Let’s Get Serious About Patriotism
The New York Times and the Washington Post have put the Democrats on notice: If you want to become president, patriotism still counts. Whether by coincidence or some conspiratorial design, both of the bellwethers of the political center gave the issue of patriotism front page coverage this past weekend.
Democrats may be tempted to dismiss the patriotism ploy as a distraction from the really important issues of the campaign. Glenn Greenwald, for one, has already denounced the Post article as “small-minded, juvenile gossip” about “tiny sideshows” like lapel pins and the Pledge of Allegiance.
Yes, it’s a shame that the the media reduce the issue of patriotism to silly symbols like lapel pins and the Pledge of Allegiance. But the fact is that patriotism is largely about emotion, and emotions are triggered by symbols that can easily seem, to outsiders, trivial and silly. To focus on the triviality of the symbol and miss the meaning behind it is a dangerous mistake. On Election Day, it can get you killed.
So those of us who desperately want to see McCain lose in November would do well to thank the Times and the Post. Regardless of their motives (which do deserve to be questioned), they have given the Democrats a well-timed reminder: Like it or not, patriotism and its symbols still matter to millions of Americans — perhaps enough to swing an election that we all thought, not long ago, the super-patriot Republicans were absolutely doomed to lose.
Look at the polls. Over 80% of the voters see the nation heading in the wrong direction. A clear majority say that the party offering a new direction, the Democrats, are most likely to make the right decisions on the major issues, especially the economy and the war. Considering that McCain’s major policy positions are closely in line with Bush’s, he should be trailing far behind.
And the polls are starting to show Clinton and Obama inching ahead of McCain — but only by a few points, generally within or just at the edge of the margin of error. And some even have McCain ahead. There is something about McCain that inclines a small, but crucial, portion of the electorate to vote for him even though they disagree with his positions. Emotion counts.
That paradox is most obvious when it comes to the war in Iraq. The most recent Pew poll shows 56% of Americans saying “bring the troops home as soon as possible.” The perception that the U.S. is reducing violence and stopping terrorism in Iraq has dropped dramatically in the last two months. More people blame the war than any other single factor for our economic woes.
Yet in a head-to-head matchup on who will make “wise decisions about Iraq”, McCain beats Obama 50% to 38%, and he beats Clinton 49% to 43%. On the question of who can best handle terrorism, McCain beats Obama 63% to 26% and he beats Clinton 58% to 31%. Those are the same kind of numbers pollsters were finding over two months ago.
Perceptions of patriotism follow virtually the same statistical pattern. In the Pew poll, 90% call McCain patriotic, 76% say the same of Clinton, but only 61% apply that term to Obama. In a recent New York Times / CBS poll, 70% McCain found “very patriotic,” compared with 40% who felt that way about Clinton, and only 29% who felt that way about Obama.
The candidate perceived as more patriotic is seen as best able to handle issues of war and national security. That may seem like an obviously predictable correlation. But why? Why shouldn’t the candidate seen as best on the economy or health care or education — the one who can do most to improve the nation’s quality of life — be seen as more patriotic? Why should it be the candidate seen as best able to defeat our enemies?
Because that’s how we are taught to think and feel about patriotism. Most of our symbols of American patriotism evoke an image of the U.S. as an embattled nation, besieged by foes who want to destroy us. Patriotism has come to mean, above all, a commitment to the survival of America as our highest value, a willingness to fight — and die, if necessary — to save our country. It’s only one version of patriotism, but at least since World War II (and perhaps a lot earlier) it’s the one that has dominated American life.
And it’s been sinking Democratic candidates, not merely since 1988, as Greenwald argues, but since 1968. For four decades now, Democrats have typically been expressing their patriotism by emphasizing the contrast between how Americans live now and how much better we might live here at home in the future. Republicans express their patriotism by emphasizing a contrast between a virtuous America and its evil enemies.
That’s the narrative McCain is counting on, and having real success with: Being a super-patriot means being able to hold the line against our enemies abroad. We may not know exactly what we all stand for as Americans. But we know damn well what we stand against.
The narrative works because of its deeper implications. If politics means making things better here at home, as Dems say, then apparently things are not very good right now. And we need a difficult internal debate to figure out how to make them better. If politics is mostly about fighting foreign enemies, as the GOP says, the underlying message is that things here at home are just fine. No difficult discussion is necessary. Our status quo merely needs to be protected against aggressors who would destroy us.
Democrats ask voters: “Which candidate will make life in America better in the future?” Republicans ask voters: “Which candidate will make you feel better about being an American in the present?” When symbols of patriotism revolve around winning wars, they become symbols of America’s present virtue (our right to win) and strength (our ability to win). So they make people feel good about being an American.
The lesson of history is that when Americans are losing a war, or think they might be losing a war, many are especially eager to vote for candidates who make them feel good about being Americans. So they choose the Republican, who makes them feel good and proud about America as it is (e.g., Nixon in 1972, Reagan in 1980, Bush in 2004).
Yes, if we could get emotion completely out of politics and force voters to decide only on the basis of rational policy views, it would be a wonderful world — and liberals would win almost every time. But it ain’t gonna happen any time soon. Yes, it’s easy to poke logical holes in the Republicans’ way of symbolizing love of country, and it’s worth doing. But it won’t win elections. You don’t get people to change their symbols and their feelings by logically deconstructing them. You get people to change by offering them a more attractive set of symbols.
When it comes to patriotism, you can create new alternatives from anywhere on the political spectrum. There is no need to choose between good policies and good symbolism. We should expect, and work for, both. Martin Luther King, Jr., understood that well enough. So did Franklin D. Roosevelt. In fact, there is a long line of successful models we can follow.
So there is no reason to dismiss patriotism as a trivial issue — and lose yet another election that Democrats should be able to win. There is every reason to engage the issue of patriotism head-on, reject the trivializing, raise the conversation to a more serious intellectual plane, and fight to take away the Republican’s long-standing lock on the symbols of patriotism.
If the Democratic candidate this fall, whomever it is, made patriotism the central issue of the campaign, I suspect he or she would win by a wide margin.
Ira Chernus is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder and author of Monsters To Destroy: The Neoconservative War on Terror and Sin. chernus@colorado.edu
Patriotism or peace, you can’t have both.
The new patriotic pledge of allegiance: I pledge allegiance to the Constitution of the United states of America, and not to the Republic that now stands,one nation under God and the Bill of Rights, of the people; for the people; and by the people;with Liberty and Justice for all.
Only idiots sell themselves to a Nation and those who would do so to a Nation without borders are doubly idiotic. Take your patriotism and your flag and shove it.
duh, it does not take a degree to figure this one out.
Vote Green Party
Say after me, and beat your chest, 1000 times, I AM MORE PATRIOTIC THAN YOU.
rebelnow: “Patriotism or peace, you can’t have both.”
Right you are. Tribalism’s never satisfied. It seems it is, however, eternally popular.
For even more enlightening ‘patriotic definition’ quotes by noted personages, see:
http://thinkexist.com/quotations/patriotism/
Then take your pick(or picks)!
Many of them apply to our dilemma!
“Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious”
- Oscar Wilde
If patriotism means willingness to fight whomever the President claims is a threat, we should call it an IQ test.
This is especially true after the events of the past seven years: A group of Saudi terrorists planned and carried out 9/11. The Saudi mastermind was hiding in Pakistan. We attacked Afghanistan and then Iraq — two nations that had nothing to do with it. These wars together have cost over $500 billion, 4,000 combat lives, God knows how many thousand non-combat or Iraqi casualties, and plunged the economy into its worst shape since the Great Depression. To boot, we have emboldened Iran and solidified its position as the dominant force in the region.
Still, some Americans view patriotism as support for the President’s adventures and support the candidate that might continue them past 2009.
The only rational conclusion is that many Americans are idiots. There’s really no denying it. McCain’s poll figures are like a litmus test on the collective IQ of the country.
Forget the 1% of right wingers that are wealthy and cynical and smile approvingly as the cash machine keeps ringing.
Over here in Europe, we don’t talk about “patriotism” any more. We talk about “nationalism”, and (most of us) recognise that it was a force that arose largely in the 19th century, had some good points (e.g. the music of Elgar, Dvorak, Sibelius, etc.) but also started two world wars. We view its resurgence - right now it’s raising its ugly fascist head in Italy - with trepidation. It’s no accident that the European Union - perhaps the most successful political initiative since 1945 - is based on the rejection of nationalism in favour of collective self-preservation.
Once Americans learn to see their patriotism as just the same as the nationalism/chauvinism that nearly destroyed Europe, there’ll be some progress.
No, I don’t think it’ll happen any time soon, either.
The Democratic nominee should just start gooning “patriotism” until it loses all power. Maybe Clinton’s on the right track with her promise to “obliterate” Iran (if it nukes Israel). Obama should come back with a vow to annihilate the two countries most threatening to America, time and place to be determined. “John McCain hasn’t told us how many millions of foreigners he’ll kill for America! Why not? Isn’t he man enough to dirty his clean hands in filthy foreign blood? I am! Amerika ueber alles! Amerika ueber alles!” From now on every Democratic candidate should wear an American flag hat, an American flag shirt, an American flag lapel pin, an American flag decoder ring, American flag pants and American flag socks.
Hey, some of us in the US recognize jingoism/chauvinism/nationalism as well! Unfortunately, this is a country where critical thinking, questioning and independent thought are now demonized. We are a nation of institutional thinkers, and proud of it! Gimme mah beer, mah red meat, mah SUV, mah little yellow ribbon on mah SUV, mah Walmart and mah flag.
I fly a flag of the world in front of my house because I do not believe in nationhood. I, however, am not running for national office. Clinton and Obama need to play that game and appeal to that crowd if they are to stand a chance in November. Prof. Chernus is absolutely correct.
“Gimme mah beer, mah red meat, mah SUV, mah little yellow ribbon on mah SUV, mah Walmart and mah flag.”
Don’t forget “mah gun.”
Mr. Revere,
Why would you retain the under “under God” part? It was only added in the 1950’s in order to ferret out “godless communists” from our universities, theater stages and movie studios.
Why have a pledge of allegence at all? Most of the worlds democracies do just fine without one.
In the Pew poll, 90% call McCain patriotic, 76% say the same of Clinton, but only 61% apply that term to Obama. In a recent New York Times / CBS poll, 70% McCain found “very patriotic,” compared with 40% who felt that way about Clinton, and only 29% who felt that way about Obama.
So it seems to me that 90% of the people in the Pew poll were STUPID and 70% in the NYT poll. Patriotism is a tool used by the ruling class to keep the poor dumb serfs in line… and by serfs, I mean the wage slaves like YOU.
The only solution I see is for things in the US to get bad, very bad.
But unfortunately, unlike the 1930’s, the only thing more powerful than patriotism among USAns is it’s every-man-for-himself individualism.
So it won’t be an episode of “The Waltons” - more like the rise and fall of the Third Reich.
Can’t someone turn it around and claim that since taxes pay for all the “good” that the “great” USA does, then anyone who complains about taxes, even anyone who is not willing to pay more in taxes, cannot possibly be a patriot. Patriots love to pay taxes to America because they love America! Tax cutters are traitors!
How about Senator Akaka writing that he wants to have nuclear arms only in the “right hands”? THERE ARE NO “RIGHT” HANDS, MR. AKAKA, NUCLEAR POWER SHOULD BE BANNED IN EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD!!! What arrogance can top your position, Mr. Akaka?
How patriotic is an administration, and members of Congress, not to mention the media-at-large, who refuse to meet their obligation to uphold the US Constitution, The Bill Of Rights, The Geneva Convention, and other International laws? They have committed crimes against the United States, its citizens, and humanity in general. They have, in essence, defaced and disgraced the American Flag. The founders of our beloved country would classify them as traitors and terrorists, and dealt with them accordingly in a court of law. The punishment? No guessing!
Gee, if there was but a single congressional patriot who would at long last stand up and call a spade a spade!
What is patriotism but an inhumane belief that “our” country is superior and all others inferior (and therefore deserving of oppression, exploitation and destruction). The world can’t sustain such delusions - not when the whole human race needs the help of the whole human race if it is the survive the coming crises. Let’s dump patriotism and go for a common fellowship between all human beings.
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel - Samuel Johnson
Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons - Bertrand Russell
You’re not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can’t face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who says it - Malcolm X
Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious - Oscar Wilde
Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy - George Bernard Shaw
I share the views of many of you. I find expressions of patriotism empty and, in light of the past few years, hypocritical and frankly, nauseating.
HOWEVER. I’m a retired medical librarian with 16 years experience on the reference desk. I learned that one of the things I needed to do, to best help people, is to somehow buy into their concerns. Not totally agree with their viewpoint, but find some area of agreement. Then I could work with that area, and gradually begin to educate them away from some of their erroneous assumptions. If you want to “sell” something, whether information in my case, or yourself and your programs as a politician, you first have to establish a certain amount of trust.
I think Ira Chernus has a point. Democratic politicians don’t need to necessarily go around wearing lapel pins. But acknowledge that lots of people have this patriotism and find a way to buy into some of it without compromising basic principles. They can say things like:
Our country was founded on some great promises and premises, such as the right to liberty, pursuit of happiness, and general welfare of ALL. I love my country, and we’ve done great things. We have also done things which are not great. I want to see us live up to our founding fathers’ ideals better. We can do that by [establishing a “Manhattan Project” to get off reliance of foreign oil, and onto renewable resources] or whatever program or idea the politician wants to discuss at the time. And finish up with something like: I want to see this country return to its great roots.
I don’t have the perfect words here, but I can tell you this: if we want to keep McSame out of the White House, we do need to buy into unthinking patriotism in some way OTHER than appealing to people’s lowest basest instincts. Recognizing that people want to feel proud in some way can be used in positive ways, by suggesting that we can all feel even prouder and here’s how we can work together, etc.
I can see Obama taking this and running with it. If Hillary were to jettison her current advisors and start appealing to something other than the lizard brain, she could do something as well, although she lacks Obama’s speech-making ability. McCain, back in 2000 and before, maybe. Not now. He’s sold his soul to the devil and does seem to be getting a little senile to boot.
Ira Chernus is smart. Patriotism is part of our national culture; and its a way of saying “i’m on YOUR side, brother/sister”. Say what you want, Mr. Chernus is telling the truth.
Oh, and in our democratic system, the PEOPLE get what they want. You can’t make the majority want something they don’t want. And if they want patriotism, patriotism is what they shall get.
So patriotism means being willing to spill innocent blood all over the world just so the U.S. can say “We’re Number One!” Screw patriotism.
Real patriots don’t have dual citizenship.
A wise woman I know once told me about running for office: “The more liberal you are, the more flags you have to have behind you.”
A monkey can be trained to wave a flag.
A flag pin is no evidence of patriotism; which is understood as love and loyalty to one’s own country.
If we truly love our country we will work for it’s benefit and dissent from what harms it.
I dissent and rebel from how we have de-evolved but I love what America was founded upon.
When Bush implemented his Doctrine of Fear after THAT DAY we call 9/11; I WOKE UP and sought the answers to my questions that the media was not asking.
Bush’s Doctrine of Fear and the demonizing of Islam has hardened the hearts of many in our homeland.
If we the people truly are the government, Godspeed on US to WAKE UP and DO SOMETHING to regain the vision and hopes of our Founding Fathers:
“Soon after I had published the pamphlet “Common Sense” [on Feb. 14, 1776] in America, I saw the exceeding probability that a revolution in the system of government would be followed by a revolution in the system of religion… The world is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.”-Tom Paine
Eileen Fleming, Reporter and Editor WAWA:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Author “Keep Hope Alive” and “Memoirs of a Nice Irish American ‘Girl’s’ Life in Occupied Territory”
Producer “30 Minutes With Vanunu” and “13 Minutes with Vanunu”
kivals wrote:
“Patriots love to pay taxes to America because they love America! Tax cutters are traitors!”
I have often thought the same thing about the right wing privatizer, anti-public, anti-tax types. Why don’t we accuse THEM of lack or partiotism for defunding thr public sector and causing decaying schools, highways, cities, and pollution that hurt their fellow countrymen.
US-style “patriotism” never revolves around a desire to make their country shine with national healthcare, good schools, national free university education, clean streets and vibrant cities, well maintained highways, high speed rail service everywhere, clean air, clean water, and a genuinely free and aggressive news media.
So firstly, US Patriotism is an abberation from any other countrys’ patriotism in that it adherents don’t seem to care one least bit about the actual welfare of their fellow citizens. As long has they have their suburban comforts, everyone else can go to hell. US patriotism is first and foremost, anti-solidarity.
Secondly, most USAns never travel to any other developed countries - even to Canada; only to cheap resorts in dirt-poor Carribean or Latin American countries. They also don’t read very much. So, most of them quite sincerely, and obstinately think that, domestically, US is simply the best in everything - living standard, technology, educational attainment; everything!
And everyone, around the world, dearly wants to be just like us!
And finally, there are the bogymen…. who want to KILL US ALL because they are JEALOUS of our Ryan homes and big SUV’s, our Wal Marts, our Southwest Airlines, our Applebees and TGI Fridays, and our Coors lite beer.
Any attempt to debunk these on any of these sacrosinct beliefs no matter how polite, is going to open one to accusations of being unpatriotic. Look at how the US cannot even adopt the measurement system or other standards that the entire rest of the world uses. Most other english-speaking cvountries changed to the metric system without problems, some of them like Australia cold-turkey. Why can’t the US? Because USAns regard metric as foreign and therefore inferior and anyone promoting it (like Carter did) is somwhow, seditious.
The uniquely pernicious properties of US patriotism is something that Prof Cernus seem to have overlooked when he wrote this piece.
I like to make a distinction between patriotism and nationalism. To me, patriotism is loving our country enough to criticize its leaders when they fail to uphold our beloved Constitution, and working very hard to remove them from office. It’s believing that our policies should always support the common good. Nationalism is the arrogant and blind belief that your country and its leaders are always right, superior to all, and entitled to bully those in the world who have different ideas. Flag pins, magnetic ribbons, and such are nothing more than meaningless expressions of ignorant nationalism.
“Why should it be the candidate seen as best able to defeat our enemies?”
Ira answered it: “emotions count”. Plus, the human being has adjusted and adapted by first and foremost eliminating or avoiding negative outcomes (Feldenkrais, Body and Mature Behavior). For those who subscribe to the triune brain modal of human development we have the reptilian, mammalian and cortex. The reptilian part of the nervous system is the quickest reacting (e.g. moving a hand away from fire or electric shock) without utilizing the cortex; the mammalian brain section adds the warmth/passion of emotional action; cutting edge researchers in human development (Rochat, The Infant’s World) now separate emotions from feelings, with emotions being the action communicating feelings, and the cortex giving override direction ability once the stimulus reaches the cortex.
The importance here is that the reptilian, the part of the brain constantly provoked by the NeoCon “terror threats”, is the most effective part of the human system for surviving immediate threats and immediate survival, it is the behavior derived from the cortex that helps the human thrive and find pleasure.
Thus, to me the task of those seeking to unseat the NeoCon’s, which fits the direction Ira is pointing, is to construct a world view that clearly states the true level of “terror threat”, while showing that the world outside US borders is a mutually human world that can thrive within Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
To me We don’t need to wait and see and perhaps change in November. I feel a larger human inclusive world view and a clear picture of the “terror threat” can be constructed within the process of calling for impeachment hearings, as well as within the hearings themselves.
It’s still a more difficult argument to construct, but with housing foreclosures and gas prices now adding to the stress of what I consider greatly inflated “terror threats”, the reptilian part of the American human will start to kick in and assist the mammalian passion and human cortex to find the answers to their fears,even overcoming another “Reichstag event”…and low and behold it will be a pleasurable outcome - impeachment hearing for George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney.
When Bush and the religious right hijacked the flag and seperated the country into the “patriots” and the “traitors,” based on who kissed his - and those who didn’t, we never fought back, but just let them take the flag and allowed them to label us.
Maybe it’s time to take our flag back and fly it proudly for what it once stood for -and still does - if only in our minds.
Race, religion and somewhere in there let’s stuff patriotism. No matter how much those well informed tinker with then resent the status quo, it would be helpful if it could be realized that the vast majority are down to earth folks who love their family and their country and want to do good. Overall humanity is like a child, we have much growing up yet. We grab onto these toys and imagine us to be grown up. I have older brothers and sisters and younger one. I don’t put the same demands on them. Wean with empathy…it’s the long haul.
Hillary has gotten with the program by reinventing herself as a working class heroine. She now claims to have worked her way through Wellesley and Yale Law and to enjoy duck hunting and beer. She’s winning the raisin and redneck vote (elderly and working-class whites)with her tough chick routine, acting like a professional wrestler. Her constituency consists of the same folks that put Reagan and both Bushes over the top. I won’t be surprised if she shows up in a red, white and blue Uncle Sam pants suit singing the Star Spangled Banner and clutching a Bible (King James, naturally).
Well, the poll numbers prove that people are stupid. They want out of Iraq, but think “100 years”-in-Iraq McCain would be better at making decisions about the war? I’m not sure I would allow those people to pump gas into my car, or sweep the streets.
Real patriots don’t wear little flag pins made in China.
Dual Citizenship — Loyal to Whom?
American / Isreali Dual Citizens Running the American Government
Attorney General - Michael Mukasey
Head of Homeland Security - Michael Chertoff
Chairman Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board - Richard Perle
Deputy Defense Secretary (Former) - Paul Wolfowitz
Under Secretary of Defense - Douglas Feith
National Security Council Advisor - Elliott Abrams
Vice President Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff (Former) - “Scooter” Libby
White House Deputy Chief of Staff - Joshua Bolten
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs - Marc Grossman
Director of Policy Planning at the State Department - Richard Haass
U.S. Trade Representative (Cabinet-level Position) - Robert Zoellick
Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board - James Schlesinger
UN Representative (Former) - John Bolton
Under Secretary for Arms Control - David Wurmser
Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board - Eliot Cohen
Senior Advisor to the President - Steve Goldsmith
Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary - Christopher Gersten
Assistant Secretary of State - Lincoln Bloomfield
Deputy Assistant to the President - Jay Lefkowitz
White House Political Director - Ken Melman
National Security Study Group - Edward Luttwak
Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board - Kenneth Adelman
Defense Intelligence Agency Analyst (Former) - Lawrence (Larry) Franklin
National Security Council Advisor - Robert Satloff
President Export-Import Bank U.S. - Mel Sembler
Deputy Assistant Secretary, Administration for Children and Families - Christopher Gersten
Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Public Affairs - Mark Weinberger
White House Speechwriter - David Frum
White House Spokesman (Former) - Ari Fleischer
Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board - Henry Kissinger
Deputy Secretary of Commerce - Samuel Bodman
Under Secretary of State for Management - Bonnie Cohen
Director of Foreign Service Institute - Ruth Davis
…If you think we’re being unfair here, ask yourself: How you would react to the Head of Homeland Security if he or she were a dual national with citizenship in Iran, Lebanon or Saudi Arabia?
Taken from article on :
http://salonesoterica.wordpress.com/2008/04/03/dual-us-israeli-citizens-running-american-government/
Another dual citizen incident:
http://www.onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_1047.shtml
Following Zakheim and Pentagon trillions to Israel and 9-11
By Jerry Mazza
Online Journal Associate Editor
Think of this as part two of Recherche du trillions perdu, my Online Journal article on Dov Zakheim, former Bush appointee as Pentagon Comptroller from May 4, 2001 to March 10, 2004. At that time he was unable to explain the disappearance of $1 trillion dollars. Actually, nearly three years earlier, Donald Rumsfeld announced on September 10, 2001 that an audit discovered $2.3 trillion was also missing from the Pentagon books. That story, as I mentioned, was buried under 9-11’s rubble. The two sums disappeared on Zakheim’s watch.
Yet on May 6, 2004, Zakheim took a lucrative position at Booz Allen Hamilton, one of the most prestigious strategy consulting firms in the world. One of its clients then was Blessed Relief, a charity said to be a front for Osama bin Laden. Booz, Allen & Hamilton then also worked closely with DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is the research arm of the Department of Defense. So the dark card was shifted to another part of the deck.
Judicial Inc’s bio of Dov (linked below) tells us Zakheim was/is a dual Israeli/American citizen and an ordained rabbi and had been tracking the halls of US government for 25 years, casting defense policy and influence on Presidents Reagan, Clinton, Bush Sr. and Bush Jr. He is, as I described him earlier, the bionic Zionist. In fact, Judicial Inc points out that most of Israel’s armaments were gotten thanks to him. Squads of US F-16 and F-15 were classified military surplus and sold to Israel at a fraction of their value.
CHERNUS poses the question, “The candidate perceived as more patriotic is seen as best able to handle issues of war and national security. That may seem like an obviously predictable correlation. But why? Why shouldn’t the candidate seen as best on the economy or health care or education — the one who can do most to improve the nation’s quality of life — be seen as more patriotic? Why should it be the candidate seen as best able to defeat our enemies?” The answer is that is that US society is under thrall to Mars rules… it’s being programmed for military “solutions,” ultimate oxymoron if ever there was one!
H BUCHMAN, SECRETARY BIRD, PUCK TWAIN: Interesting postings.
Real patriots are ALWAYS opposed to a government made up of tyrants.
“I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing…It is the medicine necessary for the sound health of government…God forbid that we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion…THE TREE OF LIBERTY MUST BE REFRESHED WITH THE BLOOD OF PATRIOTS AND TYRANTS.It is its natural manure.”
Thomas Jefferson ( responding to Shay’s Rebellion)
sorry as soon as I saw NYT and Wash P saying anything I turned off, wake up people these people are controled like you are.
Has america turned into a country of looking out for themselves ???? It sure looks like it
Are you OK , ya I am ok ( but I have a can of tinned corn in the basement) what sheep
“Patriotism is not enough…”
Nursing Sister Edith Louise Cavell, the night before she was shot in Brussels, Belgium, 12th October 1915.
Today, Patriotism seems to have been defined by the MSM and our “leaders” as simply blind obedience to what our leaders do in our name, no matter they kill us in staged terrorist attacks (this possibility can not even be entertained by MSM), or send you to fight in wars that are illegal under international law, and whose tactics in the subsequent occupation are by definition war crimes.
Nationalism has been given a bad name by the globalists. The wars of the 20th century were orchestrated by the international elite, most of whom were British and Americans whose mission was One World Government, or global control by the elite. Hitler was a creation of the unjust Versailles treaty imposed on Germany over WW I, a war we enetered for no good reason except to take sides with the British when the Germans were offering peace. Hitler was financed by the British and American elite and educated on Eugenics by the Rockefeller Eugenic Society, despite the fact Mein Khampf was widely distributed at the time. FDR recognized Stalin in 1933 as he was starving 7 million Ukranian Christians and provided aid via the Import-Export bank. Much of the Soviet technology and manufacturing capacity came from American Industrialists.
The American System has always been about country first, protecting American interests, and wars were meant to be fought only to defend America. Of course, in our own way, using the Manifest Destiny as justification, we were to the native American Indian and Mexicans what Hitler was to Europe in WW II, and the last country in the world to have legalized slavery. So we made some mistakes, doesn’t mean we couldn’t be better.
The British system of the 19th century OTOH was one of Empire and Free Trade. Free trade was the weapon used to spread it’s imperialism, even if it meant bad economic consequences at home for the working class. This is the system we have adopted today in America, since we are nothing more really than a crypto-Commonwealth nation whose leaders get knighted by the Queen for being a good poodle.
The Globalization movement took hold in Britain with Cecil Rhodes and the creation of Zionism by British non-Jews and Jews, which was a tool to spread anti-semitism and create the necessary conditions to eventually control the Middle east and Eurasia. Russia had the worlds largest Jewish population, and the Czar was considered a great threat to globalization as it was strongly nationalistic, and had supported the US in the civil war when the French and British tried to break it up. He was not suprisingly assasinated by Lenins brother, and Lenin of course then lead the revolution that turned the Soviets Communists. Who financed the revolution, you guessed it, Americans and our British elite.
Today, being a Patriot should mean being an anti-Globalist. Instead, Henry Kissinger claims anti-globalists are considered to be terrorists. Hence the Homegrown Terrorism Act.
So in this Orwellian world we live in today, not only is War is Peace, but Traitors are Patriots. Supporters of globalization by definition must be traitors, since the Constitution provides no authority to hand over the countries sovereignty without consent of the people. They tried to amend the constitution in 1976, and failed, so they just went ahead anyways after Declaring Interdependence, where citizens in the defacto global government have no rights, just permissions, and obligations to accept a lower standard of living.
The “paradoxes” the “polls” are showing in regard to the “war” and “patriotism” can be resolved quite simply:
The “polls” are tricksy Professor, false, no-good, irrelevant etc.
Reasoned anaylisis of totally B.S. information will lead to totally B.S. conclusions, yes?
And “Scientific” polling of 1500 “demographically targeted” citizens so bored or inflamed as to actually bother to speak on the phone with a pollster is obviously B.S. information posing as the “public’s opinion”, right?
So just what in the hell is the point of all this?
Its like the constant blabbing about the “Gas Tax Holiday” that Sens. Clinton and McCain have “proposed”, where the fact that both of these people are sitting Senators in the United States Congress, and should therefore, y’know, just maybe, “propose” something through LEGISLATION and not blather, is completely forgotten in the pursuit of giving all of the TeleCultured something to “debate”.
An alternative way of assesing the mood of the People might be to look at the participation numbers in both the Democratic and GOP primaries (or even non-major’s primaries) Dems are way up right? Even before the GOP “contest” became no-contest this was true. And that’s just off the top of my head.
Yet here we have this article, from a “progressive”, and yet dutifully taking the “polls” conducted by private firms to heart on its way to a desperate and classist and patronizing justification for cynical media manipulation.
If all one needs is an effective “narrative” to win our Election for King, then I don’t care whether or not “patriotism” is an important part of that “narrative”- I say to Hell with the Whole Damned Mess!
If the People are truly this Shallow and Idiotic then they deserve to get the crap tyrannical government they’re gonna get.
I don’t truly believe this though, I think what this article and many others fail to address (perhaps intentionally) is the growing majority of the People who have no faith in, or knowledge of, the workings of the “democratic system” of the State of the United States.
Or to put it another way, I think something much, Much Weirder than some seemingly conflicting “poll numbers” is going on. That this Something has to do with the transmission of information through moving pictures across distances and the impossibility of understanding the complexities of the Global System and the Totality of information at the individual level. And that the Effects of this Weird Something are much larger and more important that any one Election, State, or People.
But yeah, just keep examining B.S. with a microscope, that’s what pays the bills right?
-matti.
Americans are blind and the following two statements in bold prove it.
Published on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 by CommonDreams.org
Let’s Get Serious About Patriotism - CommonDreams.org
by Ira Chernus
“Yet in a head-to-head matchup on who will make “wise decisions about Iraq”, McCain beats Obama 50% to 38%, and he beats Clinton 49% to 43%.”
We know what McCain going to do. He’ll keep us in Iraq untill we destroy ourselves.
“On the question of who can best handle terrorism, McCain beats Obama 63% to 26% and he beats Clinton 58% to 31%.”
The only way McCain will handle terrorism is by being a poster child for terrorist recruitment.
I don’t know why the citizens of the US ever bought into the notion that republicans handle war decisions better than democrats. If any thing Bush has been completely been incompetent in his handling of the war, I could do better than him.
The war on terror is not a war at all it’s a police action better left to law enforcement The war in Iraq is not a war either it’s an illegal occupation that needs to end as soon as we can plan the exit strategy and that should take more than a month or two.
Being a patriot is supporting and protecting the constitution of our country. Our president swore to uphold and protect the constitution and he has failed. He and the people under him are traitors.
Support the troops bring them home now.
Thank you MiMiCsS(May 7,2:30 a.m.)for the very informative and well-written posts I have noticed in the last few days. “Patriotism” is just another wedge concept used to distract people from real threats coming from the Neo-Con/Neo-Liberal Globalist fraternities who yin-yang the public every four years(and every year in between) with the dancing monkeys like McCain, Obama, and Clinton. This type of Globalism isn’t directed toward a Kumbaya moment where we start working for the mutual good of peoples of the world. It’s about fuedal lords and serfs on a global level. The example playing out right in front of our faces in the U.S. right now should wake up people, but it’s so discouraging to see how so many are so reluctant to react. There can only be a few lords in this system, and the lords are concerned that there are way too many serfs to be managed and herded. Hence, these Neo-Con/Neo-Liberal thugs must have mass slaughter through endless wars, bioweapons in our food, water, raining from the sky, not to mention poison transmitted through our pharmaceuticals. The Nazis never left. They just metastasized.
Research points brought up in posts such as MiMiCcS. There’s a whole fascinating history you won’t find on PBS or the History Channel. But do it soon.
Rickster:
great posting, to bad so many on this site have all their eggs in the next wish for a time before Bush election basket.
I screem at them, ask, beg and do everything short of suggest what to do but if falls in the eyes of the blind.
I have posted this same thing several times and never got one that is not one response
I BET McCAIN WILL BE THE NEXT PRESIDENT
I feel these people are afraid to face the truth they know he has an honest or dishonest shot at winning
If he does I know what I will be doing is take care of my family first and fuck the rest.
A perfect example of how stupid and sheep-like the American electorate is. Confusing patriotism with nationalism yet again. I’d be willing to bet a million dollars that 80% of Americans - or more - don’t even understand the difference between the two.
Good little Germans all. The stupid American sheeple will get precisely what they deserve this November, as they have gotten these last 8 years after twice electing (or once, depending on how you look at it) the biggest idiot and fascist in American history to lead the country. I say: good. Let them vote for McCain. Let them reap the rotten harvest of what they have sown. If the American idiots think that 4 more years of Rethuglican rule will put the country on the right track because of something as idiotic as a lapel pin, then they fully deserve the coming Hell that is currently descending on America from within, and that they are 100% complicit in bringing on us.
You reap what you sow. Americans are too stupid to see that their country has already become a fascist regime. They are too stupid to see that torture is wrong and illegal. They are too stupid to see that their President and his cabal are - quite literally, by legal definition - war criminals by planning and invading other countries. They are too stupid to see that illegal wiretapping, doing away with habeas corpus, kidnapping, rendition, military tribunals, and destroying emails and defying congressional subpoenas is wrong and illegal. And if they are THAT monumentally stupid not to see all these things, then they are too stupid to make a wise decision in the presidential election.
Let them reap what they sow.
Demonstorm May 7th, 2008 11:31 am
It must be satisfying for you and others here to look down from your Olympian heights of knowledge at the little people that make up our country.
I don’t believe for one moment that we are as stupid as you say. We certainly have built a nation thats the envy of the world with all our stupidity.
I know its fashionable to dismiss Patriotism and love of country, civic duty, the common good, even Nationalism, which if you are paying attention the rest of the world is practicing with great sucess to our detriment.
Sophistry has its uses, but its not that hard to know who loves this country, is a Patriot. Patriot…that would be someone willing to fight and die before allowing his fellowe citizens to become slaves. Nationalism, that would be that you feel that your country does have a better system of government, a better way of life that other countries.
Voting for someone based on their party affiliation is not the wisest thing to do.
What some people call patriotism I call nationalism. There’s a big difference.
American patriotism should be adherence to the ideology as described in the Declaration of Independence.
All people have rights. Not just Americans. To say otherwise (Hello? Guantanimo?) is to deny what the founders stood for.
I am an American. And we are no longer the envy of the world. You are living in a time gone by.
We are a fascist, bullying regime that is now world-famous for our illegal invasions, torture, destruction of civil liberties against our citizens, and for doing anything we want and the rest of the countries of the world be damned.
I despise my country. You should, too.
“We certainly have built a nation thats the envy of the world…”
Dear Sir. Thomas More,
Can you list some things that someone in, say, Norway, France, or even Canada would “envy” about the Unites States?
Who’s waving the most flags? Corrupt predatory politicians?
Or?
Some of the most patriotic Americans were those blacklisted by Repubs. the latter being among the least patriiotic.
Noam Chomsky is one of the very most patriotic Americans and Rush etc. the very least.
People are mostly just dumb amimals and the sorry future of this planet should provide great opportunity to practice mindless violent predatory animal behavior.
Grandpa Bush was apparently a great supporter of Hitler during WWII. I’m sure he recited the pledge of allegence with great sincerity and no doublt wore a flag pin on his lapel.
Guess he was a patriotic traitor. It’s OK then???
The Washington Past as the political centre ? What are you telling me now ?
I really don’t understand a thing about this country ‘America’ when I hear that people still think that Republicans are better in ‘defending the nation against the enemies’. Still, Americans are totally missing the point. The only thing I see Republicans do is screaming, mostly with the purpose of keeping people afraid. Isn’t it obvious that ‘terrorism’ is only an issue when there are Republicans in power ? Reagan was screaming his head off about terrorism and indeed, the eighties were a dangerous time for Americans, they were making a lot of enemies, and they were already arming a lot of rogues in order to breed a future generation of terrorists (Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein to name but a few) all in the name of ‘the war against terrorism’. In the nineties it became a bit more quiet on the terrorist front. Here and there a terrorist plot was uncovered but never too much noise was made about it. The intelligence agencies are doing their work and making sure that normal citizens can sleep happily at night.
Then Bush comes in power, fails to interpret a message ‘Osama bin Laden determined to strike U.S. targets’, lays out the red carpet for twenty Arabs with pocket knives to hijack four planes and starts screaming about terrorism again. Maybe he meant it just as a ‘reminder’ to the American public to let them know that the terrorists still exist. And that’s not even a stupid political strategy: after all, American voters are more likely to support Republicans when they are afraid of terrorists, because Republicans are just ‘better in defending the homeland’.
I’m really missing something here ?
When will it ever penetrate the thick skulls of a majority of Americans that (and this is really the central theme of all foreign policy debates)
REPUBLICANS = TERRORISTS !!!!
Should we also just start screaming ? Just arguing and explaining yourself clearly does not help. People don’t listen and they don’t understand. Really, what is so patriottic about these Republicans ?
Clemsy said: To say otherwise (Hello? Guantanimo?) is to deny what the founders stood for.
Well, I think you’re misunderstanding what the ‘founders’ stood for… they stood for no British interference in the ruling of the ‘colonies’ by the WHITE MALE LANDOWNERS… The Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, contains just the right language to convince the ‘middle-class’ that they have rights and power, but really, they don’t.
The so-called “founding fathers” are directly responsible for the plutocracy that you see now… THAT is what they stood for… The idea that these were ‘good and noble’ men is a Myth.
At the end of the day… people all over the world really just want to live good lives, have family, feel love, have food, have some fun, and do something meaningful…find some some answers to the deeper mysteries of life perhaps, and grow in some way, and be creative, feeling accomplishment. People do not naturally hate, that is a disease. And there is nothing to be afraid of among normal human beings.
Then there are the greedy ones who fuck it all up.
Patriotism is a reaction to the influence of the greedy and the problems they have caused. It is a symptom of disease.
The crisis’ facing the world are of a moral/conscience/spiritual nature - depending on how you lean. But an atheist does not, by nature lie any more than a spiritually bent person does. All people, commonly, share one heart and one dream.
I do think, if a solution is to be found by humans, it will only come about by raising the dialogue to a much higher, more inspirational level, resonating with what is shared and good deep in the hearts of people naturally. The fear play has no positive outcome and it’s audience only exists for lack of an inspiring alternative. IMHO