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Getting a Handle On the Moment With all the "Latterday Patriots" and "Homefront Rambos" running around these days selling woof-tickets about what they'd do to Osama bin Laden (if he wasn't half a world away surrounded by a thousand armed fanatics), I think it's important for all the recently afflicted kneejerk patriots in the crowd to try to remember that they should not expect rational people who are able to think for themselves to react to the events of September 11th the same way they do. I don't know how to break this to you, guys, but bleating patriotic platitudes like a mindless automaton and obediently yelling "Sieg Heil" every time some self-serving political opportunist breaks wind doesn't make you the national standard by which the patriotism of others should be judged. Your pathetic "Credit Card Nationalism" (patriotic paraphernalia acquired after September 11th) doesn't make you the patriotic icon you'd like all your little friends to think you are (or have deluded yourself into believing), it just makes you "fashionable." You might also want to try to grasp the fact that everybody who doesn't bend over backwards to kiss your red, white and blue butt is not a terrorist, traitor, communist, or whatever. This includes the clerk at the local convenience store who talks funny, that (multiple expletives deleted) who cut you off in traffic, the neighbor who complains about your stupid dog tearing up his flower bed, people who can read and write above a sixth grade level, and, in general, anyone who isn't publicly bemoaning their patriotism loudly enough to suit you. Here's an idea... try to get a handle on the fact that this isn't some sort of bizarre macho he-man flag waving competition, its a clear and present danger of monumental proportions in the REAL WORLD. Accordingly, rather than all 285,152,338 of us (10:29 EDT Sep 16, 2001) wasting valuable time trying to impress everyone else with endless repetitions of how eloquently we can express our shock, anger, sorrow, religious faith, patriotic fervor, yada, yada, yada, let's knock off the World Wrestling Federation mentality NONSENSE and get on with the BUSINESS at hand - ridding the world of Saudi financed terrorists. |