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Is Greg Gumbel more patriotic than Barack Obama? Patriotism is about what you do, not what you wear

Submitted by Chad on Thu, 04/17/2008 - 10:43am.


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No offense to Greg Gumbel, but does wearing the flag pin make Gumbel more patriotic than Barack Obama?

"Is that a pledge pin on your uniform?" - Animal House, 1978

Pinned conjures up different images in our society. There was a time when girls were pinned if the boy was serious about the relationship. Getting pinned in a wrestling match is a bad thing.

But does wearing a flag pin make you patriotic? Or perhaps the better question, does not wearing a flag pin make you unpatriotic?

According to that logic, the on-air personnel at CBS Sports are more patriotic than Barack Obama. So Greg Gumbel is more patriotic than Barack Obama.

What??

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The geniuses on the ABC News debate last night decided that "patriotism" was a more important topic than health care or how to create more jobs. We had a video question on whether Obama loves the flag.

The flag pin ritual became somewhat relevant after September 11 to "show patriotism." So we became slaves to a symbol. If we wore the magic symbol, we were patriots. If we didn't, we weren't. Why if terrorists wore a flag pin, they couldn't possibly blow something up, could they?

It was bad enough that politicians started to wear them. Politicians love peer pressure, but when news anchors also started wearing them, it was truly a sad day. It was almost as if they couldn't report anything bad about the U.S., even if it was true (turns out that actually happened).

The idiocy of the flag pin controversy was captured well by Doonesbury on Sunday.

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While we've seen fewer and fewer news people wearing the flag pins, one place you can still see them is the coverage on CBS Sports. Okay, let's see if we can comprehend this. Are the folks at CBS Sports afraid that viewers will be confused over which country they are in? And what if an employee is Canadian, should that person be required/coerced to wear a flag pin?

Leadership is not responding to peer pressure ("You want a shot with that Hillary?"), but show direction that is right, not always popular. Obama took a big gamble by not wearing the flag pin, showed actual leadership in doing the right thing. And his reward: stupid questions about the viability of patriotism.

If patriotism was about what you wore, then Stephen Colbert wrapped in nothing but the U.S. flag would be extremely patriotic. Now he does it as a joke, but the flag pin issue is a dangerous one. False patriotism is dangerous to our democracy, and doesn't make us any safer or patriotic.

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Flag Fetishism

Submitted by renarich on Sun, 04/20/2008 - 12:15am.
This nonsense about flag pins makes me wanna holler! It is the same as worshipping a golden calf, mistaking the menu for the meal, judging a book by its cover, substituting jerking off for intercourse. It pulls for the most primitive, atavistic kind of "our tribe-their tribe" group-think. It is profoundly disrespectful to the flag to use it in this manipulative way. Richard Ferry San Jose, CA
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Flag pin wearers

Submitted by revolution9 on Fri, 04/18/2008 - 10:29am.
The politicians and media-types who wear flag pins but stand idly by while our Constitution is run through the paper shredder remind me of the "religious" types who go to church on Sunday but ignore the teachings of Jesus (presumably most of the lapel people call themselves Christian) the rest of the week.
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Flag Pin = Heil Bush

Submitted by urthsong on Fri, 04/18/2008 - 12:13am.
I used to wear my flag pin until I realized that people might think I supported Bush. At that point, I bought an earth flag which I have in front of my home. I display bumper stickers for single payer health insurance, "One People, One Planet, One Future", ending the war and impeaching Bush. One I used for quite a while had a waving flag pictured and said,"Dissent is Patriotic". There were finally so many dissenters coming on board that impeaching Bush got priority in my limited bumper space. Really, I'd like my flag back from those greedy, unamerican corporatists. But as long as they are holding it hostage, I may consider opting for an alternative design. What say we have a flag photo enlarging the portion of our Constitution with "We the People" on it. Wouldn't that be beautiful? Pat Williams
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Isn't it funny

Submitted by willymack on Thu, 04/17/2008 - 5:40pm.
How many flag pin wearing, flag displaying "patriots" don't know the first thing about what's actually going on in our country or the rest of the world? If you profess to love your country through display of the colors, don't you think you could go a step further and take the time normally reserved for watching fox "news" or some other witless show and do some research aimed at making yourself a more informed citizen? Don't you think this is important? Or, maybe a tiny voice in your mind is telling you things ain't kosher, and you're afraid at what you'll find out if you dig a little bit. Just asking.
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Isn't Professional Sports all about making money?

Submitted by Norm on Thu, 04/17/2008 - 1:15pm.
Chad, I think you are confusing Corporate Media Patriotism with loyalty to the American People. Corporate Patriots are loyal to their sponsors, not the American People. The American People are there to pay the bills, provide the raw talent to feed wars, professional sports, cameramen, etc... Greg Gumbel and his fellow media whores are doing their job well. They are loyal and patriotic servants to the Bush Crime Family and their fellow co-conspirators and sponsors of the Corporate Media Monopolies. Why on God's Earth wouldn't they criticize Barack Obama for not wearing an American Flag pin? Every federal employee was given a flag pin by George W Bush to show loyalty to "HIM" after 9/11. Doesn't "HE" answer to "GOD" only and therefore "WE THE PEOPLE" should answer to "HIM" and "HIS CRIME FAMILY" as "GOD's" representative on EARTH? If all this fascism isn't depressing enough, try listening to the daily criminal abuses of our liberties as told on Democracy Now! by Amy Goodman. Ask Don Siegelman what he thinks of our DOJ's abuse of power to throw an ex-State Governor in jail on false made-up charges.
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