hope you guessed my name

Please allow me to introduce myself
I'm a man of wealth and taste
I've been around for a long, long year
Stole many a man's soul and faith

And I was 'round when Jesus Christ
Had his moment of doubt and pain
Made damn sure that Pilate
Washed his hands and sealed his fate

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
But what's puzzling you
Is the nature of my game
------------------------

[Last week when Osama Bin Laden was back in the News, I kept thinking of the lyrics to this song by the Rolling Stones, about the persistent nature of evil.]
------------------------------

I stuck around Saint Petersburg
When I saw it was a time for a change
Killed the Czar and his ministers
Anastasia screamed in vain

I rode a tank
Held a general's rank
When the Blitzkrieg raged
And the bodies stank

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name, oh yeah,
What's puzzling you
Is the nature of my game, oh yeah

I watched with glee
While your kings and queens
Fought for ten decades
For the gods they made

I shouted out
"Who killed the Kennedys?"
When after all
It was you and me

Please let me introduce myself
I'm a man of wealth and taste
And I laid traps for troubadors
Who get killed before they reached Bombay

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name
But what's puzzlin' you
Is the nature of my game, oh yeah

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, oh yeah
But what's confusing you
Is just the nature of my game

Just as every cop is a criminal
And all the sinners saints
As heads is tails
Just call me Lucifer
'Cause I'm in need of some restraint

So if you meet me
Have some courtesy
Have some sympathy, and some taste
Use all your well-learned politesse
Or I'll lay your soul to waste, umm yeah

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name
But what's puzzling you
Is the
nature-of-my-game
Oh yeah
Oh yeah

Tell me baby, what's my name
Tell me honey, baby guess my name
Tell me baby, what's my name
I tell you one time, you're to blame

Oooh who
Ooh woo

What's my name
Tell me, baby, what's my name
Tell me, sweetie, what's my name

oh yeah
---------------------------------
["Sympathy for the Devil," from the album Beggars Banquet, Decca Records. 1968]

It's like -- these horrible people instigating horrible acts in the world keep coming back. If it isn't Stalin, it's Hitler. It it isn't Hitler, it's Pol Pot; if it isn't Pol Pot, it's Ghadaffi (sp?); Bin Laden overlaps Ghadaffi; and just -- aaauuuggghhhh.
Most of the time I don't think about evil, but thinking about Bin Laden last week made me think of this song and then found this quote from the song's co-author, Keith Richards: he says what I have tried to figure out -- I read it & thought, "There it is!"

Keith Richards -- [2002] "Sympathy is quite an uplifting song. It's just a matter of looking the devil in the face. He's there all the time.
... Evil -- people tend to bury it and hope it sorts itself out and doesn't rear its ugly head. Sympathy for the Devil is just as appropriate now, with 9-11. There it is again, big time. When that song was written, it was a time of turmoil.

It was the first sort of international chaos since World War II. And confusion is not the ally of peace and love. You want to think the world is perfect. Everybody gets sucked into that. ... You might as well accept the fact that evil is there and deal with it any way you can. Sympathy for the Devil is a song that says, Don't forget him. If you confront him, then he's out of a job."
[end quote]

-30-