Although a new poll reveals that fewer people than ever now describe themselves as being "extremely proud to be an American" the New York Times approvingly reports that sales of overpriced Fourth of July T-shirts have never been better
Apparently, proclaiming blind sartorial devotion to your country on this Independence Day erases any need to actually experience the unconditional love, either for your country or most especially for your less fortunate fellow humans.
If you buy a $60 red, white or blue T-shirt from the American Giant corporation and you wear it at a Martha's Vineyard or Hamptons barbeque, you can hide the awful truth that for the very rich elites of the owning class, the most important fealty is to the bellicose, borderless feudal kingdom still quaintly known as NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.)
Borders and nation-states are for alternately containing and expelling the little people, who if they do wear a Fourth of July T-shirt, it's probably cheaply made in China. And that is not very patriotic at all, insinuates the Paper of Record, given that "we" are in competition with China and may even go to war with them.
“If you’re leaning into Americana to sell items that aren’t American made, I find it disingenuous,” said Kristen Fanarakis, the founder of Los Angeles-based fashion brand Senza Tempo and an advocate for locally made apparel.
The virtuous rich, for their part, wear made-in-America patriotic couture that is, according to one overpriced T-shirt manufacturer, directly inspired by the bipartisan "America First" ethos of "corporate boardrooms and policy circles in Washington, DC."
Make that the oligarch-inspired revolving-door world of the war-hungry Atlantic Council, the American Enterprise Institute, consolidated media, the State Department, and the whole sticky web of public-private entities that work in solidarity and cooperation to bring feel-good democracy to the subjects/consumers of One NATO, Under God.
Meanwhile, news that fewer everyday US residents are fanatically devoted to their heavily weaponized and border-controlled nation-state would be encouraging were it not for the fact that a terrifying four out of every 10 Americans still describe themselves as "extremely proud" patriotic extremists. The vast majority of respondents told Gallup pollsters that they are "very" or at least "moderately" patriotic, while only a dismal four out of a hundred had the actual guts to admit that they are not patriotic at all.
Now, I would hazard a very unscientific guess that at least some of the people who were called by Gallup and asked to rate their patriotism might have been cowed into swearing what they construed to be a loyalty oath on demand. Who knew if that phone call was a trap being laid by Homeland Security? Who knew if their answers would end up in some top secret NSA database somewhere out in the desert? And, come to think of it, who in their right mind picks up the phone when an annoying pollster calls at the dinner hour?
Meanwhile, since the "economy" is allegedly on such an awesome upswing, those deficient in the patriotism department should just get a dose of corporate propaganda therapy.
Paul Krugman, liberal columnist at the Times, has made the gaslighting of dissatisfied and struggling Americans into his own cottage industry. His Fourth of July column is no exception. Life is so good, according to something called the economic Misery Index, so why are people such ungrateful sad-sacks? Will they finally wake up and give Joe Biden a little credit?
But are people noticing this improvement? Traditional measures of economic sentiment have become problematic in recent years: Ask people how the economy is doing, and their response is strongly affected both by partisanship and, I believe, by the narratives conveyed by the news media. That is, what people say about the economy is, all too often, what they think they’re supposed to say.
Are these the same people who claim to be extreme patriots because that's what they think pollsters want to hear? Anything is possible, especially in the NATO Feudal Kingdom, where the rulers create their own alternate realities (like "we're winning this war and spreading democracy!") on such a tiresome regular basis.
Conservative columnist Gabriel Nadales expands upon the Krugman narrative when he glibly writes that the main reason that patriotism is on the decline is because those damned people just don't think properly. They are the unfortunate wrongthinkers.
Dwindling patriotism in America could be due to the increase of Americans sadly believing we are a country in decline. But it doesn’t need to be that way. Although it is fair to say America may be on the wrong track in certain respects, America has the 11th highest GDP per capita, according to the World Bank. Our system of government has been a model for countries across the world. The American flag remains a symbol of freedom and justice for those living in oppressed places like Hong Kong.
Talk abut faulty thinking skills. The American flag itself is a terrifying symbol of oppression in too many colonized, bombed, exploited, invaded and economically sanctioned places throughout the world. The "thought leaders" spanning the A-to-B political spectrum of neoliberal capitalism are churning out the same narrative at the same time that they bemoan non-existent divisiveness in each other. The reality is that they are conjoined twins sharing the same capitalistic brain.
On that note, here's wishing all you out there a happy and smoke-free celebration of our great American Founding Myth.
