Well, DUH!!!
Of course patriotism has to come from the heart, if it's going to mean anything. And religion too, which Republicans are trying to force back into public schools. What this says about Republicans, is that their agenda, from anti-abortion to pro-military, has nothing to do with genuine patriotism or religion or with any real values. It’s all just about control, like you do with school children.
Republicans, and conservatives generally, live very narrow and joyless lives. They have sacrificed everything, relationships, personal integrity, any innate sensitivity or intelligence, to the job of making money. It is an endless task, because no one ever seems to have enough money. But even when they are “rich enough”, they’re still not happy. They have given up everything that makes life worthwhile and now life has passed them by. They have nothing to show for their sacrifice but their adherence to a rigid and artificial set of “values”. The have destroyed their own lives and now they want to destroy yours.
Democrats, and again liberals generally, want to make your life easier. They support higher wages and personal choices. They are decent, middle-class people who want you to become more like them (a legitimate source, incidentally, of working-class antagonism.) Democrats want social change, but nothing really radical like worker control or, fer Chrissakes, an equal distribution of property. In fact the liberal agenda is meant to prevent real change. When people are comfortable, they’re not going to demand too much of the rich.
By and large it’s a sensible and successful strategy. And it puts radicals, such as myself, in the position of dismissing marginal improvements in people’s lives, on the principle that things have to get worse before they get better.
So why don’t Americans always elect Democrats? NEXT