This just in: The motive behind the action is what bothers me the most. Not the action itself.

Someone protests racial injustice by kneeling at a football game. Is this patriotic of anti-patriotic? I’m thinking its the former.

Here is my litmus test: What would a spy do?

A spy would never not kneel at the playing of the national anthem because that would draw attention to him. No, he will pretend to be a patriot and put his hand over his heart while the national anthem is playing. Good boy! Only someone that is secure in his or her position as a patriot dare to do something unexpected.

Are we not, after all, allowed to express ourselves? Are we not allowed to protest? That is what kneeling at a football game is. It’s a protest. In this case it’s a person saying, “We are not treating all Americans equally and I want us all to acknowledge that.”

Let’s try another…

I watched once as Donald Trump got up on a stage and stopped to hug an American flag. Patriotic? I think not. He is pandering to his base. BTW, pandering mean “catering to or exploiting another’s weaknesses.” A patriot wouldn’t cast doubt on an election with ZERO evidence to back him up.

I see Senator Munchin going against a bill that is filled with climate change initiatives. This same person make $500,000 a year off of his coal investments. He says, “We can’t afford it.” Well, the bill pays for itself so what is his real motivation?

Trump holds up a bible, upside down, after violently chasing peaceful protesters away that were standing where he wanted to stand. A man of God? Trump? Or is he once again pandering.

Trump once said, “If I ever run for president, I’ll do it as a Republican because they will believe anything.”

At least he got that right.

Mitch McConnell says he will not vote to raise the debt limit. Is it because he is concerned about the budget? Recall that the debt went up by $7.8 trillion during the time Trump was in office and Mitch not only did not oppose it…he help to do it. So, is he being responsible or is he letting Americans suffer for personal political benefit?

Republicans are up in arms about mask mandates saying, “It’s my body. I can do what I want.” They are also passing very restrictive abortion laws controlling the “body choices” of half the people in the country. Women can’t get abortions because old white men in Texas don’t want them to. Pandering to the evangelicals.

“We should stay in endless wars so that terrorists don’t come over here and kill us.” This is a very popular Republican position. And yet, far and away most terrorism is domestically grown. Uneducated white men blaming non-whites and non-Christians for their poor quality of life. They form “boy clubs with guns” and pat each other on the back as they plan their next assault on non-whites and those that oppose racism. If Republicans are against terrorism, shouldn’t they be against all terrorism ans not just against terrorist that won’t vote for them.

I see people do things all the time that I don’t agree with. “He’s using a 7-iron and I think he needs to use a 6-iron.” This never riles me up; even if it affects me directly. Everyone has freedom of choice and they don’t need to act like I wish they would.

It’s the hypocrisy that gets to me. The action that is publicly described one way that is actually motivated by something else. That something else is always hidden or disguised. It is so because it is dark. People don’t lie to hide their motives if they believe they are just. So when they do it, you know that they know they are being malignant.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim