Is this a new trend or did I just notice it for the first time, perhaps because of my biases? I noticed so many motorsports people running around the Arizona desert with American flags on the back of their machine. Sometimes they go to quite a bit of work erecting a flagpole back at camp.
Doesn't that seem strange to you? What is the point of adorning sports equipment with the American flag? Maybe fishermen should tape a little American flag to the end of their poles. That might be kind of fun to watch if they are fly fishermen. What are the 'motos' trying to say -- that their sport is more patriotic than others? And what does any sport have to do with patriotism?
Perhaps in their febrile imaginations, their Polaris Ranger -- blasting around in the Arizona desert -- is like a military Humvee, blasting around in the desert of some Mideastern country. Therefore they are 'supporting the troops, who are protecting our freedom.'
A strange game is going on in the minds of anyone who is making an observation. It is never pure 'hardware' -- it is always mixed with a little 'software.' So I admit that this observation may just be a projection of my disdain for the slavish veneration of the military in the country that used to be America.
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The reader could chastise me for offering up one more sour observation of the moral and cultural decline of this country. In my defense, sourness or anger may be just a symptom of powerlessness.
Last summer I did have a snippet of power that, I am proud to say, I acted on. A camper asked me, the campground host, whether she could get a military discount at our campground. I answered "No" -- we only honored the senior and handicapped discount cards.
She showed me her military discount for the Texas state park system. I pointed out that our campground was a federal campground. The camper just wouldn't take "No" for an answer. She probably had a lot of experience at shaking people down, and winning. She probably couldn't go to a Dollar Store for a bag of Cheetos, without asking for a military discount. So many ex-military people have become addicted to being told that they are heroes. They expect mere civilians to bow down to them.
But she chose the wrong civilian. It didn't work on me. I was proud of not giving in to her moral bullying. I was also happy for not giving her my opinions about the subject. That was not a sour experience.
Doesn't that seem strange to you? What is the point of adorning sports equipment with the American flag? Maybe fishermen should tape a little American flag to the end of their poles. That might be kind of fun to watch if they are fly fishermen. What are the 'motos' trying to say -- that their sport is more patriotic than others? And what does any sport have to do with patriotism?
Perhaps in their febrile imaginations, their Polaris Ranger -- blasting around in the Arizona desert -- is like a military Humvee, blasting around in the desert of some Mideastern country. Therefore they are 'supporting the troops, who are protecting our freedom.'
A strange game is going on in the minds of anyone who is making an observation. It is never pure 'hardware' -- it is always mixed with a little 'software.' So I admit that this observation may just be a projection of my disdain for the slavish veneration of the military in the country that used to be America.
_________________________________
The reader could chastise me for offering up one more sour observation of the moral and cultural decline of this country. In my defense, sourness or anger may be just a symptom of powerlessness.
Last summer I did have a snippet of power that, I am proud to say, I acted on. A camper asked me, the campground host, whether she could get a military discount at our campground. I answered "No" -- we only honored the senior and handicapped discount cards.
She showed me her military discount for the Texas state park system. I pointed out that our campground was a federal campground. The camper just wouldn't take "No" for an answer. She probably had a lot of experience at shaking people down, and winning. She probably couldn't go to a Dollar Store for a bag of Cheetos, without asking for a military discount. So many ex-military people have become addicted to being told that they are heroes. They expect mere civilians to bow down to them.
But she chose the wrong civilian. It didn't work on me. I was proud of not giving in to her moral bullying. I was also happy for not giving her my opinions about the subject. That was not a sour experience.
Comments
Why do Canadians fly the American and the Canadian flags from their RVs while camped in the United States? I'm sure that has no military significance. The same thing with RV Parks in Yuma flying both flags. Or why is it bad to fly a Confederate flag yet good to fly one from any country on earth?
Canadian flags in snowbird AZ? Maybe it is just a way of inviting the Canadian neighbors in for a typical "So what part of Canada are you from" type of conversation.
Confederate flags are a protest vote.
I fly the America flag on my house out of a personal choice. I’m an American. I’m proud of it. Hope that does not offend you. Actually, I don’t care if it offends you or not. 😱
The flag is not coming down.
Chris
The good news is that Empires always collapse at the bottom of sunspot minimums when they are most corrupt, we enter that time now and it will peak in the 2030's.
In Rome, as the weather got colder and colder, the taxes increased from 1% upto 80% to pay for the soldiers, and their pensions. Eventually, the burden became to much. It was the unfunded pensions that caused the armies to cannibalize Rome.
Up to the fall, Rome created a percentage of money above what was needed for commerse, this along with a 1% tax on the people funded the Roman government for hundreds of years.
Today, 97%+ of money is digital, created on a computer screen, so I wonder why the Federal Government borrows money, rather than creating what it needs, like Rome did, keeping the money creation to a 3% to 5% above GDP, ah, but that would mean government would have to be small with no standing army pretending to protect our freedoms with all of their privledge.