National Ostrich Day

It’s kind of hard to honor our nation’s founding.

Maybe we should call it “National Ostrich Day.”

I have a vision of a million people all gathered in one place, without protective masks and no social distancing, and all with empty smiles and vacant eyes as they pray for a country that is good and honorable, in their definition.

And they remove their heads from deep in the sand so that they can march on like robots or zombies in a hurry to make it home to take the drugs in their silos that will keep them forever entranced and without a morsel of courage and morality and not an inkling of the ending that is very nearly upon us and is looking us all straight in the eyes.

And leading the throngs of the ostriches is the nation’s ostrich in chief, whose disciples want him enshrined in granite for all of history alongside the legends, presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt.

And our leader speaks at Mount Rushmore to unwavering, unquestioning followers who wear no protective masks and crowd together in the face of warnings about social distancing and dare anyone to prove them wrong. And there is nary a word about the pandemic crushing our country, with more than 100,000 dead and still counting.

And there is not a syllable about the growing national movement of African Americans and honorable white people who want to stop the killings of unarmed black men and women and end white privilege in the name of our founding principles.

The soaring unemployment gripping the nation merits not even a breath from the president.

Instead, his tirade is about the “merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our children.”

Is there an explanation from the president about why African Americans and good Americans everywhere should be inflamed over statues that deify leaders who fought to keep the black man in chains or statues of honor to explorers who committed genocide against the native Americans?

No, not one word to urge Americans to listen to one another and to face the huge problems that threaten to topple the country. Instead, the president demonizes anyone who finds fault with the current state of the nation or for that matter, with him. No soothing words of peace and understanding from this faux leader.

“Angry mobs are trying to tear down statues of our Founders, deface our most sacred memorials, and unleash a wave of violent crime in our cities,” he said. “This attack on our liberty, our magnificent liberty, must be stopped, and it will be stopped very quickly. We will expose this dangerous movement, protect our nation’s children, end this radical assault, and preserve our beloved American way of life.”

And on and on he goes, while the girlfriend of the president’s son and members of the vice president’s Secret Service detachment test positive for COVID 19.

“The violent mayhem we have seen in the streets of cities that are run by liberal Democrats, in every case, is the predictable result of years of extreme indoctrination and bias in education, journalism, and other cultural institutions,” the leader intoned. “The radical ideology attacking our country advances under the banner of social justice. But in truth, it would demolish both justice and society.”

And he ends his speech with angry words that challenge anyone who has a different world view while claiming that he represents the values of America.

“They want to silence us, but we will not be silenced,” he said. “Here tonight, before the eyes of our forefathers, Americans declare again, as we did 244 years ago: that we will not be tyrannized, we will not be demeaned, and we will not be intimidated by bad, evil people. It will not happen.”

The ostriches are those people who are in a patriotic rage and vehemently oppose wearing protective masks because it infringes on their liberty.

They are the people who for the life of them, cannot understand and will not tolerate any national recognition of Juneteenth. The day commemorates the June 19, 1865, day when the Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas, with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free.

They are the white people with the best of intentions who cannot fathom why it is “Black Lives Matter” and not “All Lives Matter” and call for equality and understanding after the Army beats down the left wing, traitorous protestors and rioters.

They are all of those people who are inflamed and morally indignant that it should even be suggested that the African-American national anthem be sung along with the American national anthem before NFL football games.

How terribly offensive. Decide for yourself on the anthem that was penned in 1900 and titled “Lift Every Voice and Sing” with words by James Weldon Johnson and music by John Rosamond Johnson. It goes:

“Lift every voice and sing, till earth and heaven ring,

Ring with the harmonies of liberty;

Let our rejoicing rise, high as the listening skies,

Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.

Sing a song full of faith that the dark past has taught us,

Sing a song full of hope that the present has brought us;

Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,

Let us march on till victory won.

Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod,

Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;

Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet,

Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?

We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,

We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered;

Out from the gloomy past, till now we stand at last

Where the white gleam of our star is cast.

God of our weary years, God of our silent tears,

Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;

Thou who hast by Thy might, led us into the light,

Keep us forever in the path, we pray.

Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee,

Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee.

Shadowed beneath Thy hand, may we forever stand,

True to our God, true to our native land.”

Pretty offensive? Huh?

And for the many who never knew that Francis Scott Key’s 1931 anthem was more than one verse, here it is in its militant, violent entirety:

“Oh, say can you see by the dawn’s early light

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,

O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?

And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

“On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,

Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,

What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,

As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?

Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,

In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:

’Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

“And where is that band who so vauntingly swore

That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,

A home and a country should leave us no more!

Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave

From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:

And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

“Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,

And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!”

On Ostrich Day we honor every American’s right and duty to bury his or her head in the sand and ignore the signs that our great republic is crumbling under the weight of its own lies.

Maybe it is time for a new national anthem that reflects unity, courage, pride, scenic beauty, progress, peace, cultural and biological diversity, and respect, coincidentally the foundation of the national anthem of that world power, Nepal.

The national anthem of Nepal was written by the poet Pradeep Kumar Rai, also known as Byakul Maila, with music by Amber Gurung.

“Woven from hundreds of flowers, we are one garland that’s Nepali

Spread sovereign from Mechi to Mahakali.

A shawl of nature’s wealth unending

From the blood of the braves, a nation free and non- moving.

A land of knowledge, of peace, the plains, hills and mountains tall

Indivisible, this beloved land of ours, our motherland Nepal.

Of many races, languages, religions, and cultures of incredible sprawl

This progressive nation of ours, all hail Nepal!”

A recent BBC poll noted the top national anthems from around the world. The Star Spangled Banner was not on the list.

“O Canada,” the Canadian anthem, made the cut and reads:

“O Canada!

Our home and native land!

True patriot love in all of us command.

With glowing hearts we see thee rise,

The True North strong and free!

From far and wide,

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

God keep our land glorious and free!

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.”

Maybe a new anthem could be patterned after the beautiful ode, “Hymn to the United Nations, written in 1971 by Pablo Casals with lyrics by W.H. Auden.

“Eagerly, musician.

Sweep your string,

So we may sing.

Elated, optative,

Our several voices

Interblending,

Playfully contending,

Not interfering

But co-inhering,

For all within

The cincture

of the sound,

Is holy ground

Where all are brothers,

None faceless Others,

Let mortals beware

Of words, for

With words we lie,

Can say peace

When we mean war,

Foul thought speak- fair

And promise falsely,

But song is true:

Let music for peace

Be the paradigm,

For peace means to change

At the right time,

as the World-Clock

Goes Tick- and Tock.

So may the story

Of our human city

Presently move

Like music, when

Begotten notes

New notes beget

Making the flowing

Of time a growing

Till what it could be,

At last it is,

Where even sadness

Is a form of gladness,

Where fate is freedom,

Grace and Surprise.”

For pure poetry and beauty, read the national anthem of the proud, island country, Cape Verde, “Chant of Liberty.”

“Sing, brother

Sing, my brother

For Liberty is a hymn

And Man the certainty.

With dignity, bury

The seed

In the dust of the naked island

At the escarpment of life

Hope is as big as

The sea

Which embraces us

Sentinel of the oceans and winds

Persevering

Between the stars and the Atlantic

Intone the Chant of Liberty.

Sing, brother

Sing, my brother

For Liberty is a hymn

And Man the certainty.”

Yes it is way past the time to reexamine the United States.