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Of course, the political principles he was talking about were things like representative government (which we don't really have, thanks to our electoral system), trial by jury (tell it to Jose Padilla), and a strict separation between church and state, a separation which seems more than a little threatened after the events of last week. For those who missed the American media frenzy, or those reading this at some point in the future and wondering what I'm talking about: on Wednesday the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that the Pledge of Allegiance, which American children are instructed to recite in public schools — "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" — was unconstitutional, because it meant that students who did not believe in God were left with an unacceptable choice between reciting something they believed to be a falsehood and actively protesting (which is a bit much to ask of a seven-year-old in the face of an angry adult teacher.) It was a wonderful, heroic ruling, a victory for everyone who's ever been browbeaten for refusing to pay lip service to the deity of someone else's religion. And the country went, as they say, apeshit. The Senate voted unanimously to condemn the ruling (and to get back to that representative government thing — the ruling may have been unpopular among the public, but I can guarantee that it was supported by more than 1%. So much for a legislature that reflects the people.) Amendments to insert God into the Constitution (currently bereft of such references, a deliberate move by the deist framers) were bandied about. Pundits hysterically punded it for days. And George W. Bush accused the court of being "out of step."
Interesting phrase, "out of step," given the regimes notorious for keeping everyone quite literally in step. And it's worth noting that a big part of the purpose of government is to forestall the tyranny of the majority. (Mr. Lieberman, you who were so quick to call for an amendment: realize that the majority would vote to put not just God but Jesus into the Constitution.) But that said... yeah. Times like these do make me wonder what I'm doing in this country. It's certainly not because of allegiance. In fact, my problem with the Pledge of Allegiance is threefold: first, there's the religion thing; second, there's the matter of pledging to a symbol, a gaudy piece of cloth (and, c'mon, no matter how patriotic an American you may be, you have to admit that the US flag is ugly — it's garish, it's overly busy, it's missing even a single line of symmetry); and third and most importantly, I don't really believe in the whole concept of allegiance. Allegiance is "my country, right or wrong," and I think that supporting a country when it's in the wrong is, well, wrong.
Note that allegiance is not the same as love. If your kid has just, I dunno, robbed a bank or something, love is what has you visiting the jail to offer emotional support and testifying as a character witness in hopes of a lighter sentence. But allegiance, well, allegiance means you're driving the getaway car. Loyalty only makes sense in the context of conflict. Every recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance — well, let me back up. After all, the Pledge of Allegiance is in theory supposed to instill kids with patriotism, but I suspect that most kids who say it are just parroting the syllables. I certainly learned it phonetically, back in preschool, and even after I learned that it wasn't "plejaleejence," for years I began "I pledge of allegiance..." without it even occurring to me that that made no grammatical sense, since to me it was just an incantation, no more meaningful than the Arabic prayers I also learned phonetically. But say I'm atypical. Every recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, for those who understand it, drives home the idea that you have to choose a side. Against whom? When the Pledge was initially formulated, the scars of the Civil War were still fresh: are you loyal to the USA or are you still, deep down, a secessionist? (Hence the emphasis on "indivisible.") Later on, it was a Cold War thing (hence "under God," added in 1954 to highlight the difference between us and the godless commies.) And now? If I'm picking America as my side, who's the other? Al-Qaeda? The so-called Axis of Evil? Judging from last week's rhetoric, the answer might well be closer to home. Because from my vantage point, it looks an awful lot like the battle lines being drawn are between the portion of the nation which is Under God and that portion which isn't; and by extension, between those who are Loyal Americans and those who would dare to criticize the country or its current regime in any way.
So if I'm not an American, what am I? I've often wondered where I might flee to if ever the cultural climate turned so scary that I felt compelled to leave. I like Vancouver enough that I'd consider getting a summer home there if ever my bank balance were to crawl back above three digits, but I doubt I could become a Canadian citizen (or an Australian one, enamored as I am with Instant Runoff Voting and the Italian food in Melbourne) so long as I have to pledge to become a faithful subject of the Queen of England to do so. I mean, if I find "In God We Trust" an offensive motto to put on American coins (and I do) then how could I ever switch to the doubly offensive "God Save the Queen" given that I believe that deities do not exist and that monarchs should not, figureheads though they may be? Proper republics like France are more tempting in that regard (and their attitude toward sexuality is a dramatic contrast to the puritanical hysteria prevalent here) but, well, I ain't French. European nations may be de facto multiethnic states these days, but they're still basically homelands for particular groups. The more I think about it, the longer my list of requirements becomes. I couldn't stand to live in a culture that wasn't heterosocial, with boys and girls raised as equals who interact with one another a lot; nor in one big on honor and protocol and face-saving and whatnot; nor in one where everyone smokes; this list could get arbitrarily long.
But what if instead of one nation, indivisible, we had multiple nations, quite divisible? What would the USA look like if the South had won the Civil War and left the country several states smaller? What sort of civil rights legislation could we have passed well before the 1960s without the South to block it? What sorts of presidents might we have elected if they didn't have to appeal to the southern states to win the White House? Yes, I realize that practically speaking, this could probably never have worked — the US would have fought war after war to reabsorb the confederate states, or there would have been a mellowing of relations and an eventual reunification, or something — but still, I can't help but fantasize about letting those who seem to want to turn this country into the Christian States of America have their own chunk of the continent so that I can live somewhere else.
In the end, though — and here's where we get one of those nifty "full circle" dealies the kids are so crazy about — this is only part of the picture. When I think about where I might ideally like to live, a secular nation with progressive politics is no good if they don't have good burritos there. And a good slice of pizza, and warm winters and dry summers, and air that smells right and topography that looks right... in short, homeland. Maybe one reason I don't believe in America is that I've lived many places within it, and yet in the Midwest, in the South, in the Northwest, in New York City, in New England, in places I couldn't stand and in places I quite enjoyed, I've felt like an expatriate. I wouldn't pledge allegiance to it, and if I were to move back to California I imagine I'd probably move on again at some point, but the flag of my homeland doesn't have stars and stripes on it. It has one of each. And a bear.
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