Beware Blinding Patriotism

By Dyeru @ Adobe Stock

At the Institute for Political Economy, Paul Craig Roberts acknowledges the left’s anti-Americanism but warns the right against blinding patriotism. He writes:

Patriotism Has Destroyed America

I don’t mean by patriotism’s absence. I mean by its presence. I will explain.

First, let’s understand who we are talking about. Not the liberals, not the leftwing, not the woke. These are the creatures who spend their time denouncing America.

We are talking about conservatives. They are the patriots.

I am not saying that there is anything wrong with patriotism. It is a good thing when it is not blinding. But patriotism can be very blinding.

I could write a book about this, but who would read it? So I will go straight to the basic point. Conservatives are not blind to the fact that much is wrong, but who do they blame? They blame foreign “enemies”–Russians, Chinese, Muslim terrorists, Iranians, Palestinians. The fault is never in their own government. When you tell them it is, they get defensive, angry, and call you a “commie who hates America.”

Their patriotism confuses country (that is, the Constitution) with the government, and they defend the government that is the cause of the problems.

Consequently, conservatives do not understand Washington’s hand in all of the crises that we currently face and, therefore, conservatives are impotent and can do nothing to avoid the crises. Instead, they project the blame externally as the propaganda does. Their patriotism makes them victims of propaganda serving agendas of which they are unaware.

Try telling a conservative that Russia didn’t invade Ukraine, but merely intervened in Donbas, Russian Ukraine, to protect the Russians there from being massacred by a Ukrainian army trained and equipped by Washington. This is an absolute fact. One that is child’s play to document and prove beyond every doubt. But if you tell an American conservative this, you will be regarded as a traitor of your country in service to Russia.

If you tell a conservative that the real sources of America’s economic trouble is not China, but Washington, Wall Street, and the Federal Reserve, He will wonder how much China is paying you to help China take over America.

For conservatives, patriotism requires you to believe the government’s narrative. If you don’t, you are suspect. Consequently, conservatives find themselves going along with the developing American Police State as it “protects” them by dismantling the Constitution that actually does protect them.

Think about it. Who got blamed for President Kennedy’s assassination? Oswald, an alleged Russian agent on the CIA and FBI’s payrolls.

Who got the blame for 9/11? A handful of Saudi Arabians who could not possibly have pulled off the feat. And Osama bin Laden, long an accomplice of the CIA in the Afghan war against the Soviet Union.

It wasn’t the Iranians, Russians, or Chinese who drove Americans into submitting to the Covid vax which has killed more people than Covid and left larger numbers permanently health injured.

It is extraordinary that conservatives, who revere our Founding Fathers trust government that the founding fathers did not trust.

Read more here.