This song was written to award the top pledger for the quarterly Catholic and Enjoying It Tin Cup Rattle pledge drive, Irenaeus. The idea was that I'd write a song about whatever topic he chose. One of the options given was "How about a generic liberal pro-abortion Catholic politician (a la Pelosi, Biden, Sebelius, etc)?".

So with Joe as my inspiration, I cranked out this piece, by far my loudest yet (and the first to feature my actual guitar playing all the way through).

http://www.victorlams.com/audio/Victor_Lams_-_Compromised.mp3

Approximate lyric:

Compromised,
I compromised.
Compromised,
I'm compromised.

I was born with a clear and distinct idea,
Between what was wrong and what was right.
From Augustus and Aquinas and then brought down to me:
The Truth was taught impermutably.

Before I Compromised,
I compromised.
Compromised,
I'm compromised.

I became a lawyer and then a senator,
I took my position very seriously,
Faithfully represented those who'd elected me,
But all that changed in 1973

That's when it soon became apparent,
That the winds of change were blowing,
Privacy became the mandate,
Basic human rights forgoing,

Personhood now redefined
We had a simple choice to make
We chose to change our party line
and I my principles forsake

Protect the innocent the weakest of the weak
Fight for the poor the huddled, disenfranchised
Were words I lived by but now I defied
Turns out it's easy when you've got money on your side.

Actions without responsibility
or consequences gives you a free ride
Why defend the defenseless when it's so
much easier to live with yourself after you've

Compromised,
Like I compromised.
Compromised,
I'm compromised.

One consequence of my decision
Is the matter of my religion
I sound like I'm some kind of nut
When I say "I'm personally opposed, but"

When you've speaking on the stumps
turns out that's good enough for chumps
And for thirty years it was sufficient
To shut up Cardinals and Bishops.

But now things seem to be changing again
Can't get away with what I did then
God forbid I need a defense
When I can no longer claim ignorance

It gets harder to be a politician
When you're at odds with your tradition
And when I'm denied my final prize
At least I'll know it's because I
...
Compromised.