May Day is set aside for dancing around the maypole if you’re a pastoral youth or striking, marching and brawling if your an urban unionized worker but in the USA it’s a day of loyalty. The nice May 1st tradition of dancing around a circle covered with flowers was born in a time long past and has no discernible purpose except for frolicking between well adjusted heterosexual youth and celebrating the joy of existence in God’s springtime glory. The mean International Workers' Day, also known as May Day by all commies, was created right here in the USA through the ingenuity of German immigrant anarchists who organized a nationwide strike demanding a eight hour work day (and probably a bunch of other shit that no one writes about or remembers) on 5/1/1886. You read that right - not 1967, not 1929 or 1917 - no. the year was 1886 and America was at the vanguard of the world wide socialist revolution. In the days that followed the strike there was “peaceful protest” in many Northern and Midwestern cities but on May 4th some yahoo! worker tossed a bomb into a police line in Chicago’s Haymarket Square and kaboom! the whole world changed. The Haymarket Affair became the the seminal moment in the labor movements around the world and a few years after the massacre the first day of May was proclaimed Labor Day - May the fourth be with you.
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| Loyalty |
Once the Bolsheviks got their own country in 1917 the USA decided to turn May 1st into “Americanization Day” and use the designated date as a time to teach newly arrived immigrants about the countries history, traditions and civic order. By the 1950’s communism was still going strong in the USSR and spreading around the world so Congress made 5/1 an officially recognized Loyalty Day
Ike’s 1959 Loyalty Day proclamation is decidedly American Greatness and straight to the point but our current POTUS Jo(((k)))e fires off a shotgun blast from the White House balcony and listens for bloody screams of agony from his subjects so here We go...
Paragraph 1.
On Loyalty Day, we celebrate our allegiance to the project of this great Nation and the democratic ideals woven into the fabric of our Constitution. As Americans, we do not command loyalty, but seek to earn it through our actions — including by living up to the principles enshrined in our Constitution and respecting the will of the people as reflected in the democratic process. Drawn together by the promise of equality, freedom, and justice, we are a Nation of shared ideals and strong, resilient people. Here in America, loyalty does not mean fealty to any one leader or political party, nor does it mean unthinking praise or willful ignorance of our shortcomings — it means loyalty to our common ideals, and to one another. It means standing united as one people, even as we cherish our differences and respect dissent.
KOTCB commentary - This great Nation is NOT a “project” and We pledge allegiance to the Republic and NOT democratic ideals (whatever those are) that, as it happens, are NOT “woven into the fabric” of the US Constitution. Loyalty Day is the direct result of a a “command” otherwise known as a law passed by Congress and signed by the President of the United States of America so We DO “command loyalty” which is, if you think about it, a philosophical requirement of the very concept of loyalty. The fact that President Biden believes that loyalty is a transactional fealty “earned” through patronage or extortion goes a long way to explaining the rational behind Democrat and #NeverTrump treason over the past 5 years. If “respecting the will of the people” is one of the ways our government “earns” the loyalty of its citizenry then We the People owe the current regime in Washington DC nothing but cold indifference because The Big Lie of Joe Biden winning 80 Million votes on November 3, 2020 shows complete disdain for “the democratic process” and the sovereignty of voters. The USA was founded on the ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and nobody came here (or stayed here) because the government promised them “equality, freedom, and justice” which it didn’t and can’t but which, unfortunately, it now appears to want to do. In 2021 America is NOT a country of “shared ideals” and, based on the pathetic obedience and fear (there is no other word for it) surrounding the Chinavirus We are no longer a “strong and resilient people” as We once were. Straw man arguments that some American’s make an “unthinking” or “willfully ignorant” pledge of loyalty to a Cult-of-Personalty demagogue (Obama/Trump) or political ideology (Hope/MAGA) need to be torched and burned to the ground. No, according to the White House loyalty in 2021 is all about “common ideals” (left undefined) and one another (meaning your neighbor) which is another way of saying NOTHING. Or, put another way, “one people” united in our “differences” and “dissent” and THAT vision of our country is proposed to “earn” the loyalty of 330 million people living within the porous boarders of these 50 United States.
Paragraph 2.
Our country is a diverse tapestry of many cultures, heritages, religions, and languages, brought together around the values and ideals we all share as Americans. Together, we celebrate our differences and draw strength from our common commitment to perfecting our Union. No matter what challenges come our way, our Nation holds strong together — bound by our Constitution and the rule of law, uplifted by individual liberties and promises of justice we have worked hard in each generation to secure and expand, and consecrated by those who have sacrificed to preserve, defend, and care for our Nation.
KOTCB commentary - The USA is NOT a diverse tapestry. The “values and ideals we all share as Americans” is our national culture and that heritage supersedes and eclipses whatever “cultures” we left behind in the old country. While some might “celebrate our differences” or focus on “perfecting our union” there is no substance in these ephemera to which anyone can pledge loyalty. At this point the proclamation gets kind of sad when it discusses “our Constitution” and “the rule of law” that “promises justice” and “individual liberties” as if these things, discarded and irrelevant, are “holding the Nation together.” Worse, it taunts America’s patriots who sacrificed blood and treasure over the centuries only to see it ruled by a diaper wearing imbecile who, as figure-head for the state, shows every citizen (and the world) how washed up and inadequate the countries political system has become.
Paragraph 3.
We see loyalty in the members of our Armed Forces, who selflessly serve in harm’s way; in their families, who, in the timeless words of the poet John Milton, “also serve who only stand and wait;” in our educators, who dedicate their lives to nurturing young minds; in our first responders, who put their lives on the line to save others; in all those who have the courage to call out our Nation’s imperfections when we fall short, and who continue to push our society to live up to its founding promise of freedom, justice, and equality for all. May 1 is also International Workers’ Day, and we honor the workers whose service and sacrifice has helped turn the tide against the COVID-19 pandemic. On this day, we show our gratitude to our essential workers — and to all of the workers who have organized and fought to improve our Nation and create a fairer and more just society for all.
KOTCB commentary - The loyalty of the Armed Forces is not “earned” by some politician or idea - it is freely given by the people in the military and, like cops, will be honored no matter how stupidly the government behaves. The “poet John Milton” was a 17th century Englishman and has next to nothing to do with Loyalty to the USA having died 100 years before the British Colonies fought for independence and self rule. “Educators” which is another name for teachers, have proven themselves to be the least loyal class of people in the entire country and deserve no recognition from the President. As for “all those” who “call out our Nation’s imperfections”, well, you’re welcome, but I’m not sure I’d call the KOTCB loyal to the current political establishment. There is NOT a “founding promise of freedom, justice, and equality for all” and this is a complete misreading or, more probably, a purposeful distortion of American “values and ideals” - see commentary of paragraph 1. Which brings us to “International Workers’s Day” which was deemed to be so foreign and un-American that the US government created Americanization Day/Loyalty Day as a more wholesome substitute celebration. Workers of the world unite and let’s defeat COVID-19 so that we can “create a fairer and more just society for all.” Thanks, but no thanks.
Blah, blah, blah
It is a Loyalty Day proclamation worthy of a pretender President who commands no loyalty.That’s just were we are in 2021 America and it will be interesting to see just how long this bland “leadership” will survive. Hopefully the Nation will not be confronted by and external of internal enemy that requires true loyalty to defeat.
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