Robert Kuttner writes and edits “The American Prospect.”
He reminds me of myself. I am a patriot but since the 2016 election, I have not felt patriotic. I have been ashamed of my president and my nation. Hateful, crazy people had taken control of our government. It seemed like every ounce of compassion and respect for the rule of law had been stamped out.
Kuttner explains why we must recapture our country and restore “the better angels of our nature.” Love of country means love of our neighbors. Love of country means rebuilding its infrastructure. Love of country means respect for democracy and the rule of law. Love of country means protecting the Constitution.
Kuttner on TAP
On This Anniversary of 9/11, the Case for Patriotism. I noticed a large American flag outside the home of a neighbor, marking this fateful anniversary. My first reaction, I am ashamed to admit, was to wonder if there might be a Trump voter in my nice liberal neighborhood. But then I thought, hey it’s my flag, too.
As we head into 2020, it’s time for a serious game of capture the flag. Patriotism is too valuable to leave to Donald Trump and the far right. But let’s define it properly.
Patriotism today means an America that is once again a beacon to the world, and not the world’s laughingstock. Economic patriotism means operating trade and industrial policies to reclaim jobs and industries using technologies invented here, and to develop new ones.
Republicans have allowed multinational corporations to give away those industries and jobs, abetted by trade policies supported by too many Democrats. (Corporations may be “citizens,” but it’s hard to find less of a patriot than a U.S.-based multinational.)
Patriotism, progressive style, means massive investment in our public systems, so we can be proud once again of American infrastructure. Instead, our public facilities are museum pieces.
After World War II, everyone was a patriot. Not only had American military might defeated the Axis, but the war effort had modernized the U.S. economy. The great public works of the Roosevelt era were a wonder.
During the Vietnam protests, when some radicals were burning flags, the venerable socialist leader Norman Thomas objected: Don’t burn the flag, wash it. Amen.
Progressive patriotism has some catch-up work—to extend the idealistic promises of the Constitution to Americans of all races once and for all. Then we can be fully proud of America with no asterisks or footnotes. We might even make America great again. ~ ROBERT KUTTNER
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Not every American is a real patriot anymore than everyone that claims to be a Christian is a real Christian.
To tell if someone is a real patriot, they have to live it by honoring this oath that was written into the U.S. Constitution by the Founding Fathers.
An individual, except the President, elected or appointed to an office of honor or profit in the civil service or uniformed services, shall take the following oath:
In the Federal Government, in order for an official to take office, he or she must first take the oath of office; this is also known as a swearing-in ceremony. The official reciting the oath swears an allegiance to uphold the Constitution. The Constitution only specifies an oath of office for the President; however, Article VI of the Constitution states that other officials, including members of Congress, “shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation to support this constitution.”
https://bensguide.gpo.gov/j-oath-office?highlight=WyJjb25zdGl0dXRpb24iLCJjb25zdGl0dXRpb24ncyJd
Note that nowhere in the Oath that is in the U.S. Constitution does anyone have to obey the U.S. President.
NPR: “Where Does the Oath of Office Come From?”
Every incoming president back to George Washington has spoken the 37 words in the oath of office:
But where does the oath come from?
Marvin Pinkert, executive director of the National Archives Experience, says, “If I went up to 12 people on the street and said, ‘Where would you find the instructions for the oath of office for the president of the United States?’ I doubt that many of them would tell me, “It’s actually written into the Constitution.'”
https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99323353
This is a loyalty Oath, not loyalty to any president, the flag, or the country, but to the U.S. Constitution.
Too bad every citizen isn’t required to take this oath when they turn 18 and are eligible to vote.
I did a search..Robert Kuttner and Charter schools……he seems to want to separate the good charter people, from the bad charter schools. A dream come true for them.
When “patriotism” is conflated with “American exceptionalism”, portraying the US as a “beacon to the world”, is when I cease being “patriotic”. That arrogant attitude has been the cause of much murder, forced regime change, suffering, and planetary destruction since the beginning of the alleged US republic in 1789.
The US is now, justifiably, seen as the greatest threat to world peace:
Countries around the world view the U.S. as a bigger threat than Russia, China – Axioshttps://www.axios.com/the-biggest-global-threats-us-russia-china-c3230b2c-447e-472a-b9dc-5b2a2e2b3117.html
Since nuclear weapons have the capacity to cause a Nuclear Winter which would terminate most life on the planet, and since the human-caused accelerating Climate Emergency is causing the Sixth Great Extinction, it is time to discard patriotism and replace it with planetism.
Planetism sees the whole of the earth and its varied inhabitants as interdependent, not as commodities for plunder, exploitation, and profit.
Planetism is what the truly mature human species realizes and chooses, wisely discarding its juvenile pretensions of narrow, destructive and self-destructive nationalism/patriotism/exceptionalism.
We have little time left to wake up to this reality, less than 11 years according to the recent UN report.
Our schools should be educating our young to appreciate and realize this next step in human consciousness, instead of re-affirming the destructive 19th century beliefs in nationalistic hubris.
As the great, legendary cellist Pablo Casals wisely reminded us years ago: “Love of country is a splendid thing. But why should love stop at the border?”
Beautifully put.
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I lost my Patriotism long before the 2016 election. When I was younger, politicians (many Dems) were demonized for PORK. At least these pet projects had some significance to the infrastructure of the Nation (although we did have things like” the road to nowhere…). Then all the Politicians got smarter about playing fast with tax dollars and were able to funnel the funds into think tanks and lobbying groups which would be self serving. Patriotism died a long time ago with the rise of free markets and capitalism. Our “Leaders” don’t show Patriotism.
I have been disillusioned with the leadership and many of the representatives of both parties in recent years. Likewise, I am repulsed by the empty jingoism of #45 and company that use false patriotism as way to energize their base.
Living in a military community, I am impressed by those that choose to serve and defend our country. Where I currently live service to the country is a family tradition that is often carried from generation to generation. I admire them for their courage and personal sacrifice. When someone in a family joins the military serves, the whole family serves in one way or another. Spouses become single parents, and many times grandparents step in to care for grandchildren when parents are deployed. Often one spouse leaves for a deployment, and the remaining spouse takes care of the the children, puts the house up for sale and packs up the home. While the military pays for movers and sometimes packers, it is generally the wives that are the unsung heroes that make the many moves possible. In their own ways the military spouses and their children are serving as well. These are the Americans I admire. They deserve our respect unlike many of our politicians.
All the nits who inhabited the fur at the base of the Mugwap’s, ahem, nether part, incorporated themselves as Nitlandia. But then the nits on the ventral side broke away from the ones on the dorsal side, saying that they tended to lie about in the sun far more than was healthy, and the ventral nits declared themselves superior in every respect to the lazy dorsal nits and with patriotic fervor expelled all ventral nit sympathizers while singing South Nitlandia uber alles, by some nitwit.
It was ever thus.
Aie yie yie. Correction: Expelled all dorsal nit sympathizers
If we are to survive, we shall grow beyond this tribalism. Otherwise, we are doomed.
Our hope is still our public schools and our public school teachers.
The beginning of the end of my patriotism was when the Bush administration chose to use a national tragedy as an excuse to invade a sovereign, secular nation that had nothing to do with said tragedy (while ignoring the nation which was most involved, which said nation has now reduced Yemen to a smoking rubble with our help).
My patriotism revived briefly when Obama was elected – I naively thought the Bush years had been a wild anomaly. And then I saw Obama codify and extend everything Bush had done and my eyes were opened. The Bush years were not an anomaly and neither are the Trump years.
As a world history teacher I see what a miracle our nation is. If you hate America, you haven’t read enough history.
It’s not hating our nation. It’s hating self-serving legislators & government officials who have forgotten that their job is to SERVE the people. It’s hating these same people for taking $$$$$ from individuals & corporations & destructive organizations such as ALEC & the NRA, which are destroying our nation. It’s hating the oligarchs’ never-ending greed; CEOs who make 12 million times what their workers do, & sell defective products (such as Boeing’s Max 800)
& pushing pharmaceuticals that KILL “other people,” whose lives do not matter one whit. It’s hating a militia that forces people off their own land, & shoots rubber bullets at women & children. AND , of course, it’s the fulfillment of the prophetic words of H.L. Mencken who said, on July 26, 1920, “…the White House will be occupied by a fool & complete narcissistic moron.”
THAT’S what I hate. & I bet almost every reader here can express the same or similar feelings.
&…there is too much more to say; every day brings some fresh hell.
VOTE as if your lives depend upon it, because they DO.
& vote ON Election Day, because paper is safer, & the voting machines get worse (& hacked) every year.
I love the America that is supposed to be, not the one conquered by oligarchs and religious zealots.
Exactly, Diane!
Ponderosa,
Please define what it takes to “hate America”.
For instance, I HATE and DESPISE everything Trump does. My loyalty is to the U.S. Constitution, not a president or a political party.
I HATE and DESPISE everything the totally corrupt and obstructionist, subversive Republican Party has done since Obama was president. Well, actually, since Reagan was governor of California.
Does that mean I “hate America”?
My case against patriotism is that it’s just a tepid form of nationalism, and nationalism is a key ingredient of fascism.
Fascism is just a few steps down the road from patriotism.
But even if we don’t go all the way down that road to full blown fascism (American patriotism has brought us pretty close), patriotism pits our nation against other nations in a quest for dominance to the detriment of the “losers.”
No thanks, on “loving my country”
I agree.
NO, when it comes to the loving the country no matter what, but YES when it comes to defending the U.S. Constitution against enemies both domestic and foreign.
And #1 on that enemies list is Donald Trump.
#2 is Moscow Mitch
#3 is Poppin Putin