The Assault on America's National Identity
By: Rich Lowry (MSN)
WTF?
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The NFL has a new national anthem, or at least a rival to the old one.
© Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports An Air Force airman holds an American flag before a game between the Minnesota Vikings and the Denver Broncos at Broncos Stadium at Mile High in Denver, Colo., August 11, 2018.
According to reports last week, the NFL will play "Lift Every Voice and Sing," commonly referred to as the black national anthem, before every game this year.
This is more than woke virtue-signaling, although it is assuredly that.
The NFL has been such a battlefield for the cultural struggle over the national anthem and protests because it long ago eclipsed baseball as the national pastime. Heretofore, as one would expect of such a thoroughly American sport, the league had identified itself with a robust patriotism (pre-game flyovers, gigantic American flags unfurled on the field, tributes to servicemembers . . . ).
That the NFL has swung drastically the other way is a sign that a new national identity is emerging to supplant the old. This new American identity is, of course, getting pushed by every lever of elite culture. It is defined by "anti-racism" instead of the American creed, Black Lives Matter instead of, say, the American Legion or Veterans of Foreign Wars, and new rituals, holidays, and heroes instead of ones that have been long established and, to this point, uncontroversial.
The national anthem? It will now compete with the black national anthem and, by implication, risks becoming the "white" national anthem.
Juneteenth is worthy of commemoration but is being set up as a competitor holiday to July 4.
1776, that most iconic year, is under pressure from 1619.
Statues of American legends such as the celebrated explorers Lewis and Clark,, and Roger Clark, "Conqueror of the Old Northwest," were removed in a single day in Charlottesville, Va., the latest instance of a remorseless iconoclasm sweeping the land.
And so on.
Why does it matter? A nation is to a large extent defined by its symbols and associations, the holidays, rituals, heroes, and history — the mystic chords of memory — that constitute its collective self-understanding. This is how a nation tells itself what it is and what it's priorities should be.
As the 20th-century liberal historian Arthur Schlesinger explained with regard to accounts of the past in particular, "as the means of defining national identity, history becomes a means of shaping history."
When the late Samuel Huntington published his classic book — Who Are We? — in 2004, his warnings about the potential rise of Hispanic separatism in the American Southwest seemed overly dire. But now his words about the creation of a new national identity seem — typically of Huntington — quite prescient. "The greatest surprise," he wrote, "might be if the United States in 2025 is still the country it was in 2000 rather than a very different country (or countries) with very different conceptions of itself and its identity than it had a quarter century earlier."
In discussing the roots of identity, Huntington notes that people inevitably define their identities in opposition to an "other." He quotes the French novelist Andre Malraux stating it starkly, "Oh, what a relief to fight, to fight enemies who defend themselves, enemies who are awake."
The British famously defined themselves in opposition to their continental enemies. The historian Linda Colley writes, "Time and time again, war with France brought Britons, whether they hailed from Wells or Scotland or England, into confrontation with an obviously hostile Other and encouraged them to define themselves collectively against it. They defined themselves as Protestants struggling for survival against the world's foremost Catholic power."
The "other" in the case of our new national identity isn't foreign powers or alien practices, but American traditions themselves; everything that doesn't fit into a new "anti-racist" narrative of the country must be denigrated and cast aside.
New ceremonies, catch-phrases, and heroes will replace the allegedly inadequate, sinful ones of yore. The NFL, which not too long ago represented a consensus American patriotism, is now part of the vanguard of this hostile redefinition of what American is and should be.
Tags
Who is online
119 visitors
Gotta shake your head.......Two United States National Anthems? What next? Every race anthems? That would last longer than the game LOL.
We have a National Anthem that belongs to every citizen. Some don't like the words in a couple of the later stanzas but FFS people. Few know those words anyway as the first is the one sung most often.
The NFL has a first amendment right to sing anything that pleases them. You aren't required to sing along. You aren't required to go to the games. You aren't even required to watch them on tv. Why do you have a problem with free speech?
I don't have a problem with free speech. I have a problem catering to every little bit of picking winners and losers and breaking tradition to do so. They are appeasing ONLY because they lost a lot of audience when some washed up QB decided to take a knee during the anthem a few years back and this move could backfire and have much the same effect that "knee man" did. It's ridiculous to play anything but the official National Anthem of the United States of America..........unless of course one WANTS do continue to cultivate divisiveness.
Oh so you're against capitalism?
Ummmm no. Where you got that from my comment will remain a mystery for the ages if you refuse to take the rest of the comment into consideration. Especially the backfire part. They were just getting past the effects of the first and getting some viewership and fans back but it's not enough I guess. And there is a fine line between capitalism and greed. They lost a BOATLOAD of money with the pandemic and now are desperate to make up for it.
Taking a knee during the anthem is also free speech. What did you guys do? Boycott. That's your right. The NFL has decided that the racist right isn't who they want to be aligned with. I, personally, think they're making the right choice there. When you cannot please everybody you have to go with your conscience.
That's exactly what they are trying to do. Please everybody. And yes taking a knee was and is free speech. But you know what they say, and he has lived it since, you can say what you want when you want but you can't avoid the consequences.
So true. Kapernick never played again. The racists won that round.
Racists??!? LMMFAO.
You guys should just boycott the NFL again. I, personally, love watching football so I won't be joining you. Have fun watching the LPGA.
They sure did Stevie. It's shameful
So. according to you, every single owner in the NFL is racist.
Exactly how big is that broad brush you use?
Who the hell is "you guys"? I didn't boycott it the last time. As a matter of fact I am a PSL owner for the Carolina Panthers and have been for the last 10 years. I go to every home game. Even the two preseason games.
So enjoy your table tennis.
The use of "ONLY because."
And are appeasing a socially conscience market made up of way more people than oppose it. Capitalism at work.
Your comment, especially in light of what you're saying, doesn't make any sense. Just Jim NC has exactly the same right as the NFL to express what he thinks of what the NFL is currently doing concerning anthems as you claim the NFL has about that same issue. Surely you recognize this, yet you appear to take Just Jim to task for expressing his opinion in the same manner you claim he his taking the NFL to task for expressing theirs. Basically, the pot calling the kettle black.
Um, yeah. NFL has a conscience. That's a defendable argument right there alrighty.
Alternatively, many feel as I do. I don't pay ridiculous amounts of money to watch what is essentially just a game so that someone can shove their political beliefs at me. Racism? Don't make me laugh! The real crime isn't racism, it's greed. Making something so out of reach for most people that they'll never get to see a live game because of the cost. If Kapernick wants to put his politics ahead of what he was actually paid to do, more power to him, but it isn't racism to reject him for it any more than it is to reject ordering one thing from a business and receiving something else entirely.
My take on it. First off, I get kinda pissed that they can pay some players upwards of 80 mil yet taxpayers are usually on the hook for stadium costs.
Second, I personally would not, or don't, go to a game just to have a spectacle of faux patriotism.
I am a firm believer that the anthem has no place at the start of nothing more than an expensive game.
The NFL has always marketed itself in a certain way. Mostly toward a rural or more country audience perhaps from the belief that , on the whole, football is more popular in the less urban states or locales. And of course we know that football rules the sports scene across the southern states, although in truth it has always been very popular in the north as well. For years and years a country singer did the opening song for Monday Night Football every week, and then when the main game went to Sunday nights it was still a country singer doing the song. it is not at all uncommon for large American flags the length of the football field to be unfurled on special occasions like the start of the season , or on holidays, or for the playoffs. In other words fairly often. Then there are the military flyovers.
What I dont understand is why anyone cares if they add "the black national anthem" to pregame entertainment. I bet you after the first week or two they don't even show it any more on tv. They had stopped showing the national anthem on tv before the NFL games until the Kaepernick thing became such a firestorm, then the networks had to show it. I'm sure tv would be just as happy if they didnt have to show any of it.
Why do people care?
Much of the rest of rich Lowry's argument is just senseless and or dishonest. No one, not a single soul, has to choose between Juneteenth and the 4th of July. The same goes for the rest of his comparisons.
Lol.. the racists got Tebow too!
Why not a white national anthem too? And how racist is it to exclude Hispanics from having their own national anther? And Asians?
Let's just get rid of the idea of Americans altogether, since that's the end goal of all this.
Who employs majority black players on pretty much every team.
Such dumbass logic we see here.
Agreed.
Neither do I, but that isn't the issue. A country divided against itself will not stand. People are actively trying to tear down America and put something else in it's place and what that thing is isn't pretty. Seriously. If people think what we have now is ugly, wait until those trying to do the tearing down will do if they are successful. It will be something similar to or just like China's cultural revolution or what any other socialist/communist country does to those they set up as "enemies of the state" in order to manipulate the masses.
If we want to continue as a country then there has to be some unifying thread that runs through it to which we can all agree with. I would like to think that is the constitution, secularly speaking. Yep. I'm completely aware of the fact that those who wrote it didn't do a great job of actually following it except for those of their own race, and even then, imperfectly. Mostly they applied it to those with land and money, like every single country ever (Socialists and communists substituted influence, loyalty and power blocks for land).
In spite of that, although they applied it imperfectly, it doesn't mean what they came up with was bad. It was good, actually and, until recently, the way we turned out was proof of it. Persons of every race, including whites, ended up with more freedoms than the places from which they came. Again, not perfectly, but demonstrably better than any other country ever.
And that's what a national anthem should be about. Not singling out one specific race for past, and I mean past, injustices. I don't actually insist that we must continue with the current National Anthem. I'm totally open to a new one. The one thing I do insist on, however, is if we feel we need a new one, it should be about a uniting ideal as a collective nation and not about one particular race.
Can't agree. To be a country that isn't eating itself from the inside out, there has to be something that unites us. A good anthem would do that and should be played everywhere it can be.
Will never agree. Faux forced patriotism Imo is akin to nationalists using patriotism as a means of exclusion.
It should not be played anywhere and everywhere. It should be used for appropriate venues, which is not a game.
Sean, the sooner we have the racial reckoning , the sooner we can have a better country. Ask Kavika if he thinks the racial history of this country should be swept under the rug, and he comes from a different perspective than black lives matter.
We had a racist country for almost all of our history. I wish it werent so , but it is. For white people to simply say "I wasnt born then so its not my problem" is not going to cut it.
All this current brouha developed after George Floyd when it was seen that so many white people had become willing to hit the streets is support of black lives. Suddenly it seemed as though maybe the big page of historical racism in America could finally be turned.
The opportunity is still there but as long as so many whites want to keep saying they are the real victims of racism unfortunately nothing good will happen.
That's one way to look at it. In my opinion, based on what all the commercials are aimed at, their target audience seems to be hard working families or individuals trying to take advantage of the American way. Heck, even the stupid beer commercials which imply that, if only you drink their brand, women will flock to you assume you're not some out of work welfare case.
Further, I don't think your analysis is very accurate. I don't think football and the NFL was marketed toward rural or more country audiences, historically. I think it was marketed more towards the aggressive nature of males, regardless of location. More, the nature of the sport naturally appeals to the male nature, historically.
While I can't speak for everyone, I can speak for myself. As I've already said in other posts here, I don't watch football for political reasons. Enough of my tax dollars already goes for subsidizing sports to be happy to have the same sports telling me what my political views should be.
Let me try to put it into terms you might better understand. If I go through the drive through at some fast food place and place an order for a cheeseburger I don't want the person taking my order telling me cows are contributing to global warming through bovine flatulence. I'm paying for a cheeseburger, not that person's opinion or the high likelihood they will get my order wrong.
In the same way, I pay for the ability to watch a football game because I want to watch football, not have some athlete making ridiculous amounts of money tell me his political opinions about how oppressed he is or how unfair life is or whatever their issue may be. I don't have the slightest problem with them doing it on their own dime and time, but I certainly do on mine.
I seriously doubt if anyone will be able to force you to listen to the black national anthem simply because you are tuned into an NFL game. Even if they play it on tv , or at the stadium if you are there live , you can always play with your phone, eat something, or go to the bathroom.
Personally, I seriously doubt if it will show up on the tv broadcasts after the first week of the season.
This is a drop in an ocean.
Okay, cool. That's your opinion, whether I agree with it or not. More power to you.
The only issue I have with it is, how do you know it's faux or forced? Our country has a flag. Is that faux or forced? I mean, it supposedly stands for something in the same way the Anthem is supposed to. Do you think we ought to dispense with flags? The name of our country is supposed to stand for something. Is that faux or forced? Should we dispense with that as well? I mean, considering your view, where do you draw the line? Should we just be identified with a meaningless Princian symbol and call ourselves "The country formerly known as the United States of America?"
Presumably, you feel our country should stand for something. At least, I would hope so. Some principle that we all should strive for. If so, why wouldn't it be appropriate to play an Anthem that reminded us of this?
I don't need symbols or a song to know love of country.
Hopefully I don't get edited for this but that's a pretty ignorant statement. It's hardly about the "black national anthem" simply being played at a sports event. Yeah, I can pretend to ignore it but that isn't the end of it. What the issue has to do with is a current generation claiming personal abuse for what happened to past ancestors.
Know what "stolen valor" is? It's when someone who never served wears the uniform, with medals and everything, and tells everyone what a hero they were. That describes a lot of what's going on today. People take what happened to their ancestors and wear it as if they themselves suffered it. It's total BS. Remember the photos from the 60's where white police officers were letting their dogs chew on black protesters simply for standing up for what the Constitution insisted was their right? That was valor.
Today, municipalities and politicians roll over and pee on themselves over anything having to do with race. And they do so because of people with stolen valor and idiots who back them because of some fantasy ideology.
No, it's not. Enough drops make a river and that is what we have here. This is simply one piece in a multi faceted effort to subvert. I think you know this.
Neither do I, but you and I, as individuals, aren't the subject. The nation is. To be a nation, those things are needed. I don't know how anyone but an anarchist could disagree.
I think David Duke would agree.
Ask Kavika if he thinks the racial history of this country should be swept under the rug
Who is saying the racial history of this country should be swept under the rug? I'm objecting to the destruction of the concept that we are all Americans, rather than dividing us by our race.
ty iy are the real victims of racism unfortunately nothing good will happen.
As long you keep insisting people are defined by their race, nothing good will happen.
Nothing personal , but your comment reeks of contradiction. You werent born when the British bombarded Fort McHenry in 1814 but still you rise to hear that battle commemorated in song. You weren't born when the American troops stormed Omaha Beach or Iwo Jima but still you stand in reverence to it. If the events of history dont mean anything to people who werent born "then" , why do we teach US history to school children in both middle school and high school as compulsory courses?
Is it ok to teach that the European colonists were nothing but hard working god fearing people even if evidence shows they treated the natives who predated them on this continent badly?
There is a member here who posts something praising the founding fathers almost every day. Why arent the lives of the founding fathers irrelevant and meaningless bits and pieces from a time no one alive today experienced?
To say that no one alive today is responsible for the past is to say that no one is/was responsible for it.
All we have to do as white people is take a little medicine and come out and say we all have to do better.
Millions and millions of whites are not even willing to do that because "they werent there".
Not at all. There's a difference between claiming something for myself based on what someone else did that I didn't and recognizing the efforts of someone else. When I hear the Anthem, I am not thinking of Fort McHenry. I'm thinking of taking a stand for something. That's what I stand for when it is played, not some specific battle.
Standing in reverence to those who stormed Omaha beach or Iwo Jima is not the same as claiming their valor. You are making a false equivalency. If you want to use those things as examples, then the equivalency would be that I deserve (some thing) based on what they did.
Not at all what I said or referred to. I think you know this. This is nothing but a straw man argument. I didn't say anything like the events of history having no meaning to current day people. I said current people act as if what happened to their ancestors happened to them.
No, it's not okay, but it isn't as if that hasn't already been taught for years. I'm almost 59 years old. That means my educational years were from about 67 to 81. Even though the media at the time portrayed Custer as some sort of hero, my education, even way back then, told the truth about him. I remember the conflict between the movies I saw on TV and what I learned about the truth in school. I remember reading books about white child captives of Native Americans raised by them and their experiences which de-villainized them, although they were hardly the idyllic portrayal of Native Americans we're asked to swallow today.
Again, a straw man argument. I didn't say what happened in the past was irrelevant. What I was referring to was that some today feel that because their ancestors were treated badly that somehow means we owe them something today. They take what happened in the past and superimpose it onto their lives and claim they are owed something.
That's different from people who actually did the suffering. Take the Tuskegee syphilis experiment for example. I'm totally on board for reparations for those who suffered that atrocity. A Native American sterilized because she was Native American? Totally for reparation. Reparations because someone happens to be of that same race, sorry. Nope.
This statement doesn't make any sense whatsoever. There were people who were responsible for Wounded Knee and slavery. Nothing can change that. There is no logical argument to claim that people today, regardless of their beliefs, could have had any effect on what people of the past did and for what reasons they did them.
Perhaps the difference between us is that you seem to want the present to pay for the past, whereas I want the present to learn from the past in order to have a better future for all. Trying to pay for all the wrongs in the past is a fools game and everyone knows this. What it actually is, is a political tool in order to achieve a desired outcome, not an actual effort to redress wrongs for people who are dead and don't care.
Horse shit. What is needed is the realization there are right ways and wrong ways to live. Color has nothing to do with it.
Neither were millions and millions of people of other colors. Even the poorest of the poor, regardless of color, have it better than most countries in the world. If it were not so, people would not do everything in their power to come here.
People with your view seem to like portraying this country as the greatest evil on the face of the planet, as if we are currently living in some dystopian nightmare. Well, people with your views are doing all that they can to bring that to reality, in my opinion.
I dont think anyone wants someone to "pay" for 1619, they want it acknowledged. As far as I can tell, and I pay attention, there are many many adults in this country who neither know about or acknowledge the racist history of America.
What some people do want to be paid for, and maybe it will be up for some sort of negotiation is loss of generational wealth due to segregation and the ghettoizing of generations of black Americans. The aggregate average wealth of black Americans is about 1/10th of whites. A lot of this can be traced to discriminatory housing practices over the first two thirds of the 20th century. I dont know if "reparations" are in order but it should be looked into.
I dont think anything I said is "straw man" . Blacks today want a "reckoning" for 300 + years of racial discrimination. Whats the problem?
If you think that, you're either lying or delusional. Just my opinion
Um, yeah. How many white Americans do you think that actually applies to? Are you expecting to receive, or have you received, some vast amount of wealth from your parents when they die or do die? Myself and my brothers will inherit my parent's house when they die. It isn't a mansion in any sense of the word. It's just a small house. Dad has some money in investments but it isn't much. None of it will be life changing. I don't know anyone personally who will be any different, regardless of skin color.
Here's my take on things. Life isn't fair. I wanted to be a pro golfer on the PGA tour. I don't have the talent. Am I supposed to feel all discriminated against because of that? Nope. My parents are not rich in any sense of the word. Am I supposed to feel underprivileged because they couldn't contribute a penny toward college? Nope. My dad told my from a young age that I had better have a plan because once I finished High School I was out of there. I had no clue about anything so I took him at his word and joined the Army. Now, aside from the union job I have, with great benefits compared to what most people have, I also have an Army retirement which I started drawing the day I retired. People of every color can say the same thing and have the same things I have.
My point? I don't dwell on what's unfair. We are human beings so naturally things are going to be unfair. That's our nature. I just do what's necessary to succeed. What bothers me is people like yourself want to eliminate that. You seem to think, as far as I can tell, that simply being alive means you have rights to certain things you don't actually have rights to. No one owes you anything simply because you exist. Work for it or die.
And I put that down to culture. I know black people who have everything I have because they have the same attitude I have and have done what I have done. I don't deny that it may have been harder for them to achieve, but achieve it they did. The rest are where they are because of their culture.
In my opinion, no, it shouldn't. If unfair housing practices still exist, I'm all for eliminating them, as long as it's realistic. Reparations, forget it. Forget it because who's idea of who was discriminated against applies? The Irish and Italians certainly could make a case for that. Further, how far back do we go? When America first gained its independence, the constitution mostly applied to wealthy land owners, not the common man, regardless of color. Why shouldn't that be considered in reparations?
Nope. You can't fix the past. You can fix the present, which should consist of making sure as we can that everyone has the same opportunities their talents and aptitudes qualifies them for, not striving for some BS equality of outcome regardless of qualifications.
Because no one owes generation K for what happened to generation A. No one in generation K is responsible for what generation A did. It's that simple. Human beings are not good people by nature. They are self centered. Racial discrimination sucks but that isn't the entirety of American history. Neither is what happened to Native Americans. Or the Asians. Or the Italians. Or the Irish.
Here's the way I see it. The color of a person's skin is meaningless. It says nothing about their character, talents or aptitudes in a purely clinical sense. There is a right way to behave and there is a wrong way to behave. This is also indifferent to skin color. That is, if a particular behavior is right or wrong, it's right or wrong regardless of skin color.
What this means is, if buying a house should be based solely on a person's ability to pay the mortgage, then that should be the sole criteria. That means, if a black, Asian, Latino, white person or Martian can meet the criteria of the loan, they should be able to buy the house, regardless of what neighborhood that house is located in.
What it should not be based on is history. That is, because applicant A happens to be a member of a historically discriminated population should have no bearing on whether or not that person qualifies for the loan. The only relevance to the historical discrimination is to ensure that isn't the basis for denying the loan. I.E, this is a predominately (pick your race) neighborhood and your not part of it so, loan denied. Totally for fighting such things.
To my mind, people who are truly against past discrimination take that past as a lesson in history but don't try to "fix" it. They look at the mistakes of the past and say "here's what it should be" and work to make it that way. That is, the path forward is to end what prevented certain people from opportunities others had but don't try to "make up" for what others did in the past. I'm largely Irish, ancestrally. I know a few things about what my ancestors had to put up with. I know today that no one would spend a second's thought about it. They would just assume I had all the same opportunities and benefits I do. Reparations would never occur to them.
I'm totally convinced you are all about equality. That's why I oppose you so much. It's your "brand" of "equality" that I oppose. You, and those like you, want to reduce people to the equivalence of parts in a machine. Just like every communist entity or philosophy that ever existed. It's the ideal that matters, not the people. Regardless of aptitude, talent, skin color, intelligence or anything else that makes an individual an individual, you want equality of outcome. No matter how little or how much effort someone puts in, the result should be the same. Nope.
I watched a lot less NFL IN 2020 than any year since I became a fan in 1971. I’ll watch even less this year. The college game is a great alternative for all of the major sports.
It’s more like a big broom from from which to launch sweeping generalizations
In the south and parts of the Midwest and mountain west it’s the college game not the pro game that is king, especially in football. And these are universities that generally are not excessively woke.
Your comments seem to be all about you. I dont base appropriate societal decisions on personal anecdotes about individuals.
Lets say there's a house where various young people live. Every week every member of the house is given a poker chip which they use to buy goods and services, or they can save the chip for later. Human nature being what it is, the ones who save most of the chips instead of spending them all grow in perceived esteem because they have more "wealth" and status.
Now let's assume there is a group of young people who were not permitted into the house for a long long time and they had to stand on the outside looking in. For that long long time they didnt receive any poker chips because they were on the outside looking in, but now the thinking inside the house has evolved and the outsiders have been let in and are given the same one poker chip a week as everyone else.
We have achieved nirvana ! Everyone is on the same playing field , everyone has the same opportunity to spend or save their weekly allotment. Whats wrong with this picture?
Simplistic? I dont think so.
By the way, some of the richest people in America have never worked a day in their lives.
Since you believe everything must be based on individual merit you must be against any form of inheritance.
Some years ago, Sam Walton's six children held as much wealth as the bottom thirty percent of Americans - that's one hundred million Americans. None of Sam's kids ever had any role in managing Walmart. They were rich because they were Sam's kids.
Which I think is a large part of the problem with your politics. You don't think of people as individuals but, rather, like a flock of sheep that needs to be managed. The ideology is more important than the people and why communism never works.
Pretty much everything. The main problem with it, though, is it isn't remotely close to explaining about current reality. Who issues the poker chip? Where did it come from? Who produced the goods and services the poker chip is a placeholder for? Why is it given to these people simply because they are in the house? Who paid for the house? How is it possible to save the poker chip when doing so means you don't eat or any other necessary activity? How were those who did not get a poker chip survive, since they could not have access to food, shelter or anything else the poker chip purchases?
Point is, while I understand that analogies are not intended to be that specific but, rather, illustrate a particular point, it should at least deal with real world issues. Your analogy rests on one that doesn't exist.
Well, I can certainly agree with that, but only because I know what nirvana is (no, not the band). Literally, nirvana means "cessation" or "extinction". Your "nirvana" is nothing more than equality of outcome, regardless of effort. That is why you are so against people like Bezos. What he is is the opposite of equality of outcome. Your "nirvana" is simply the extinction of the individual over outcome of the masses as a whole.
I have said nothing that says everything must be based on individual merit. There is literally no one who believes such a thing. No one believes protection under the law should be based on individual merit, for example. Certain things, such as the example I just gave should not be merit based.
However, the manner in which I do believe things should be merit based concerns an individual's efforts and talents. For instance, the idea that the VP of the United States should go to a person based on innate characteristics, such as sex, color, nationality or other such attributes is insane. It should go to an individual most capable of doing the job. Lauding the fact that the VP is a female woman of color of a certain ancestry says not one thing about whether or not that person is capable of doing the job.
As far as inherited wealth is concerned, I do not associate that with merit any more than I do with inherited physical traits. I think those who do suffer from envy and jealousy.
So?
It's a litmus test, Drak. It differentiates categories of social sensitivity.
Except capitalism is dead, murdered by Supply Side Economics.
Oh, is that what you call it?
Yes.
"-the mystic chords of memory-"
Now there's a piece of writing that does not fit with rest.
There is only one official national anthem.
There is no 'assault' on America's national identity, whatever that's supposed to mean.
Much ado about nothing. Ho hum.
I think they meant to say "The Assault on America's white Nationalists Identity".
Anyone else wouldn't give two shits about what some privately owned sports team plays before their games.
That's untrue and you know it. Imagine you paying good money to go see a movie in a theater you've been waiting a long time to see and, when it finally comes out and you go to see it, the company that made the film begins with a political comment you don't agree with. What do you suppose that's going to do for your movie experience? Think you'll enjoy it?
Further, the reason you can go watch that movie or some privately owned sports team is because people pay them money so they can do what they do. Without you and I they would not exist, so it isn't all that private, really, as I believe the NFL should have already learned and is about to get schooled in again.
Opinion pieces usually if not always need to be evaluated in conjunction with evaluating the author.
Rich Lowry is a conservative talking head who has been on network news shows dozens of times . He is sometimes described as an "old school" conservative.
Not old school enough to condemn Trump and Trumpism though.
I would put his credibility on an issue like "patriotism" to be somewhere around 5 on a scale of 1 to 10.
-----
We could all get on the same page in this country if "whites" would just admit America is not a white nation, and would accept the fact that it is now multicultural. Really, it would not be that painful. But there are millions and millions of whites who want to fight to maintain "traditional" descriptions of America, some of which will not be viable going forward.
If only Barack Obama had not decided to run for president and they had stayed in their place........ sigh.
Well, surprise, surprise, surprise!!!
Imagine that, folks, we somehow have managed to work Trump into yet ANOTHER freaking conversation having absolutely NOTHING to do with Trump!
Step right up, folks, get your "I Hate Trump" tickets, hats, and t-shirts!!!!!
Rich Lowry is an old school conservative who nonetheless supported Trump from time to time and didnt go "never Trump" like a lot of the other old school conservatives did.
Of course that has to be considered when evaluating an article like this.
Your never ending attempts to downplay messages by shooting the messenger gets pretty fucking tiring JR.
THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH TRUMP, BUT TO BE HONEST, I DO ADMIRE YOUR STICK-TO-IT-IVENESS IN ASSURING THAT EVERYTHING IS ALL ABOUT TRUMP 24/7/365!
SUCH PERSISTENCE IS RARE!
Isn't that just SOP when the actual article is beyond dispute?
what makes you think the actual article is beyond dispute?
Facts.
Well, that and you criticizing the author instead of addressing the actual article.
It's a tell that almost everyone can read.
All you do is try and speak to the most superficial elements of a topic. You are constantly beyond your depth.
And all you do is attack sources you don't like.
Trump automatically generates an "if you aren't with them, you're against them" situation.
Trump is a fascist. An enemy of democracy. Apologists for Trump, regardless of how they phrase their arguments, are also fascists.
A rose is a rose is a rose.
So... why do you bother with him?
I try not to- his participation is rather wide ranging you know, at least on articles I comment on.
Tex, the outlook of people who write opinion columns and op eds is completely pertinent to discussing the articles. Its not my fault if you dont understand that.
Tex, I could talk about the substance of this article in my sleep better than you could awake.
It's tactics. Occupy the terrain. It doesn't matter what is done with it.
i agree.
Yeah. If I posted an article about how often fast food chains get orders wrong, some would claim it is Trump and Trumpism to blame.
Nonsense
I can't take any author seriously who spells Wales "Wells"
Rich Lowry doesn't know fieldgoals from touchdowns!
Maybe not, but he does know what song is our only national anthem and what traditions are.
Hendrix!
Being booked last (early Monday morning) most of the people were gone by the time he played it. Hendrix said in an interview months later he only got 8 minutes of sleep the night before.
Whatever the circumstances... it's a great bit of guitar.
Met Hendrix and smoked with Bob Marley. Doesn't get better than that!
That's impressive...
Beyond dispute?
Nope
Ok, let's talk about the article.
Lowry seems to be saying that the change comes from a choice. We have to choose between 1776 and 1619. We have to choose between the 4th of July and Juneteenth. We have to choose between The National Anthem and Lift Every Voice And Sing, we have to choose between The American Legion and Black Lives Matter.
This is all bullshit. No one has to make any of those choices.
Why are we worshiping mostly wealthy white men from 250 years ago , to the EXCLUSION of an admission that the society back then was demonstrably unfair to people of color and women. Arent we supposed to progress over centuries?
I think the constitution is great. I think the Declaration of Independence is great, but lets clarify what was going on back then by adding pertinent information such as what 1619 does.
1619 isn't a choice, it isn't even American history.
it's just more fucking babbling by race baiters intent on rewriting history.
I am pretty sure you know nothing about 1619.
Ronald Reagan:
You know, John...
You spend an awful lot of time, arguing with people who don't give a fuck about truth...
I just wish they were better competition.
Ronald Reagan:
"Trees cause more pollution than automobiles do."
Talk about knowing things that aren't so. Reagan was the winner in that category.
Why do I have to choose between Juneteenth and Independence Day? I want to celebrate both.
You dont have to choose. Saying it has to be a choice is a far right fantasy.
Agreed. These snowflakes are becoming unhinged
Next progressives will want their own football league for blacks.
In my opinion, the most significant statement, that is the most important one made throughout this discussion, was made by Drakkonis:
"A country divided against itself will not stand."
That thought was biblical, and was quoted by Abraham Lincoln.
In almost every respect, I see America as a nation divided against itself, whether it be Republicans vs Democrats, conservatives vs liberals, right wing vs left wing, believers vs non-believers, race vs race, States vs States, those who would bury history vs those who would recognize it, vaxers vs anti-vaxers, sports team vs sports team, right down to the division of opinion right here in these very comments. The argument made is that such is the privilege of "free speech", so unifying factors are just fodder for arguments and fights and perpetual divisiveness. And to what does that lead? Progress or stagnation?
I've made it perfectly clear here for a long time that I stand with the flag and the national anthem as necessary unifying symbols not of a government of a few years, but of a nation, a country, the land that Woody Guthrie wrote a song about. In that respect I may be in agreement with many members here who rarely, if ever, agree with me.
First hand evidence of what I've been saying....
The rural plague
.
Why is the Star-Spangled Banner sung to open... whatever ?
Two professional sports teams square off. How is the national anthem pertinent?
The anthem is sung so often that the only way for the singer to get any notice is with vocal acrobatics - sometimes to the point of rendering the music unrecognizable. Does this really show respect for the nation? The spectators are s-o-o-o bored...
There are lots of patriotic songs. If the purpose is to show respect, wouldn't it be more effective to produce multiple different songs?
Does anyone actually think about this?
I have been asking that for years.