In the past few years, the Pentagon spent $6.8 million to pay for patriotic displays during the games of professional sports teams. That’s according to a joint oversight report released by Arizona Republican Sens. John Flake and John McCain on Wednesday. The senators found that since 2012, the Pentagon has signed 72 contracts with teams in the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League, and Major League Soccer that amounted to “paid patriotism.”…. “The Atlanta Falcons received $879,000; the New England Patriots, $700,000; and the Buffalo Bills, $650,000. The Atlanta Braves received $450,000, the most of any Major League Baseball franchise, while the Minnesota Wild were paid $570,000, the most of any National Hockey League team…. The Atlanta contracts included a 2013 event during which a roaring crowd cheered as the Falcons welcomed 80 guard members who unfurled an American flag across the Georgia Dome’s turf.”
It’s no secret that Americans have become far more reflexively patriotic since 9/11. How often do we hear rote recitations of “We thank you for your service” directed at our men and women in uniform whenever public announcements of any sort are made? Not that they aren’t worthy of support and admiration, but it’s hard to imagine a reasonable person arguing with the contention that most of those invocations come far more from a place of obligation than of sincerity. When one repeats words because they’re a social expectation, they soon cease to possess any meaning.
Since 9/11, patriotism has been the expectation- the rule instead of the exception. Remember flag pins…and the resulting controversy when- GASP!!!- a politician didn’t wear one? Yes, merely by failing to meet expectations and wear a cloisonne American flag pin, a politician’s patriotism could be- and very often was- called into question. Was he/she not proud to be an American? Was he/she a terrorist sympathizer? Why does he/she hate America?
It’s beyond silly, of course, but such is the power of groupthink. As it turns out, the Pentagon has been using tax dollars to stoke the fires of patriotism among the American sheeple. Having an all-volunteer military means that service branches must market and sell themselves like any other product. Then again, no other product has the ability to invoke hearth, homeland, mother, and apple pie in the tug-at-the-heartstrings manner our military can. Dial Soap can’t depict itself as the last bastion between our freedom and the unwashed terrorist hordes that would destroy us. Charmin Toilet Paper can’t portray itself with jet fighters, American flags, and the promise that they will always be there to protect America and all she stands for.
Another “Wag the Dog” scenario, perhaps? Or is it just that the Pentagon realizes that patriotism is a product like toothpaste or potato chips, meaning it can be sold to the American sheeple? Like any other product, it’s about increasing sales and market share, right? Besides, what patriotic American would ever think to question our military? They’re too busy reflexively thanking them for their valiant, selfless service and sacrifice.
