of millennium. Its almost hard to believe that humans are capable of such a grand scheme.

I empathize Brother. Ya know, I invented a little joke that i tell myself when I get too bummed out about life. It always makes me chuckle. Here's how it goes:   LIFE SUCKS... THEN YA DIE... THEN YA REINCARNATE, AND LIFE SUCK ALL OVER AGAIN.  (I hope it works for you too.). 

do not worry the sky is not falling peter green albatross will clear your ears then your cloud

Jackson's music got so edgy in the 1980s.  For the time, it was the BEST thing for him to do.  Some say it is he at his very best.

Almost 30 years later and this is just as true as it was when it was released. 

+DWSimmy
Human, it will never change

So true. Love You

It's even more true in 2019.

Now 34 and counting.

And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

Peruvian panpipes!!!

“The enemy is fear. We think it is hate; but, it is fear.” Gandhi.
.
"The powers in charge keep us in a perpetual state of fear keep us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor with the cry of grave national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by furnishing the exorbitant sums demanded. Yet, in retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened, seem never to have been quite real." General Douglas MacArthur

"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, IT IS THE LEADERS of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY COUNTRY." Goering at the Nuremberg Trials
.
“War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.” - George Orwell
.
ALWAYS FOLLOW THE MONEY!
Will

@MissDistarr Jackson Browne penned and sung this tune over 30 years ago, and reads like todays headlines since Eden, and ever since!!! 8-(

I like your point, the US has this element, yet so does every part of this world I have seen it first hand, yet it the US and the French who are first to sacrifice to do the hot zones right, then are misused by nefarious leaders, is so true, and tragic, we need to be first citizens of humanity, first and foremost... thank you much RIDE! (I put THE SUNSHINE in my eyes...ahh, trippy!)

@RaVen DaWn  Thank You, You are very kind.  That quote so strongly reverberates in the history of mankind, it is frighting to me that the masses haven't caught wise to this ploy of the puppet masters. Mankind has been warned over, and over again.  As long as war fattens the pockets of the rich, and serves the agenda of the powerful, the underclasses will be marched to war. All wars are fought for resources (greed/wealth), the excuses for that war may very, but war will always benefit the rich/powerful. I am no peacenik, and I am not proud to admit, that there is a evil on this world that just needs killing,  When you have a chance look up online this short, and thought provoking article;
 "10 George Orwell Quotes that Predicted Life in 2014 America.   You may find degrees of disagreement with the author's reasoning, but Orwell's quotes will stick with you as you connect Orwell's 65 year old quotes to today's headlines.

Never vote for a lawyer, lobbyist, career politician, or any of the parasites that feed from them, by career choice they have already shown that their conscience has a price.

Peace Be Well, and Stay Strong, Will 

Amen x ^ beautifully stated, Love you Ride

@Doble Helice You are very kind, Maybe one day I will be able to accept a kind word without feeling shamefully guilty that I am unworthy. Maybe tomorrow will be that day,..... I just don't know... Please Be Well, and Stay Strong in your message to this world. Will

An old Chinese prayer, "Oh god, make my heart a stone!"

Ezekiel 36:26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.

Great song v Especially the lyrics!!! So sad but so true

Powerful song

Thanks for pointing out the typo...fixed it. They definitely CAN be counted on to tell us who our enemies are. Enjoy!

Just bought 'The Best of Miami Vice' soundtrack and this song is on it.
I had totally forgotten this great and timeless song.
Just as relevant today as it was in 1988.

I have never ever forgotten this song, and it's rolling thru my head today.

drumdust Wasn’t a viewer, but 30+ years ago I saw the MV episode that featured this track - truly subversive television that was unique for its time.

Sadly, this song's lyrics are appropriate for the last decades. History does repeat itself, and we still dont learn...

This is a very appropriate song for what is going on right now.

There's actually a typo in the next to last verse. The line should be "They CAN be counted on to tell us....." :)

Chilling