Oy vey. Sure, you can't have irony without something to bounce off of, and that something has to be local and arch-familiar otherwise it doesn't work. But the melancholy, angry, ironic moods Hendrix was able to evoke argued for the reality of historical betrayal: "the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air" fade into a police siren. As for Blake, do you really think that when he suggested we "build Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land" he meant ..."and nowhere else"? He built from what he knew (England) to an as yet undreamed possibility, when we are free from the "mind-forged manacles" -- patriotism being one kind of manacle.
I understand what it means to struggle for justice, freedom, consciousness. What I don't understand is how these come to be equated with the interests of one particular country.
Joanna