Well, I won't be watching National Football League action, that's for sure.
It's all because the owners of the league's 32 clubs have decided to ban kneeling during the singing/playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
Players must now stand during Francis Scott Key's claim to fame...or risk getting fined.
The only other option for the NFL's athletes: Stay in the locker room until the song's finished.
I remember all the letters that appeared in the Omaha World-Herald during the 2017 NFL campaign...letters that asked those protesting football players to air their grievances "on their own time" rather than in front of stadiums full of people (as well as in front of millions of TV viewers).
Well, those Americans who gave their newspapers such letters have now gotten what they've been on their own knees begging for.
And it probably won't take long before some of those same letter writers attack any NFL players who actually use "their own time" to address issues such as police brutality.
In time for last Wednesday's Washington Post, Shaun R. Harper (a professor at USC who runs the school's Race and Equity Center) turned in a heck of an editorial about the circuit's new kneeling ban.
Harper talked about how the new edict is all about ethnicity.
Out of over 1,700 NFL players who suited up last season, 70% are Black. Seven of the teams had African Americans as their head coaches.
Every last squad in the league is owned by White people.
And starting with head honcho Roger Goodell, most of the people who make up the power structure at NFL headquarters in New York City are Caucasian Americans.
Add it all up.
Harper did just that, talking about how the kneeling ban signals that the team owners don't give a good, good hoot about fighting racism in America. In addition, he stated that "the league is only interested in Black men as laborers and entertainers, not as citizens with the right to use their influence to awaken our nation's racial consciousness, disrupt racism, and improve circumstances for members of their communities who are harmed by racist policies and practices."
The key word is "citizens."
Later on in that editorial, Harper (he's written a dozen books; his most famous one: "Scandals in College Sports") called on NFL players to sue the league over its efforts to hold back gridders' freedom of expression (we're talking First Amendment rights, you know!).
SRH also talked about how he joined many other African-American football lovers in boycotting last year's NFL contests to show solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and other activist players.
Shaun, I'm a year late to the "party," but here I am.
I'll continue to read about the games in the paper and online.
I just won't watch the games on TV anymore...until the Jerry Joneses and Daniel Snyders lift that stupid kneeling ban and stop cozying up to a man who wanted one of those NFL teams earlier in this decade.
That's right...Donald John Trump.
Even if Trump and his enablers/supporters don't really get it, patriotism involves more than standing at attention when you hear, as George Carlin put it, the world's only national anthem that mentions rockets and bombs.
Much more.
Just got a few thoughts rolling in my mind right now...so, here goes:
*Quite a few people who've been sending letters to the Omaha World-Herald to protest the NFL players who are taking a knee during the playing/singing of "The Star-Spangled Banner" have been asking those athletes to protest "on their own time." (Maybe such letters have also shown up in your city's newspaper or newspapers, too.)
Say those NFLers went on to confine their grievances over America's longstanding history of injustice to "their own time."
Once the word got out, how do you think the people attacking the NFL players following in Colin Kaepernick's footsteps would react?
I'll bet you the same way they are right now.
*One of the biggest myths out there in sports is that today's NFL players don't get involved in their communities.
You'd be surprised to find that many (if not most) of the players on the league's 32 teams are involved, in some way or another, in community work...be it through foundations or through some other kind of charitable work.
*I read yesterday that NBC's and MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell blew out 71 candles.
And I still can't help but think about Mitchell's role (as well as that of so many other Big Media journalists) in handing the Big Prize to a man who, from 2004 to 2015, hosted NBC's most famous stunt show (okay, reality show).
Last year, as Donald Trump sought the Big Prize, viewers of the news programs Mitchell appeared on (as host or as a guest) got the impression that the New Rochelle, NY native didn't "want to cover the Clintons anymore."
Well now, special prosecutor (and former FBI director) Robert Mueller is spearheading an investigation of the Trump-Putin connection that- let's face it- helped take 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue out of the Democratic Party's grip.
Heads are rolling right now...especially that of Trump's first campaign manager, Paul Manafort.
With that in mind, does the birthday dinner Mitchell enjoyed yesterday leave a bad taste in her mouth now?
Speaking of taste...hope you're enjoying today's Halloween candy! See you later!
"Wouldn't you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, 'Get that son of a b***h off the field right now. Out! He's fired. He's fired!'"
-Donald Trump at a recent special-election rally in Alabama
With Puerto Rico in a gigantic mess because of Hurricane Maria, among other huge issues, the head of the American people finds it more important to denigrate National Football League players who've taken a knee during the singing/playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner" to protest bigotry, racism, and police brutality right here on these shores.
Vintage Trump.
YECCH!
Trump was in the Heart of Dixie on 9-23-2017 to help Luther Strange, the Republican who inherited- and is trying to keep- the US Senate seat that Jeff Sessions gave up to become this country's attorney general (or top shyster, now that Sessions has the top spot in the Justice Department).
All the former host of NBC's The Apprentice did was unleash the biggest day of protest in NFL history.
19 of the league's 32 squads participated in protests of some kind or another; in total, 200 players took a knee or sat down during what the late George Carlin called the world's only national anthem that mentions rockets and bombs.
And three entire teams- including the Pittsburgh Steelers- wouldn't even come out of the locker room for our national tune.
This time, some team owners (one of them was Washington's Daniel Snyder) joined those protesting players in solidarity.
Now if one- just one- of those team magnates would just sign the man who brought taking a knee during Francis Scott Key's claim to fame to football...
Right now, a lot of those teams are off to terrible starts on the gridiron. Week 3 of the 2017 NFL campaign is in the books, and the Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, New York Giants (a playoff team last season), San Francisco 49ers, and Los Angeles Chargers [yep...they moved back to Tinseltown (their 1960 home as one of eight original American Football League teams) after spending the 1961-2016 period in San Diego] are still winless.
Seven more- the New York Jets, Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Chicago Bears, New Orleans Saints, Arizona Cardinals, and Seattle Seahawks (another 2016 playoff squad)- are 1-2-0 right now.
Maybe one of them could use a Colin Kaepernick...even as a second-stringer or third-stringer, if not as a starter.
All the former University of Nevada star was doing, starting with the NFL's 2016 preseason, was calling attention to racism and police brutality here in these fifty states.
He wasn't disrespecting the national anthem or the flag the song praises.
And the Constitution's First Amendment guarantees Kaepernick and America's other 321 million citizens the same right to take a knee, sit down, sprawl on the floor, etc., etc. to protest injustice.
Check this out:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech (emphasis mine), or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
If you've got a copy of the 2017 World Almanac and Book of Facts, crack open Page 511. You'll find the above paragraph.
Maybe that'd be something Trump can somehow get up the courage to do.
Oh, by the way, football isn't the only sport where players at any level you can name are taking knees in protest.
This past weekend, Bruce Maxwell of baseball's Oakland A's became that sport's first player to protest by kneeling during "The Star-Spangled Banner."
If Trump and other Republicans found out about Maxwell's feat, how would they react?
How about you?
If kneeling while someone sings his or her heart out prior to the beginning of a sports event doesn't cut it for you, what's a better way to protest injustice from sea to shining sea (and then some)?
Last year, I set foot in the state of Texas for the first time in my life (the occasion was our family's first reunion in nine years). To get to America's Lone Star State, I traveled in a plane for the first time in ten years.
The reunion took place on Labor Day weekend in the Dallas/Fort Worth/Arlington area. And in between the hassles of getting in and out of both Omaha's Eppley Airfield and one of the world's biggest airports (Dallas-Fort Worth International), I did have a good time.
*Well, this week, the Metroplex opened up a new amusement park (see the pictures above).
I've got to be honest with you: If I get a chance to go back to North Texas, and I want to go to an amusement park (and I mean a REAL amusement park), it's going to be Six Flags. (Correct me if Six Flags over Texas changed its name in recent years.)
*Speaking of plane travel...I understand that, for the first time since enacting it earlier this year, Congress decided to back off a taste on upholding its sequester.
Today, after the Senate took action, the House voted to get many of the air traffic controllers off the furlough the sequester brought on.
The whole point was to help out all those frequent fliers and all those business travelers.
It's fine that today's Republican-led House wants to put a stop to (or at least a crimp in) all those flight delays and cancellations. Restoring jobs to those air traffic controllers is great.
It's too bad those same US representatives don't have the guts to restore the money that keeps programs like Head Start and Meals on Wheels available to all who NEED those programs.
*And speaking of guts...I'm still incensed at the 46 US senators who showed they wouldn't stand up to the National Rifle Association.
Some (if not all) of those 46 cowards (that's right, cowards) got on TV, radio, and/or this here World Wide Web to explain just why they wouldn't stand for background checks- the measures that would've made sure buying a gun here in America is no longer as easy as buying a carton of cigarettes.
No telling how many of those chickenhearts (oops, I mean senators) told reporters "It wasn't an easy vote."
No telling how many of them cited the Second Amendment.
I mean, background checks were the very least of the demands gun-control advocates have wanted all this time. We keep hearing that nine out of every ten Americans who answer opinion polls have come out in favor of those background checks.
Both of Nebraska's US senators (that's right, Republicans Mike Johanns and Deb Fischer) played chicken on background checks.
If you don't want as little as to put a background check between someone and his or her wanting to buy a "shootin' arn," then you're in favor of keeping the gun violence going. It's as simple as that.
*On something just a little bit lighter...after some details have come out this week, I'm not as excited about the upcoming College Football Playoff system as I would've liked to be.
And it's all because it'll be run by the same people who cooked up the BCS nonsense: The commissioners of the now five wealthiest Division 1-A football-playing conferences (Atlantic Coast, Big Ten, Big 12, Pacific-12, and Southeastern).
I'd have preferred to see the NCAA take it over...but we keep hearing that there's no longer any real leadership in that governing body.
Got the feeling that the commissioners will rely on the USA Today and Harris Interactive polls (and maybe the Associated Press poll will be a deciding factor here, too, a la the past).
And if that's going to be the case...instead of each league's champion qualifying for the playoffs, get ready for things to get to the point where all four of the playoff clubs will be from the SEC.
One more, and I'm going to wrap it up:
*Lots and lots of sports reporters and sports talk-show hosts have been worried about this year's NFL draft; the consensus feeling is that the 2013 selection process just doesn't have the glamor that last year's did.
It's time for the media people to calm down.
More 2013 NFL draftees are going to turn out to have great playing careers than any of us might think. (Yeah...I know: How often do you get a situation in which an Andrew Luck, a Robert Griffin III, and a Russell Wilson come out of college at the end of the same academic year?)
Far as I'm concerned, all this media fear about this year's National Football League draft manifested itself in (1) a USA Today article about the biggest busts in the draft's history and (2) an ESPN report looking back on the 1983 NFL draft...the one that produced Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterbacks John Elway and Dan Marino.
Don't feel disappointed that the Kansas City Chiefs went with offensive lineman Eric Fisher as their top draft pick- the NFL's first choice here in 2013.
And don't automatically label Geno Smith a failure.
Let's just see what happens.
One thing that's happening is: My time is up.
Thanks for reading "Boston's Blog!"
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