In case you haven't heard, there will be a very big professional football game this weekend, which some, such as Iraq War Chorus Soloist Gregg Easterbrook, are framing as yet another battle of Good vs. Evil. Good will be represented by heartland America's Indianapolis Colts; Evil will be represented by those East Coast Fifth Columnists, The New England Patriots. The Patriots won the first of their three 21st century Super Bowls in the wake of 9/11 against the mighty St. Louis Rams. The image of the underdog, all-for-one-one-for-all Patriots coming out of the tunnel as one for pre-game introductions served with George Bush's bullhorn moment as one of those iconic impressions of the time and a country united.
Like Bush, the Patriots' approval rating since then has plummeted. Most recently for the spate of lopsided defeats this immensely talented team has pinned on its opposition. Keeping starters on the field long after the game’s been decided, continuing with aggressive play-calling, and average victory margins of 25 points have raised anguished cries throughout the land that the Pats are "running up the score." A top executive at the company I work for stopped me in the hall after the Pats crushed the Washington Redskins 52-7 and said, "You should be ashamed of your Patriots."
"Ashamed of my Patriots?" This from an executive of a company whose motto would be (if not for the mitigating influence of our marketing department): "We crush the competition, pillage their towns, eviscerate their employees, rape their women, and sell off their children bigger, better, and faster than anyone." I then asked my executive friend about a company he’s invested in and greatly admires, “Are you ashamed of Microsoft for running up the score?”
Seriously, folks, isn’t running up the score what America is all about? A few examples:
The US military budget is almost 29 times as large as the combined spending of the six “rogue” states (Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria).
The US military budget is 3 times the size of the combined military budgets of our erstwhile “enemies,” Russia and China.
http://www.globalissues.org/...
In the US, the richest 1 percent own 40 percent of the total property of the country, while 80 percent of US citizens own just 16 percent.
http://academic.udayton.edu/...
“Of all high-income nations, the United States has the most unequal distribution of income, with over 30 percent of income in the hands of the richest 10 percent and only 1.8 percent going to the poorest 10 percent.”
http://www.worldwatch.org/...
“The average CEO of a large U.S. company made roughly $10.8 million last year, or 364 times that of U.S. full-time and part-time workers, who made an average of $29,544.”
http://money.cnn.com/...
Since the US invasion, deaths in Iraq: 655,000 Iraqis; 3,839 Americans.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
http://www.antiwar.com/...
In a land awash in such gross disparities, we have had a wretched excess of radio talk, TV commentary, and column inches dedicated to the high moral question of whether the Patriots should be taking a knee with a big lead and seconds left on the clock. I know this is mostly driven by sports producers and editors, who still charmingly refer to their beat as the toy department of life--drug scandals, widespread gambling, spousal abuse, and the hideous creature that is O.J. Simpson notwithstanding. But with Easterbrook leading the hue and cry, we reach the nexus between sports and political commentary in this country.
In his pre-Iraq war writing, Easterbrook drooled over the US military’s ability to shock and awe Iraq into submission by dropping as much ordnance on Baghdad in a single night as was dropped during the entire 1991 Gulf War. He later embraced the grotesque “fly paper” strategy, which extolled the virtue of isolating a hundred thousand Americans in Iraq as bait for and incitement to a host of foreign enemies, all in the cause of securing peaceful shopping at the malls back in the homeland.
Yet in surveying the scorched earth of New England’s 8 –week shock and awe campaign, Easterbrook mounts his high horse to accuse the Patriots of being, get this, “bad sports.” The supporting chorus behind him is full of jocks, ex-jocks, and jock-sniffing “reporters.” No doubt most of them would dismiss this entire argument as being irrelevent to them. After all, they’re just talking about a ball game. What’s that have to do with war and peace? The chasm between rich and poor?
In this culture, of course, it has everything to do with it. New England Coach Belichick has been called a genius. He may be, though I doubt he’s genius enough to be consciously mounting this brilliant campaign to expose our widespread cultural hypocrisy. But there it is for all to see. Patriots up 38-0 and still driving for another score. That’s us. That’s our country. Driving to build ever more weapons, make ever more dollars, put ever more space between us and the wretched of this earth. Our sports departments can continue to delude themselves into thinking that they’re in the toy store of life despite the very serious billions of dollars that stream through American sports on a daily basis. They can ignore all the outrageous disparities that are as much a part of our national identity as the flag. But when they join Easterbrook atop that moral high horse, they become, with him, the horse’s ass.
Go Pats!