UI – Part 333 – Nationalism and Patriotism

Flag Controversy

In California on the campus of the University of California, Irvine, a portion of the student body is demanding the America flag not be on display anywhere on campus. This is disturbing to me.  They are offended by America, the leader of the free world.  It is as if they prefer Bonnie and Clyde as heroes to the enforcement agencies established and manned to protect all citizens from the selfish and evil actions of others. The police were the villains trying to capture the glamorized bank robbers who stole from hard-working people and killed their way cross country.  They were pursued by siren blaring defenders of our safety, those defenders made out to be cartoons as the criminals were romanticized.

The Flag of our Nation is the banner of the freedoms we enjoy.  It is a statement of the independence we achieved.  It commemorates those who have fought and died preserving our rights as individuals, to include freedom of speech.  This campus is not a private center for education.  It is supported in a significant way with public money.  Both the State of California and the Federal Government provide subsides to the students, even those who are protesting.  Thus all Americans are aiding those who object to the red, white and blue.  Should those opposed yield on any support they receive to give greater credence to their demands?  The entitlements they receive are not rewards for their misbehavior.  They are blessings from a free society bestowed on those who are citizens.  By paying the full tuition, without any third-party support, they can affirm in their statement that they do not need America.  But we all know they do.

National Pride and Patriotism

How has our National Pride been so diminished?  How has Patriotism become a bad word?  Who has enabled such negative thinking towards our Nations?  America is exceptional.  We have been a defender of our freedom and most helpful to foreign countries to maintain or establish the human rights we enjoy, the rule of law to apply to every citizen, regardless of race, creed or religion, and equality of sexes and preferences.  We have resisted ideological strains that are intent on eroding what we have achieved, but it appears we have not been totally successful.  When we have come to the aide, militarily, of a foreign sovereignty and stopped the spread of evil we did not occupy as imperialists, but stayed to support those whose goals included all the people.  We oppose genocide, ethnic cleansing, anti-Semitism, and hatred. But admittedly it continues and unfortunately consumes many people for reasons difficult to comprehend.

Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is not an effective approach to maintaining nationalism or patriotism.  In fact it is as an acid that erodes the steel structure of a Nation.  It seeks a global terrarium that contains in each country cultures that have grown in different soils, having used different herbicides and fungicides, and having had caretakers with mixed thinking as to proper nourishment and treatment.  Weeds have been eliminated in one garden that is cherished flowers in another.  Multiculturalism attempts to have within the borders of every nation mico-gardens from ancient to modern societies, living side-by-side.  But you and I know that barriers will exist to prevent the flow of one garden into another, or rakes and shovels will be raised, a fight to establish a larger garden as needed or demanded by one versus another.  The historical source of each garden will have its own banner flying at the entry gates and every effort will be made to maintain the garden as it was in its homeland.  There was a reason homelands were left behind and a new plot of land was sought, a plot where the fruits can be more plentiful, sweeter and more varied.  The host country cannot allow separate gardens to flourish, but must ensure the practices of the horticulturists that established their methods of cultivation become the teachers of the new arrivals.  The most viable methods must continue and not be diluted by outsiders seeking to take up residence without changing.   If the multi-gardening methods are adopted the host, the welcoming nation, of the blend of gardens in turn will lose its identity and the pride of the quality of the produce for which it was made famous.  The jam will not taste the same.

America must protect its garden.  Immigrants must learn our methods, or history, our love of freedom and embrace it or go back to the land from which they came.  If bad worms are allowed to occupy our soil then means of annihilating these invaders must be established.  If homegrown invaders rise-up then the source of their discontent must be found and eradicated.  Any unknown leak in the walls of our society can only last for so long before it becomes a problem.  Then the plumbers will be called in and the problem fixed; so too the source of the problem will be known and preventative measures will be necessary and must be taken to prevent a recurrence.

Concerns

Political Correctness is not a good application for America’s best products. It has run amok.  So too progress made to unite our Nation racially, culturally, and under the umbrella of our Flag has stopped and in fact been reversed.  Divisiveness is greater today than in years past.

I fault our leadership and our media. In one way I can understand the media as conflict creates news and helps to sell what they distribute. The more riled up a city or a faction of society or a political party becomes the more material is made available for the newspapers, the TV reporters, the tweeters, the bloggers and the action committees, political or otherwise.  But the leadership – therein lays the greatest concern.  Are they properly focused on our roots, our history and our achievement; or are they indifferent and seeking a revised cultural identity influenced by funds flowing from foreign powers.

Educators today emphasize individualism, the self, more than history to the extent that many persons are conditioned to see America as a bully.  They wrongly think they have learned America achieved much at the expense of others. Many professorial types encourage such understanding.  That is not true. But applying it personally, the lack of success of the individual is also due to America, and thus as the American Indian they deserve to be compensated (entitled).  The definition of success becomes an issue. Money becomes the focus.  The haves verses the have-nots, the achievers verse the non-achievers. The measure of success has been distorted.

The foreign influence peddlers, the bulk of which are from the Middle East, seek a change in who we are by attacking our Constitution.  The freedoms it provides are not the freedoms they prefer.  The alterations they seek include revising our Laws to limit free speech, placing more power in the hands of fewer and fewer, seeking a divided and confused society to falsely condition them for a desire to change.  Those attempting to subvert and modify our culture utilize our tolerance and openness to accept and advance a foreign ideology within our established educational system as well as schools and worship centers they fund.

Hope and Change Delusion

The hope and change America needs is not coming from Washington today.  We were the hope for the world.  We represented the change the entire world needed.   We are the host country to many immigrants.  Those who choose America must also choose to be Americans. If not, then they are choosing to be subversives and must be sent back from whence they came.  Our leadership, then, must do everything possible to make them Americans or return them.  Focus on our history.  Focus on English.  Teach them the Constitution.  Be an American first.  Respect your historical culture but do not expect America to preserve it for you.  Your culture is now American.  Resist the influence of foreign elements and ideologies and insist our education centers teach the meaning of being an America, to include love of country, Flag, National Pride and how to be a proper Patriot.  Love America or leave America.  America is not to be changed.  We are to remain the beacon most people in the world can see and aspire to be more like.  We cannot let America become a target from outside as well as within.  Our enforcement agents must be empowered to properly urge the flying of our Flag, ensure our Constitution be met and the anti-bodies among us be eliminated, re-educated, or allowed to leave for another country of their choice (since America is not their preference as it is)

No Banning the American Flag

To ban the America Flag anywhere in America is to ban free speech and curb the freedom this Country fought so hard to achieve.  Fly the flag boldly and widely.  It needs to be raised over synagogues and churches, mosques and community centers, on front porches and back porches, and wherever a patriotic American lives, learns, prays or works.  Raise the Flag with a National and Patriotic fervor that announces to the whole world, we are and remain who we are – Proud to be Americans.

Grace and Peace