Originally published in Wilder Voice Vol. 3, Iss. 5.
I recently re-watched Aaron Sorkin's ill-fated Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (a show, by the by, that comes off much better the second time around). One line in particular, spoken by Matt Albie (Matthew Perry), has been banging around my head as I've watched and read some of the Republican flailing during the last couple of months: "If I have contempt for my government, it's nothing compared to the contempt my government has for me."
Senator Inhofe puts forth this claim (via Hilzoy over at Obsidian Wings):
Regardless of what polls show, Inhofe said, voters will have to ask themselves a question once they get behind the curtain in the voting booth on Election Day.
"Do you really want to have a guy as commander in chief of this country when you can question whether or not he really loves his country?" he asked. "That's the big question." (...)
After he was asked for an explanation on why voters should question Obama's love for his country, Inhofe issued a written statement on Friday to clarify his earlier comments.
"Let me be clear," he said. "I am not questioning Sen. Obama's patriotism, but you have to question why at times he seems so obviously opposed to public displays of patriotism and national pride, like wearing an American flag lapel pin."
Leaving aside, for the moment, the idiocy of claiming that Obama is "opposed to public displays of patriotism and national pride" (because, you know, running for president isn't a public sign of patriotism or anything); and further leaving aside the prima facea asinine notion that flag pins are representative of one's patriotism; I find the idea that the "big question" of this presidential season is--for anyone outside of the media and die-hard Republicans--Obama's love of country. One might make the case that the big question this season is what do we want our country to be like? Do we want a country marked by more war, more debt, more inequity, more presidential idiocy, or do we want a country of center-left values.
I think that when voters step into the booth, they will be asking themselves questions about pocket-books and wars, energy and education, not flag pins and Rev. Wright. If I'm right, then how can one explain Inhofe's apparent disconnect from reality? How can one explain his fascination with Obama's patriotism?
One could argue that Inhofe is trying to inject character-based attacks into the political topography because he knows his party--and his party's policies--are at the hight of their unpopularity. One could argue, too, that Democrats, due to some entrenched political-cultural narratives, are considered to have questionable patriotism (by Republicans and the media). It's probably both.
I believe in the existence of a narrative called "American Exceptionalism". Read about it here. This, I think, explains the media's willingness to print and support these kinds of scurrilous and stupid "Obama doesn't wear flag pins" stories, but it doesn't explain--at least not completely--why people like Inhofe don't think Obama's patriotic.
Former Speaker Newt Gingrich has written a number of books. As much as reading them makes my blood pressure rise, they are pretty illuminating. There's a common theme: America is a Christian nation. And, as such, Patriotism is piety. In Gingrich's Rediscovering God in America, he writes:
[T]he purpose of this book is to rediscover the historic source of American Liberty [it's God, if you were wondering] and to rediscover the founding generation's understanding of what is required to sustain liberty in a free society [God/prayer in schools, God/Ten Commandments in courts, God/Christianist policies in government]. And to do this is to truly discover anew the centrality of God in American history and in the ongoing story of American liberty. [emph. mine]
If you believe, as Gingrich does, that American liberties stem from a divine--and, in particular, a Christian--font, then it stands to reason that those who do not believe that do not believe that God should be in government (that is to say, do not believe in a fundamentalist Christian agenda), you are unpatriotic.
Patriotism is piety, dirty hippies, and don't you fucking forget it.
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