The gifted singer, songwriter, and actor died on September 28th at the age of 88.

There have been many articles and tributes to him. He had a varied career and many of his songs were sung by others and became major hits.

Kristofferson was a Golden Gloves boxer, rugby star and football player in college; received a master’s degree in English from Merton College at the University of Oxford in England; and flew helicopters as a captain in the U.S. Army but turned down an appointment to teach at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, to pursue songwriting in Nashville.
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Starting in the late 1960s, the Brownsville, Texas native wrote such country and rock ‘n’ roll standards as “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down,” “Help Me Make it Through the Night,” “For the Good Times” and “Me and Bobby McGee.” Kristofferson was a singer himself, but many of his songs were best known as performed by others, whether Ray Price crooning “For the Good Times” or Janis Joplin belting out “Me and Bobby McGee.”

One aspect. of his life that received less coverage was that he was veteran of the military who was a critic of war. Chris Houston fills in that gap.

Later in his career, Kristofferson’s politics and music became distinctly anti-war. “They’re killing babies in the name of freedom,” was the opening line of his 1990 song Don’t Let the Bastards (Get You Down). As the fifth track on his album Third World Warrior, it was released just months before the United States launched the Gulf War. Lyrics in the song include, “we’ve been down that sorry road before…It’s too late to fool us anymore,” and, “it’s getting hard to listen to their lies.”

Kristofferson’s disdain for the Gulf War was on clear display during a New Zealand television interview. In May 1991, Kristofferson toured with Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings who performed as the supergroup The Highwaymen. During the tour, the group appeared on the local current affairs show Holmes. Host Paul Holmes asked the musicians what was ailing the United States. Kristofferson gave a three-part answer. He spoke of “flag waving and choreographed patriotism that we had back in Nazi Germany, a half a century ago.” Kristofferson said that the U.S. had a “one party system, which is in control of all three branches of our government” and described a “lap-dog media that is cranking out propaganda for the Administration that would make a Nazi blush.”
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Kristofferson knew that his politics hindered his career, but he was undeterred. Stephen Miller’s 2009 biography quotes Kristofferson, “I found a considerable lack of work after doing concerts for the Palestinian children and for a couple of gigs with Vanessa Redgrave and if that’s the way it has to be, that’s the way it has to be. If you support human rights, you gotta support them everywhere.”

His antiwar stance upset some of his fans but he that did not deter him.

Kristofferson’s sharp-tongued political lyrics sometimes hurt his popularity, especially in the late 1980s. His 1989 album, “Third World Warrior” was focused on Central America and what United States policy had wrought there, but critics and fans weren’t excited about the overtly political songs.

He said during a 1995 interview with the AP he remembered a woman complaining about one of the songs that began with killing babies in the name of freedom.

“And I said, ‘Well, what made you mad — the fact that I was saying it or the fact that we’re doing it? To me, they were getting mad at me ’cause I was telling them what was going on.”

The song that he is probably best remembered for is Me and Bobby McGee. Here is Kristofferson with a live performance of it.

The version that is best known is the one by Janis Joplin who recorded it the day before her death of a drug overdose at the age oof 27.

Here is Johnny Cash and Kristofferson singing another Kristofferson classic Sunday Morning Coming Down, whose memorable opening lines set the mood for the rest of the song.

“I woke up Sunday morning with no way to hold my head that didn’t hurt.
And the beer I had for breakfast wasn’t bad, so I had one more for dessert.”