It’s time to dispel the myth that one political party is the party of true, constitution-loving, patriots. Senator Katie Britt (R-Alabama) in her kitchen table bedtime story underscored the idea that has been a primary talking point for Republicans – that they are the ones “steeped in the blood of patriots who overthrew the most powerful empire in the world.”
Actually… it was the conservatives of that era who remained loyal to King George. But we won’t go there just yet. Republicans and Democrats as we know them today do not resemble the parties at the time of our revolution. More relevant today are the ideas by which to lay claim to patriotism. Or to be representative of “true constitution loving, hard working Americans.”
It is Republican policy that has turned supply side economics into bedrock. Better known as “trickle down” which expands wealth at the top with the notion that their success will trickle down into jobs and higher pay. It doesn’t. It has created the income gap in America which has left the working class frozen at low wages and hopelessness at improving their situation. It has gouged prices and made essential needs like healthcare and education part of the free market. The wealth hasn’t “trickled down” in fact it has expanded exponentially at the top to where a tiny percentage control half of all of America’s wealth.
Those hard working patriots have seen an almost non existent improvement while the top have increased their holdings by 250% over the past 30 years.
It is also Republican policy that has turned away from the constitutional protection of religious freedom and toward theocracy. Republican-conservative legislation in state houses is limiting the exercise of free speech by banning books while also diverting public funds to parochial schools to indoctrinate children with more fundamental Christian specific values.
“Good,” you say? Well, it isn’t constitution-abiding so pick your side. You can’t have both.
I suspect most of those Republican legislators posing with their copies of the constitution haven’t actually read it. Because you can’t read the second amendment and not wonder if the framers were saying “a well regulated militia” meant they believed that a well regulated militia, made up of citizen-soldiers, would ever not be “necessary for the security of a free state.” They wrote that prefatory clause when the national army was still being debated as even being necessary.
Regardless, context is important and saying that you are a constitutionalist simply because you read “the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed” is weak evidence.
Republican policy in the last century has undermined working conditions, labor laws, environmental stewardship (which should be of concern to America’s farmers), and has embraced the corporatization that diminished family farms. There have been complicit Democratic policies but to say that Republicanism is the safe haven for working Americans is complete nonsense.
Support for Donald Trump completely erases any claim of being God-fearing, salt of the earth, constitution-loving, patriotic Americans. Even another off mic video of Trump, as president, hears him saying that he wants “his people” to stand in uniform allegiance to him “ the way they do for Kim Jong-Un.” Not to mention that he feels the president should be immune to any prosecution. And that protesters who slander the president should be imprisoned.
Some people may agree with that. Ok. But they can’t say they are patriots who love the constitution.
And finally, the progeny of those who stood with King George, the Loyalists who wanted to maintain the order of the status quo, follow the ideological strain of Conservatism. Loyalists thought rebellion was immoral and feared radical change. Not quite “steeped in the blood“ of the revolutionaries.
