In celebration of Flag Day, an eloquent and inspirational statement of values and principles, from the leader of the Democratic Women of Santa Barbara club.
The article calls for us to be “indivisible,” yet immediately divides people into ideological camps.
Most Americans aren’t waking up thinking about left versus right. They’re thinking about whether they can afford groceries, whether their kids are getting a quality education, whether they can ever buy a home, and whether they’ll have to leave the community they’ve lived in for decades.
If we truly want unity, let’s stop assuming people with different political views are extremists and start judging policies by their results. California families are struggling with affordability, housing, education, and energy costs. The results here speak for themselves. Those are problems worth solving together.
And yes, everyone has the right to express a different opinion. I spent 26 years in uniform defending that right. I simply believe we’ll make more progress when we spend less time labeling each other and more time working on the issues that affect working families every day.
Patriots are those who understand and fulfill their civic duty to responsibly participate in our Republic, a representative democracy. Patriots do not require party or any group affiliation. (I’m an involved registered NPP.) of possible interest, my Flag Day article.
I think one of the important contributions of this piece is the reminder that the original pledge did not include the phrase "under God," which was added during the Cold War to create distance between the US and the Communist Soviet Union. At our contemporary historical moment, in which the Trump regime is trying to re-write and distort our nation's history to embrace "Christian nationalism," we are reminded here of one of the keystones of our Constitutional order, the separation of church and state, alongside the importance of a civic polity that embraces all Americans, not just the ones that the current regime views favorably.
“So on this Flag Day, let us say it plainly: WE ARE THE TRUE PATRIOTS!” Isn’t it divisive to claim that one partisan political party or group “are the true patriots” while in the same article stating the Flag belongs to all [Americans]? It seems a contradiction.
The article calls for us to be “indivisible,” yet immediately divides people into ideological camps.
Most Americans aren’t waking up thinking about left versus right. They’re thinking about whether they can afford groceries, whether their kids are getting a quality education, whether they can ever buy a home, and whether they’ll have to leave the community they’ve lived in for decades.
If we truly want unity, let’s stop assuming people with different political views are extremists and start judging policies by their results. California families are struggling with affordability, housing, education, and energy costs. The results here speak for themselves. Those are problems worth solving together.
And yes, everyone has the right to express a different opinion. I spent 26 years in uniform defending that right. I simply believe we’ll make more progress when we spend less time labeling each other and more time working on the issues that affect working families every day.
Patriots are those who understand and fulfill their civic duty to responsibly participate in our Republic, a representative democracy. Patriots do not require party or any group affiliation. (I’m an involved registered NPP.) of possible interest, my Flag Day article.
https://thesantabarbaracurrent.substack.com/p/in-celebration-of-flag-day-june-14?r=2v0ld1&utm_medium=ios
I think one of the important contributions of this piece is the reminder that the original pledge did not include the phrase "under God," which was added during the Cold War to create distance between the US and the Communist Soviet Union. At our contemporary historical moment, in which the Trump regime is trying to re-write and distort our nation's history to embrace "Christian nationalism," we are reminded here of one of the keystones of our Constitutional order, the separation of church and state, alongside the importance of a civic polity that embraces all Americans, not just the ones that the current regime views favorably.
“So on this Flag Day, let us say it plainly: WE ARE THE TRUE PATRIOTS!” Isn’t it divisive to claim that one partisan political party or group “are the true patriots” while in the same article stating the Flag belongs to all [Americans]? It seems a contradiction.