"it's 10:00. do you know where your kids are?"
this was often something you would see on tv during the reagan years, generally during a newscast. it was also widely ridiculed by young people at the time. you still hear it from time to time. it's meant to ask the question: are your kids on drugs?
what stipe is doing is ironically putting himself in the role of the adult, here. he doesn't exactly want to be the adult. he doesn't want to be the "downer". but, he's also seeing this world first hand, and he's reflecting that the news reports are not entirely frivolous. that the kids are on drugs. or, at least some of them are. and, the ones that are on drugs need a bit of help with it, too.
he's trying to establish a perspective that exists in some kind of middle ground.
he's then taking that middle ground to reflect on the real value of freedom, and how he feels about getting in the way of the freedom of others. the car is the american symbol of freedom.
the drug lingo is consequently entirely accurate, but it's a giant double-entendre about feeling caught between the counter-culture and a feeling of responsibility to help people. to stipe, this is a very stern moral dilemma that pits two equally valuable ideals against each other. he's struggling with this moral dilemma.
the language about bush & ollie north is also accurate. you just have to understand their connections to drug smuggling, even as they're rounding people up for it. freedom?
what that does is set the tone for a record that is broadly about feeling powerless to change things, and the futility of getting lost in it.
it's really a fucking lyrical masterpiece.
but, through all of it, remember: a working class hero is something to be.
