I get lots of email. Most of it is Democratic fund raising efforts for various candidates throughout the nation. Then there\u2019s the \u201cthe thing\u201d \u2013 I\u2019m turning sixty-five (Holy S**T) in September. I had no idea how many different ways you can \u201cbuy\u201d Medicare coverage, from the Auto Club to my house insurance provider, but now they\u2019ve all sent me \u201coffers I can\u2019t refuse\u201d. Somehow, I once had the idea that Medicare would save me money on health insurance. Now I understand \u2013 in my case it will cost me an additional $1800 a year (though my existing insurance will cover more of my costs \u2013 so if I have a \u201cbad\u201d year, I\u2019ll be ahead). It\u2019s better than paying more for private insurance without it \u2013 I think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But I managed to get in on some \u201cRight-wing\u201d mailing lists as well. Those emails don\u2019t come to Martin, usually it\u2019s Jane or Dale (yeah \u2013 I don\u2019t know why), but it\u2019s full throated craziness. There\u2019s the emails from Jim Jordan and even \u201cthe turtle\u201d McConnell. And there\u2019s the new ones from something called \u201cGOPUSA\u201d. For a while thought it was some Chinese site \u2013 GOPU-SA, but then I re-read the title and got it. I\u2019m not a regular reader, but I occasionally dip in to see what \u201cthe other side\u201d is saying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Which is really the long way around to say that I found this \u201cright-wing-nut\u201d guy named Bobby Eberle (didn\u2019t he race in NASCAR in the late sixties?). He has a You-Tube broadcast, aptly named \u201cThe Thirteen Minute News Hour\u201d. I listened to him for the first time today while tending to the barbecue ribs I was smoking. His Fifth of July broadcast was about \u201chow the radical left is \u2018Un-proud\u2019 to be American\u201d. The basis of his claim? Interviews with young women, many of them of color, asking how proud they were to be American. And ALL the ones he showed said they weren\u2019t \u201cproud to be American\u201d. So there is the proof \u2013 I guess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His point was that it is the fault of the \u201cleftist teachers and media\u201d that these Americans aren\u2019t proud of America. He blamed \u201ccritical race theory\u201d. And he said that the Fourth of July is supposed to be a day of national unity \u2013 and if you\u2019re not \u201cunited\u201d in the \u201cProud to be an American\u201d stand \u2013 well then there\u2019s something wrong with you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The phrase \u201cProud to be an American\u201d evokes memories of the weeks after 9-11, perhaps the last time when Americans were united in the face of crisis. It\u2019s the beginning of the refrain from the Lee Greenwood song, \u201cGod Bless the USA\u201d. It was the right song at the right moment, but ultimately it was co-opted by the political right, and finally by the Trump Campaign. So if you are \u201cUn-Proud\u201d to be an American \u2013 then you back the terrorists of 9-11? That\u2019s the illogic progression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bobby Eberle can\u2019t get past his own belief in the infallibility of America. Any questioning of the orthodoxy and \u201cmythology\u201d of 1950\u2019s 8th Grade American History class is tantamount to treason. The thing that folks like Bobby don\u2019t get is that even the Founder Fathers, Authors of the Constitution, recognized not only their own flaws, but the flaws of the nation they were creating. They put it right up front in the preamble of the Constitution, right after We the People: \u2026in order to form a more perfect Union\u2026\u201d It wasn\u2019t perfect from the start, and it\u2019s not perfect now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And it\u2019s not hard to see how many Americans today aren\u2019t so \u201cproud\u201d of America. They see an America where George Floyd was murdered on video, and hundreds of thousands of Americans were sacrificed to COVID for politics. Their America includes a nation that ignores climate change, puts Black men in jail, and allows institutions to trap folks in debt. They see all of the imperfections in our \u201cperfect\u201d Union, and recognize there\u2019s a lot to not be proud of. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the language of addiction there is a term: enabling. It means to accept and even encourage behaviors that makes the addiction worse. False pride that denies flaws enables those flaws to continue or even get worse, like addiction. And that means more and more folks get \u201cleft out\u201d of another Americanism \u2013 the American Dream. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mr. Eberle confuses pride with loyalty. You can be loyal to a nation, willing to work to improve that nation, trying to make it \u201cMore Perfect\u201d, without pride. Pride is in accomplishment, the results. And many Americans feel that our nation has not lived up to its promise, and that our current outcomes don\u2019t include them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
That doesn\u2019t mean they aren\u2019t \u201cloyal\u201d to the United States. But it does mean they don\u2019t claim a false pride in a nation that fails to include them in its promise. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"