Phony Patriots

I live in a deep blue state – CA. However, I also live in a very conservative part of the state – Simi Valley, home of the Ronald Raygun Presidential Library & Geegaw Emporium. Since the gen election I’ve noticed lots of households flying the Stars & Stripes 24/7. Most of these households don’t bother to illuminate the flag when it’s dark, and many of them are quite torn and tattered.

For most of my 74 years as a natural born American citizen, the only places that flew the flag every day were police & fire departments, schools, governmental offices, and military installations. Private homes only flew them on special occasions, e.g. July 4th, flag day, veteran’s day, and maybe a couple more I can’t recall at the moment.

I found one site that recommends flying the flag 22 days of the year, but I find it suspect as three of those days are Easter, Columbus Day, and Christmas day. Regardless, 22 days is but a small fraction (6% to be exact) of the year. Every day is <checks statistic> pretty close to All. The. Fucking. Time!!

I’m willing to bet just about every one (if not all) of these flag flying households are Trump/Elder supporters. I’ve also noticed a growth in the number of households that have installed flagpoles, set in concrete into the ground. These are permanent installations, most of which did not exist this time of year in 2020. Thankfully, it’s still a small percentage of all the houses in this city, but it’s still a bit disconcerting to see jingoism so ascendant and blatantly “waved” in our faces. OTOH, I suppose I should be grateful the fascists and traitors in this country are self-identifying.