I pledge allegiance to the flag

July 4, 2010

It’s Independence Day and I, perhaps as a result of some cosmic convergence, am moved to pledge my allegiance to this perhaps once great nation. What converged? My reading of Glenn Beck’s The Overton Window and a Facebook link that led me to the confessions of an ex KGB agent.
First a little biography. I was perhaps a bit of a political junky from an early age. I remember fondly precious times with my father when we discussed political issues, his anger about FDR’s slaughtering our cows which supposedly helped drag the country out of the depression, his defiant shooting ducks out of season because they ravaged our wheat fields. His hunting deer out of season because that’s how he fed his family. Once, I was maybe 12 or 13 we were in the car alone, odd, because I had seven brothers and sisters that we should have time alone, but we had a bit of a political discussion. I thought I was a democrat and said people should vote for Adlai Stevenson. I don’t remember why, but one of the issues must have had to do with conservation, because I remember my father reminding me that if we’re interested in conservation issues, wouldn’t we vote Republicans. They were the conservative party after all.
I remember sitting on the front porch reading the local newspaper the bold headlines pronouncing the ending of the Korean War. I wept, I think mostly because I had expected more fanfare, perhaps a parade, even a national holiday. I thought it was a big deal.
My father was a proud hard working man. He supported his large family doing any job he could find, farming, well digging, sheep herding, house moving, renovation, carpentry. When one job petered out he could always find another. The only thing that was beneath him, that compromised his integrity was living on the dole, so when a job shut down and he was briefly unemployed, his friends would encourage him to take unemployment compensation. “It’s not welfare. You paid for it. It’s been deducted from your check every week.” My father refused. He wouldn’t stand in line for a hand out, no matter what.
I respected him for that, but when I sat in political science classes in college, or listened to the discussions in the teacher’s lounge after I graduated, I silently questioned his ethics. My best friends assured me that people should not be ashamed of having to accept charity, that redistribution of wealth was necessary, that we should be a compassionate country. I did stand firm on one issue. When my colleagues threw showers for pregnant unmarried students, I did not attend, unwilling to kind of glorify, and thus encourage promiscuity.
On most issues I joined the crowd. When the Department of Education was formed I felt proud to think that Education finally got the recognition it deserved. I didn’t recognize the tusk of the elephant that would soon fill the entire tent. When Goldwater insisted that Arizona should not accept federal funding for education, I mocked him saying he was like the boy in the Netherlands who stuck his finger in the dike thinking he was stemming the flow while a tsunami of water was rushing over the top of the dam. It didn’t take me long to recognize the folly, the colossal waste of the federal aid to education.
I had been voting democrat or independent in every major election until 1980. My husband and I had agreed to vote for the third party candidate, was it Anderson? as a kind of toothless inane political protest. As I poised my hand to punch the ballot, I felt, I kid you not, I felt an invisible hand take mine and punch the ballot for Reagan. I knew that was not what I intended to do, and I knew that I could ask for another ballot saying that I had spoiled mine, but the experience was so compelling, so profoundly moving, that, almost in a trance, I simply finished the ballot and turned it in. The Reagan presidency was pivotal for me, but I remained a timid, apprehensive voice for conservative values. I registered republican, but no republican administration, no republican house or senate ever impressed me, being never quite conservative enough. I realize that republicans were trapped. In order to get elected they had to join or at least support the move toward government largess. When Clinton was elected, I think it was Al Gore who held his hand to his ear and said, “I can hear the sound of gridlock breaking up,” and I cringed knowing that what we needed most in Washington was gridlock. But I remained pretty much silent. My rebellion amounted to quitting my support of the National Education Association.
On a pivotal day for me I expressed my disdain of all the brouhaha regarding the sexual harassment suits that arose out of the aviator’s tailgate convention. One of my colleagues said, “You must listen too much to Rush Limbaugh.” “Rush who?” I countered? And that was the day that I finally found a voice that expressed the views that I had so silently held for those many years. Because I worked, I could rarely listen to him, but when I did, I was renewed.
Rush led me to talk radio, and that led me to Glenn Beck, and this pivotal day, July 4, 2010, when The Overton Window met the ex KGB agent.