Let me preface this by saying I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the thugs of the NFL who are claiming to be oppressed while being paid millions of dollars to play a game.  In fact I’m downright hostile to them.

In recent years there was a growing awareness among all Americans that the police in this country did not respect our rights and were swiftly becoming militarized along the lines of an occupying force rather than the peacekeepers they claimed to be.  Then Obama, the Democrats, and their media allies turned it into a racial issue for political reasons.  Cops, whether black, white, or whatever, came to represent white people.  And we were all told the only people they abused were poor innocent blacks.  Too many whites became reflexively defensive and now we’ve lost any progress we may have made among those on the right that had finally come to distrust the state and its armed enforcers.

Never mind that George Zimmerman wasn’t white or a cop.  Never mind that whites are more likely to be shot when encountered by police than blacks.  Never mind that there are more whites shot by police than blacks.  Never mind that half the time there’s some black criminal shot by a cop, the cop is not white.  None of that matters.  It’s cops=white people=oppressors and blacks are always innocent and oppressed.  This is mostly nonsense, but somehow people who reject this narrative feel they must always and everywhere defend law enforcement simply because Black Lives Matters hates cops.

So I thoroughly reject the reasoning Colin Kaepernick and his brain damaged followers in the NFL have for protesting the national anthem prior to their games.  But I disagree with Trump’s denouncement of them as well.

There is no reason to play the Star Spangled Banner before sporting events.  It’s tradition, but it’s a tradition that came out of support for war.  It’s a weird song anyway.  It’s written about a battle in an unnecessary war that took place 200 years ago.  What other country has a war hymn preaching reverence for the government’s flag as their official anthem?

Professional sports leagues since 9/11, particularly the NFL, have turned the minutes immediately prior to the start of the game into flag worshiping ceremonies where everyone applauds the government’s troops for killing foreigners.  Having some pop singer screech out the national anthem is the centerpiece of this disgusting spectacle.

I don’t support war.  I don’t support the government.  As many Americans have come to equate the flag as a symbol for the government and its Military, rather than what used to be an actual Nation consisting of a free people, I no longer want to sing a song about it.  So I can’t condemn anyone for not wanting to stand at attention for the Star Spangled Banner.