A growing number of local television stations across the country are reviving an older practice of broadcasting our national anthem once a day, pairing it with all-American imagery that further celebrates our nation.
Gray and Nexstar executives [two of the companies whose stations have revived broadcasting our anthem] said the reason to bring back the anthem was simple: encouraging national unity at a time of deep division in the country[.]
The stations broadcast our anthem in the wee hours of the morning, reminiscent of how our stations used to sign off for the night around midnight, broadcasting our anthem and showing imagery as part of the sign-off.
The New York Times disagrees; it says this is a divisive thing to do; it divides Blue America from Red America. That’s the message of their Julia Jacobs in her column last week.
The decision to revive the anthem tradition comes at a time when overt allegiance to “The Star-Spangled Banner” has become one of the lines that separate blue and red America[.]
The NYT isn’t alone. Here’s a University of Michigan music professor, Mark Clague:
It is somewhat provocative to bring the anthem to the fore in a new way at a moment of tension in this country[.]
Divisive, provocative to play our national anthem, to celebrate our great nation. Wow.
This piece was published a week ago, and still not a single Progressive-Democratic Party Presidential or Congressional candidate has objected to the NYT‘s, or to Jacobs’ (or Clague’s), claim that playing our national anthem is bad.
That’s highly instructive, and it should inform our voting decisions in a year.
