Hunting rifle? Better turn that sucker in buddy. That’s dangerously… conservative.
Is this Trotsky guy allowed to be so personally insulting and combative on this forum? Everywhere I look in this thread there’s a pinko-commie this, or a you-might-as-well-be-a-Jihadist that.
Well, hey, the guy’s already dead. It’s not like the mods can do much worse.
Well, except… The Punishment. But you have to do more than Trotsky to deserve that.
Who elected you hugo chavez? :dubious:
Suppose he’s a 'bot?
I can believe that.
I have been offended by ostentatious patriotism long before I was offended by this particular administration. We should be just as ashamed of displaying pride in our country as we should be as displaying pride in ourselves as individuals. President Bush early on mentioned the word “humility” with regard to international policy. Humility is a policy we should adopt as part of our collective face.
Why shouldn’t we be proud of our country? While we have much to regret, we also have much to celebrate. It may be faint praise, but historically, many countries would have done far worse with the power we had at the end of WWII and the end of the cold war then the USA did.
We were the first to really enact democracy, this was also far from perfect, but a big step up from England of the time.
We did fight a good a just war against fascism with our allies and we do take a justifiable pride in the war that thrust us into the role of a major global power.
We have slowly been righting our own internal wars and some presidents make much progress and others drag us back, but the US has plenty to be proud of.
Are we the best nation on earth? That will vary by opinion.
Are we a nation that can still take pride in our history and our servicemen? Well, we are at least to me.
My grandfathers came here dirt poor and my parents managed a middle-class life and my siblings and I have all managed a middle-class to upper-middle class life. That is the American Dream and it is still alive.
Jim
See the disconnect?
If we have cause to be proud, then we should be proud, but we should keep our mouths shut about it. Do you go around on a daily basis telling people how proud you are of yourself and your personal accomplishments? Do you set aside one or more days of the year specifically for showing people how proud you are of yourself as an individual? If you did, everyone else would think you are a conceited ass, and rightly so. The same goes for national pride, in my view. Be proud if you think you have a cause to, but there is never a good reason to wave your pride in everyone’s faces.
As Americans, we seem to have a cultural fixation on our virtues to the detriment of honest introspection. In my view, this kind of ritualized self-congratulation would only be justified if we set forth an equivalent ritualized self-flagellation. One day to fly the flag and be proud for our accomplishments. One day to fly the flag upside down and think upon our failures.
Sound ridiculous? Better yet just to be rational and humble about both, then.
I don’t think waving an American flag is getting in anyone’s “face” any more than wearing a blood donor pin, or a Red Sox shirt.
Cut us some slack.
I can’t really think of an American holiday that meets the criteria you’re putting forward, either. Some holidays like memorial day and the fourth of July are patriotic holidays, sure, but they’re a bit more deep than “yay America! We rock!”. There’s history behind the fourth of July. It’s more of a celebration, and less of a boast for most of us.
Is Independence Day also bad then? How about Labor Day?
I understand your reasoning on the individual level, but why cannot the people of a nation sit back and take little pride in our country?
We have no king*, we have no state religion*, we have no ancient symbol of our country, we have no history but the short history since the revolution, we are a melting pot of people from around the world. The flag is our one common symbol. Collectively we a celebrating our country. We use the flag to show support for the troops. This has gotten a little twisted in the last few years, but many of us still remember our loyalty is to the constitution and not the current President.
Jim
- Thank God
There’s plenty of self flagellation going around, too. There’s as much (or more) about the slavery abomination and native American oppression and genocide in school books as there is about Paul Revere and FDR.
Americans should all hate themselves for our entire history, except when democrats ran things.
The United States flag isn’t owned by any individual or political party. The symbol is owned by our country as a whole, and on days like Memorial Day, it stands for something else specific. That flag on the pole outside is in memory of my two uncles that died in World War II, defending our country from outside attackers. There’s no political inference there whatsoever.
If people like Der Trihs become so worried that someone might actually construe them as George Bush supporters because they (gasp) fly their country’s flag on a day like Memorial Day, then yeah, they’re trying to hand the flag over to the conservatives as their very own private symbol. But if everyone flies the flag, it can’t be usurped as the symbol of any one party.
I’ll bite. Sure, the U.S. has problems. It’s not perfect. But we have a lot of things I’m proud of (in no particular order):
[ul]
[li]The constitution. Sure, there are politicians bent on taking out their least-favorite parts, but most Americans believe in it, and it has stood up remarkably well overall.[/li][li]Public lands. What other country sets aside such huge tracts of land for the enjoyment of every citizen?[/li][li]The free press. Sure, we have wacko rightists and wacko leftists, but that’s part of what having a free press means.[/li][li]An system that doesn’t lock people into a single economic class. Sure, it’s hard to break out of your class, but it’s a lot more doable than in many other countries![/li][li]A democracy. Setting aside all of the “Bush might as well be a king” arguments, he’s gone at the end of term 2. We’re free to replace him with anyone we choose. Any politician can be voted out, and if they do something egregious enough, they can be impeached, removed from office, and even imprisoned.[/li][li]The right to trail by a jury of your peers. It ain’t a perfect system, but I haven’t seen a better one.[/li][li]A free market. It may be difficult, but it’s still possible for individual innovation to build new businesses.[/li][li]Community colleges. Anyone can get an education if they want it. Back in the 70’s, it cost me under $20 per unit to attend a community college.[/li][/ul]
I could make this a very long list. You can show me the problems with each point that I made above. I already said it isn’t perfect. But when you put them all together, I feel we do a pretty good job of it all.
We have our good Presidents and our bad Presidents. They all have to leave office when they’re done. Our foreign policy will probably look very different in a couple of years. Don’t abandon the country because you don’t like one leader or group of leaders.
Finally, to Boyo Jim (and Acsenray): This isn’t an “America: love it or leave it” thing. I’m really curious. Why do you live here? If you really detest the U.S., to the point that you can’t find one single reason to be proud of it, why haven’t you moved to Canada or Brazil or Australia or someplace you can feel good about? If I hated where I lived so much, I’d be out of here on the first boat.
Nope Republican administrations ended slavery and Republican administrations curtailed Monopolies and Robber Barons. Republican administrations established our park systems and got us thinking about clean water and safe foods. Republican administrations signed into law the Clean Water act. Republican administrations forced integration and got us out of Vietnam. See there is a quick short list that all Americans can take pride in brought to us by Republicans that would probably be ashamed of the “Current Republican Administration”.
Jim
At 8:56 CDT, today, a Moderator told you to stop hurling personal insults at other posters. At 9:17 CDT, you posted again to the same thread where you received that admonishment. I am cutting you a little bit of slack for the insults you hurled in this thread prior to that time, but you are out of line, here.
This is a Warning that you are jeopardizing your posting privileges with this behavior.
Stop with the personal insults. Those are prohibited in this Forum.
You would also be wise to stop with the broad brush condemnations of everyone to the left of Robert Welch Jr., not because there is any problem being that far to the right, but because there are actually conservative and right-wing posters on this board who will wind up shunning and condemning you for silly rhetoric if you continue.
[ /Moderating ]
I’d welcome a quote from any of my statements above that shows:
(1) That I detest the United States
(2) That I can’t find a single reason to be proud of it.
My complaint is not about the virtues of faults of my country, but rather about displays of pride or ostentatious patriotism. Whether I am proud of my country is irrelevant to my concern.
Not good enough. Generalized self-flagellation is not equivalent to ritualized self-congratulation.
I agree there’s a fine line here. I don’t object to having something with an image of a flag on it. I have a small American flag in my office. I don’t object to the standard first-class stamp, which features an American flag.
However, your mention of the Red Sox is apt here. Too often issues of policy are treated like sports fandom, such that the only debated issue is whether we are No. 1! or This policy makes us No. 1!. Government policy, especially international policy, is not fandom; it’s life. It’s too important to allow sports-enthusiam to play such a powerful role in society.
Would you object to one of those big styrofoam hands with the index finger pointing up, painted to look like an American flag? 
It’s difficult to get very exercised about something so patently silly.