From Daily Kos:
Its time to be done with the ridiculous idea that there are some sort of politically neutral expressions of “patriotism.” Patriotism is a consciously cultivated mindset intended to secure popular consent for military actions that might otherwise be unpopular. The US is a hyper-patriotic country because it is an imperialist country that is constantly engaged in foreign adventures that defend corporate profitability but that waste precious lives of American servicemembers.
The American Legion and VFW are, first and foremost, lobbies for militarism. Veterans Day is essentially an annual exercise in the cynical manipulation of the grief that war brings into our lives in order to secure support for ongoing and future wars by wrapping the whole enterprise in the bullshit rhetoric of “military honor.”
The exclusion of IVAW, VfP and MFSO just rips away the fraudulent veil that conceals the real purpose of this whole celebration.
I understand that veterans and their families have a desire to have their service publicly honored. But this whole framing perpetuates all sorts of untruths about the nature of America’s role in the world, the role of the military in particular, and the question of who profits and who pays and why. When Viet Nam Vets Against the War threw their medals away on the steps of the capitol it was not just a strident spasm of extremis, it was a recognition of the insidious role of all this ritual of honoring participation in mass murder for profit and the aggrandizement of power that is war. They understood that so long as the veneer of honor remained attached to the exercise in mass criminality that was the war in Viet Nam, that the war would continue. Too many progressives have been fooled by lies about protesters spitting on vets into thinking that the less on of that era is that we need to fall all over ourselves proving our patriotism. The real less on is that the anti-war movement so fundamentally challenged the legitimacy of the war machine that they had to construct an elaborate lie about us in order to restore it.
Uncomfortable as it may make some feel to hear it, there is nothing honorable about following orders that shouldn’t have been given or fighting in wars that shouldn’t have been fought. Loyalty to governments that don’t deserve it should not be celebrated. It is time to shift our frame and begin to honor those who RESIST imperial wars, whether they are soldiers or civilians.
You might be tempted to think these comments don’t represent the views of everyone on the far-left, but you would be wrong. It’s laughable when left-wingers claim they “support the troops,” because nothing could be further from the truth.
I’m not talking about Democrats in general, I’m talking about the far-left which is slowly taking over the Democratic party. These people don’t believe in fighting wars and think soldiers who fight in wars are murderers. The kind of vile, anti-American crap that you see above is the true feelings of the so-called “progressives” better known as the “nutroots.”
What they really are is a bunch of despicable people that have no right to live here. They are a disgrace to everything our country stands for and I despise them.
-Chris Jones
