Falling down on the job here as arbiter of your flag-flying habits. How could I forget that some of America celebrates this day as Columbus Day? (No one in this household gets the day off.)
Fly your U.S. flag today. Fly it to honor Columbus’s discovery of the Americas. Or, fly your flag to honor exploration and explorers, and to remember the people who suffered so greatly as a result of the collision of European cultures in search of money, and American cultures lacking gunpowder and steel.
The second Monday in October is celebrated as Columbus Day, a federal holiday (though not widely honored in private enterprise). Columbus made landfall in the Americas for the first time on October 12, 1492, 520 years ago.
John Vanderlyn, Oil on canvas, 12′ x 18′ – Commissioned 1836/1837; placed 1847 in the Rotunda of the Capitol. Christopher Columbus is shown landing in the West Indies, on an island that the natives called Guanahani and he named San Salvador, on October 12, 1492. He raises the royal banner, claiming the land for his Spanish patrons, and stands bareheaded, with his hat at his feet, in honor of the sacredness of the event. The captains of the Niña and Pinta follow, carrying the banner of Ferdinand and Isabella. The crew displays a range of emotions, some searching for gold in the sand. Natives watch from behind a tree. John Vanderlyn (1775-1852) had studied with Gilbert Stuart and was the first American painter to be trained in Paris, where he worked on this canvas for ten years with the help of assistants.
Did you notice? In the painting in the U.S. Capitol, Columbus isn’t flying the U.S. flag. Acccuracy over political correctness winds, eh?
Below the fold: A description of the painting in the Capitol Rotunda, from the Architect of the U.S. Capitol (the “official” version.)
The distinguished commentator Pat Carrithers, on Facebook: “Today is a special day. It’s Columbus Day. That’s the day on which illegal immigration is called Discovery.”
(Updating dead links, especially from the late and lamented (here at least) VodPod, I found myself back in 2008, with this post on Mark Twain’s “The War Prayer.” Fortunately, I found the film migrated to YouTube, though split in two parts. Some information that should have caught our attention in 2008 deserves noting now, and we can update and add new links.)
It’s largely forgotten now, especially in history texts in high schools. After the Spanish-American War, when the U.S. wrested several territories from Spain, including Guam, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines, the U.S. quickly got mired in one of the original guerrilla wars in the Philippines. It took 15 years, but the U.S. finally put down the rebellion — 15 brutal, bloody years. The conduct of that war shocked many people, including Mark Twain.
This piece was written partly in response to that war.
Many Americans, like Twain, who questioned the war, in turn had their patriotism questioned. Why wouldn’t they get on board with the war, and kill off those Filipino rebels? the critics asked.
Why didn’t I notice this in 2008? The film is narrated by Peter Coyote. Poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti plays the minister. Erik Bauersfeld plays the Stranger.
From the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF), a six-minute film commemorating Latino contributions to America, with a Latin version of the “Star-spangled Banner” performed by the Rondstadt Generation.
Can anyone identify the Medal of Honor winner pictured?
Information on the film from MALDEF (links to general information added; specific links from MALDEF):
When MALDEF announced its lawsuit against Arizona’s anti-immigrant SB1070 at the state capitol in Phoenix, President and General Counsel Thomas A. Saenz took with him an iconic delegation of Latino leaders, renowned as symbols of American perseverance, including Dolores Huerta, Arizona native Richard E. Chavez (brother of Cesar E. Chavez), and legendary recording artist, Linda Ronstadt. These leaders’ contributions to American progress stood in stark contrast to the anti-Latino environment in Arizona; and it was out of that contradiction that MALDEF was inspired to develop “America, Our Home,” a project to set the record straight and celebrate the Latino legacy in the United States. MALDEF staff works relentlessly each day to spread this message, but MALDEF needs your support to ensure that that message reaches every American in every state and municipality across the country.
MALDEF’s compelling short film featuring The Star Spangled Banner from a new collection of American patriotic songs recorded in Mexican musical styles by the group Ronstadt Generations, also titled “America, Our Home.” The film is directed by Edgar Pablos and features the photography of George Rodríguez, well-known for photographing key moments in the Chicano Civil Rights Movement.
It’s Labor Day 2011 in the United States, a federal holiday, and one of those days Americans are urged to fly the U.S. flag.
“Free Labor Will Win,” the poster said, encouraging a theme important during World War II, when unions were encouraged to avoid strikes or any action that might interrupt work to build the “arsenal of democracy” believed necessary to win the war. Labor complied, the war was won, and organized labor was the stronger for it. In 2012, some have difficulty remembering when all Americans knew that our future rides on the backs of organized labor.
The poster was issued by the Office of War Information in 1942, in full color. A black-and-white version at the Library of Congress provides a few details for the time:
Labor Day poster. Labor Day poster distributed to war plants and labor organizations. The original is twenty-eight and one-half inches by forty inches and is printed in full color. It was designed by the Office of War Information (OWI) from a photograph especially arranged by Anton Bruehl, well-known photographer. Copies may be obtained by writing the Distribution Section, Office of War Information [alas, you can't get a copy from the Office of War Information in 2012]
Even down here in deepest, darkest-right-to-work Texas, patriots fly their flags to honor Labor today. It’s heartening.
Flags fly all around in 1882 at the first Labor Day Parade in New York City’s Union Square; lithograph from USC’s Dornsife History Center, via Wikipedia, artist unidentified
Listen to him: This is why conservatives fear Van Jones. He speaks clearly, simply, and he’s right.
Are you a patriot?
“Who is fighting harder for liberty and justice for all than the progressives? We’re the ones fighting for that. Who is fighting, not just singing ‘America the Beautiful,’ who is defending America’s beauty from the oil spillers, from the clear cutters, from the mountain-top removers. That’s progressives. Who is honoring the Statue of Liberty when the statue says ‘Give me your tired, give me your poor, give me your huddled masses.’ You can’t be an anti-immigrant bigot and a patriot at the same time. Who are these people to claim that they’re patriots and we are not?” (From The War Room, on Current)
Fourth of July: NPR has already read the Declaration of Independence, PBS is ready to broadcast the Capitol Fourth concert (maybe a rebroadcast is available, if you’re off at your own town’s fireworks — check your local listings), your town has a parade somewhere this weekend, or a neighboring community does, and fireworks are everywhere.
Remember to put your flag up today.
Last flag on the Moon: Astronaut Eugene Cernan and the U.S. Flag — Apollo 17 on the Moon (NASA photo)
This is mostly an encore post, but I so love that photo of the flag with the Earth in the distance.
Happy birthday, Kathryn!
Tip of the old scrub brush to Thomas Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, Robert Livingston, and the cast of thousands of patriots including George Washington.
Every kid should learn this stuff by third grade, but it’s clear from what we see that they don’t.
Flag flying at the eastern front of the U.S. Capitol. Library of Congress photo
So here’s a quick review of dos and don’ts for display and behavior toward the U.S. flag on this most flag-worthy of days, the 4th of July. With a few comments.
1. Fly your flag, from sunup to sundown. If you’re lucky enough to have a flagpole, run the flag up quickly. Retire it slowly at sunset. Then go see fireworks.
2. Display flags appropriately, if not flown from a staff. If suspended from a building or a wall, remember the blue field of stars should always be on the right — the “northwest corner” as you look at it. Do not display a flag flat.
3. Salute the flag as it opens the 4th of July parade. In a better world, there would be just one U.S. flag at the opening of the parade, and the entire crowd would rise as it passes them in a great patriotic, emotional wave — civilians with their hands over their hearts, hats off; people in uniform saluting appropriately with hats on. It’s likely that your local parade will not be so crisp. Other entries in the parade will have flags, and many will be displayed inappropriately. A true patriot might rise and salute each one — but that would look silly, perhaps even sillier than those sunshine patriots who display the flag inappropriately. Send them a nice letter this year, correcting their behavior. But don’t be obnoxious about it.
4. Do not display the flag from a car antenna, attached to a window of a car, or attached in the back of a truck. That’s against the Flag Code, which says a flag can only be displayed attached to the right front fender of a car, usually with a special attachment. This means that a lot of the National Guard entries in local parades will be wrongly done, according to the flag code. They defend the flag, and we should not make pests of ourselves about it. Write them a letter commending their patriotism. Enclose the Flag Code, and ask them to stick to it next time. Innocent children are watching.
5. Do not dishonor the flag by abusing it or throwing it on the ground. It’s become popular for a local merchant to buy a lot of little plastic flags and pass them out to parade goers. If there is an advertisement on the flag, that is another violation of the Flag Code. The flag should not be used for such commercial purposes. I have, several times, found piles of these flags on the ground, dumped by tired people who were passing them out, or dumped by parade goers who didn’t want to carry the things home. It doesn’t matter if it’s printed on cheap plastic, and made in China — it is our nation’s flag anyway. Honor it. If it is worn, dispose of it soberly, solemnly, and properly.
That’s probably enough for today. When the Flag Desecration Amendment passes — if it ever does — those parade float makers, National Guard soldiers, and merchants, can all be jailed, perhaps. Or punished in other ways. And wouldn’t that be silly and unproductive?
Until that time, our best hope is to review the rules, obey them, and set examples for others.
Have a wonderful 4th of July! Fly the flag. Read the Declaration of Independence out loud. Love your family, hug them, and feed them well. That’s part of the Pursuit of Happiness that this day honors. It is your right, your unalienable right. Use it wisely, often and well.
At some small risk of sacrificing the G rating of this blog, I offer this little scene from HBO’s “Newsroom,” a program I can’t see because our cable company is not customer-oriented (but we take it for the bundled internet package). From this small snippet, I would say HBO is again showing how a cable program aimed at adult minds can achieve high quality, if not greatness. Aaron Sorkin created and writes the thing, and Jeff Daniels stars as the television news guy. This scene will give every patriotic American something to think about.
Something to think about, sure.
It’s not a question, or should not be a question, of whether one “believes in” American exceptionalism. It is a question of whether we understand that what makes America exceptional is the people who work to make things better, the people who work to make change — and that exceptionalism slips from our mantle, and from our grasp, if we don’t work to keep it.
I’m also reminded of the two posters somebody put out that showed up in every speech department in every college in America when I was a speech graduate student. They were based loosely on Plutarch‘s Lives, the book comparing biographies of great Romans and great Greeks, and the section that compared the two great orators, the later Roman, Cicero and the earlier Greek, Demosthenes.
One poster said, “When Cicero spoke, the people said how well he spoke.”
The second said, “When Demosthenes spoke, the people said ‘Let us march!‘”
Are you ready to march? November’s election day comes sooner than we anticipate.
140th US Flag Day poster. 1777-1917. The birthday of the stars and stripes, June 14th, 1917. ‘Tis the Star Spangled Banner, oh, long may it wave, o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!” Library of Congress description: “Poster showing a man raising the American flag, with a Minuteman cheering and an eagle flying above.” – Wikipedia
1777-1917: The 140th flag day. The birthday of the stars and stripes, June 14th, 1917. The text continues: ‘Tis the Star Spangled Banner, oh, long may it wave, o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave! President Woodrow Wilson remarked, “this flag, which we honor and under which we serve, is the emblem of our unity, our power, our thought and purpose as a nation. Though silent, it speaks to us of the past, of the men and women who went before us, and of the records they wrote upon it.”
MEDIUM: 1 print (poster) : lithograph, color ; 101 x 65 cm.
CREATED/PUBLISHED: 1917.
NOTES: Forms part of: Willard and Dorothy Straight Collection.
Who was the artist? Who ordered the printing, and for what specific purpose? Anyone know?
Financed and produced by the United States War Department, and shot at the Warners [Bros.] studio, although it was distributed through all of the major studios’ film exchanges and also by National Screen Services free to the theatre exhibitors: A young, healthy American Free Mason is taken in by the message of a soap-box orator who asserts that all good jobs in the United States are being taken by the so-called minorities, domestic and foreign. He falls into a conversation with a refugee professor who tells him of the pattern of events that brought Hitler to power in Germany and how Germany’s anti-democratic groups split the country into helpless minorities, each hating the other. The professor concludes by pointing out that America is composed of many minorities, but all are united as Americans. (Reissued in 1946 following the end of World War II.) (Written by Les Adams)
From the Department of Defense in 1943 and 1946, “Don’t Be a Sucker,” about 18 minutes:
(This is almost completely an encore post — one that should get more circulation. From four years ago, in 2007. I have not updated years or ages — sharpen your math skills, and do it as you go.)
Some people can’t let go of the past, and like the greedy chimpanzee who grasps the rice in the jar, and then is trapped when he cannot pull out his fist nor will he give up his prize to save his freedom, they trap themselves out of a good life.
Cover of 1996 album of songs, "Pete." Seeger, born May 3, 1919, is 88 years old now.
Some of the more astute students in our high school classes ask questions about everything. For example, they ask: “What does the Pledge of Allegiance mean, when it says, ‘ . . . and to the Republic for which it stands?’”
Is the Pledge all that important? Is the flag all that important?
Maybe. How would you answer that question, really?
Penn and Teller offer a demonstration:
What do you think? Did they burn a flag? Should that sort of performance be legal?
What if Penn and Teller burned a flag in the White House?
An exercise in ambiguity: A fictional drama about a sleight of hand, illusionary performance. (Best line: The answer to the question, “Did you go to law school?” For the record, yes, I did go to law school. I’m an amateur clown.)
@exLMWaters @markknoller Waters, do you have a U.S. senator? A congressman? Call them, today. Seriously. If that doesn't work, write me.Splashed: 1 hour ago
RT @BiIIMurray: Will someone please love Taylor Swift so she'll be quiet.Splashed: 1 hour ago
RT @BiIIMurray: Common sense is so rare that it should be classified as a super power.Splashed: 1 hour ago
RT @BiIIMurray: It would be hilarious to release a gorilla in a gorilla suit at the mall, and see the look on security's face when they pul…Splashed: 1 hour ago
RT @PhDRaptor: What if aliens have been trying to contact us through the Internet
But the "are you human" filters keep stopping them?Splashed: 1 hour ago
We've been soaking in the Bathtub for several months, long enough that some of the links we've used have gone to the Great Internet in the Sky.
If you find a dead link, please leave a comment to that post, and tell us what link has expired.
Thanks!
Posted by Ed Darrell 
.jpg "Astronaut Eugene Cernan and the U.S. Flag -- Apollo 17 on the Moon (NASA photo)")
