Respect

Does the NFL actually think that it can go to war with the national anthem and the American flag and win?  Many are trying to frame this controversy as a “protest against Trump”, but the truth is that owners, coaches and players can speak out against President Trump any time that they want.  They have huge platforms and the mainstream media would soak up every word.  So there is absolutely no need to “take a knee” when our national anthem is being played and the American flag is being honored.  As I explained a couple days ago, the national anthem and the American flag are symbols that represent the entire country.  When someone disrespects those symbols, they are disrespecting our great land, everyone that lives here, and everyone that ever fought, bled and died for America.

Everyone involved with the NFL that participated in that absolutely shameful display on Sunday needs to apologize to all of the rest of us immediately.  In 2017, many Americans no longer understand the importance of the national anthem and the flag, but there are still millions of us that do.  And the outrage that has been unleashed as a result of this controversy is off the charts.  If you go on to YouTube, you will find dozens of videos of fans burning their NFL jerseys.  There is even a new hashtag (#NFLburnnotice) that has gone viral over the past couple of days because so many people are doing this, and many mainstream news outlets are publishing reports on this phenomenon…

Outraged fans around the country are taking a stand as protests during the national anthem spread across NFL games.

Hundreds of players have taken the knee, locked arms or just stayed in the locker room to call attention to racial inequality in the nation. That’s offended many football fans, who see the act as unpatriotic. Some threatened to burn their team merchandise if protests continued, and now some are making good on that promise.

Yes, owners, coaches and players may have a First Amendment right to do what they did, but we also have a right to let them know what we think about what they just did.

As the weeks and months roll along, millions of former fans are going to be turning the games off and finding other ways to spend their Sunday afternoons.  And once these fans are gone, do you think that they will come back?

One Pittsburgh fan was so outraged that he burned “more than $1,000 worth of Pittsburgh Steelers merchandise”…

Robert Smith posted a video of himself on Sunday burning more than $1,000 worth of Pittsburgh Steelers merchandise, the Daily Mail reported. Earlier that day, the Steelers had not participated in the anthem, with the exception of offensive tackle Alejandro Villanueva, who served three tours of duty as an Army Ranger in Afghanistan before beginning his NFL career.

“We have morals in this country. We stand for this country,” Smith says in the video, which has more than 50,000 views as of Monday afternoon. “My great-uncle’s bones are lying in the bottom of Pearl Harbor for this country, for this flag, for your freedom to play in the NFL.”

“Super Bowl, right? As if I care,” Smith continues, pouring lighter fluid on the gear. “I care about our country. I care about our freedom.”

And of course now it is inevitable that “taking a knee” will start spreading to other venues as well.

Sadly, a member of Congress has even decided to do this on the floor of the House of Representatives.  According to Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, she did this in order to “stand against racism”…

“There is no regulation that says that these young men cannot stand against the dishonoring of their mothers by you calling them ‘fire the son of a b.’ You tell me which of those children’s mothers is a son of a b. That is racism. You cannot deny it. You cannot run for it, and I kneel in honor of them,” Jackson Lee said.

“I kneel in front of the flag and on this floor,” she said as she took a knee behind the podium.

“I kneel in honor of the First Amendment. I kneel because the flag is a symbol for freedom. I kneel because I’m going to stand against racism. I kneel because I will stand with those young men, and I’ll stand with our soldiers. And I’ll stand with America, because I kneel.”

I have been fighting against racism for many years too, but this is not the way to do it.

It is never appropriate to disrespect our flag or our anthem, and this is a point that White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders made on Monday…

“This isn’t about the president being against anyone. This is about the president and millions of Americans standing for something,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday. “Honoring the flag, the national anthem, and the men and women who fought to defend it.”

She added: “It is always appropriate for the president of this country to promote our flag, to promote our national anthem and ask people to respect it.”

It will be very interesting to see what the public opinion polls say in the coming days, but up to this point it has been exceedingly clear that most Americans do not support these kinds of “protests”…

In 2016, a Quinnipac poll found that only 38 percent of those supported NFL players kneeling during the National Anthem. A Reuters poll found that 72 percent found the protest to be unpatriotic but also that 64 percent agreed there should be no punishment or fine.

When you disrespect the anthem or the flag, you are disrespecting all of us and everything that this country is supposed to stand for.

If you want to make a political point, find some other way to do it.  Treating our national symbols with contempt is never appropriate, and those that have done so should be utterly ashamed of themselves.

Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.

This is going to backfire on the left in a major way.  On Sunday, more than a hundred NFL players knelt during the playing of the national anthem.  It was obviously an attempt to make some sort of public statement about President Trump, but it was an exceedingly poor way to go about doing that.  Because our young people are not even taught about the importance of our national anthem and our national flag in school, most of these players didn’t even understand what they were doing.  Our anthem is sung and our flag is proudly displayed prior to major sporting events for a reason.  The truth is that our national anthem and our national flag are both symbols that directly represent our nation.  In other words, when you show disrespect to the anthem or to the flag you are literally showing disrespect to the United States of America.  So what these players did on Sunday was essentially to spit in the face of every single American citizen.

This is not just an American thing.  All over the world it is well understood that respect for the national flag and other national symbols is not optional.  What transpired at NFL games on Sunday will be broadcast all over the planet, and the rest of the world will be laughing at our national disgrace.

The very first NFL game scheduled on Sunday was held in London, and “dozens of players from both teams” knelt while the national anthem was being played…

The first game of the day between the Baltimore Ravens and Jacksonville Jaguars saw dozens of players from both teams kneel while almost the entire Jaguars’ on-field and sideline players and employees locked arms during the U.S. national anthem, including owner Shahid Khan. Some players stood while others knelt.

And of course similar “sideline protests” happened at other NFL stadiums all over the nation.  Never before in American history have we ever seen anything quite like this…

Demonstrations spread throughout the league as many players broke out of their routine by joining the protests or engaging in team-wide displays of unity.

Several players from the Buffalo Bills, Denver Broncos, New York Giants, Detroit Lions, New England Patriots, New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons were among those who chose not to stand for the anthem. The Miami Dolphins, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Minnesota Vikings, Philadelphia Eagles, Chicago Bears, Indianapolis Colts, New York Jets, Los Angeles Chargers and Green Bay Packers stood with arms locked, though some players from those teams chose to kneel.

I honestly don’t think that the NFL will ever be the same after this.  It had already been transformed into the “no fun league”, and now the focus will squarely be on political protests rather than football for the foreseeable future.

Needless to say, millions upon millions of Americans were completely disgusted by the disrespect shown to our national symbols on Sunday, and President Trump was one of them…

“If a player wants the privilege of making millions of dollars in the NFL, or other leagues, he or she should not be allowed to disrespect …,” Trump said in tweets Saturday afternoon. “Our Great American Flag (or Country) and should stand for the National Anthem. If not, YOU’RE FIRED. Find something else to do!”

If professional football players want to speak out against President Trump, I have no problem with that whatsoever.

But for them to openly and brazenly disrespect our entire country is crossing a line that should never be crossed.

What in the world has happened to America?  All over America high school football coaches are being banned from saying prayers before games, and yet disrespecting our anthem and our flag is somehow acceptable?  The following comes from Zero Hedge…

Marc Short, the president’s legislative director, has also backed his boss, telling “Meet the Press” that a double standard for players who chose to voice their views on the field, and that the president was speaking for the majority of Americans on what sort of expression was appropriate. Short compared a crackdown on protests to the ban on high school football coaches leading players in prayer before games.

“There are high school coaches across America today who are punished for leading their players in prayer, and yet, when an N.F.L. player takes a knee, somehow that player is presumed to be a martyr for a social cause,” Mr. Short said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The president is standing with the vast majority of Americans who believe that our flag should be respected.”

Many of these players are going to look back on what they have done with great shame.  They may have believed that they were disrespecting President Trump, but the truth is that they were disrespecting this great land and every single American that has ever lived.  They owe all of us an apology, and that should happen as soon as possible.

And the NFL may think that it is all powerful, but stunts like this are going to cost it millions upon millions of dollars.  Already, ratings were way down because of the few players that were kneeling whenever the anthem was played…

Player protests of the National Anthem – such as when quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee in protest – are the number one reason sports fans watched fewer National Football League (NFL) games, a new survey shows.

If just a few players kneeling had that much of an impact on the ratings, what do you think is going to happen now?

Unfortunately, I have a feeling that this is just the beginning.  In fact, one former Democratic member of Congress is calling on all NFL players to kneel while the anthem is played…

A former Democrat Congresswoman has called for every NFL player to kneel during the national anthem at Sunday’s games, while branding President Donald Trump a ‘white supremacist’.

Donna Edwards, who retired as a US representative for Maryland earlier this year, issued the bold statement on Saturday, responding to Trump’s criticism of NFL players who refuse to stand for the anthem.

‘On Sunday, I hope every @NFL player takes a knee in solidarity w [Colin Kaepernick] against the white supremacist who squats in our White House,’ Edwards said in reference to the former San Francisco quarterback, who is now a free agent.

No matter what your political perspective is, it is wrong to disrespect our national anthem and it is wrong to disrespect our flag.

And anyone that disrespects our anthem and our flag is spitting in the face of the entire country.

What happened on Sunday was a national disgrace, and those involved need to apologize to the American people immediately.

Michael Snyder is a Republican candidate for Congress in Idaho’s First Congressional District, and you can learn how you can get involved in the campaign on his official website. His new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.