There\u2019s no question that President Trump tossed a live grenade into the NFL\u2019s locker room during his Alabama speech the other night and it has set off countless secondary explosions throughout the league and across the media spectrum. Annoyingly there is endless jabbering by pundits about the sacredness of an American right of free speech which has, in fact, never existed. If you think your boss can\u2019t fire you for saying or doing anything he finds offensive, then you need a lesson in life, cupcake. Just try it. My wife lost her job as a legal assistant at a very Democrat law firm because she dared to park our SUV, bearing my \u201cNot Fonda Kerry\u201d bumper stickers, in the firm\u2019s very Kerry parking garage. <\/p>\n
The only guarantee of free speech Americans have is their constitutionally warranted protection against government suppression of freedom of self-expression. Note that government because that is the critical term in this NFL brouhaha as President Trump well knows and well-expressed with his, \u201cFire the son of a bitch,\u201d exhortation to NFL owners. As my wife learned the hard way, self-expression at your place of employment is a very fragile concept, entirely dependent upon the breadth and depth of your employer\u2019s level of tolerance. So can we please can the discussion about the NFL players\u2019 right to free speech and self-expression and get to the subject of their protests which is the real issue?<\/p>\n
Too many in the left wing media want to play down the fact that this entire mess began with one player, Colin Kaepernick, radicalized by his lefty girlfriend, demonstrating his support for the Black Lives Matter campaign against America\u2019s police forces. Now I can understand how young men in their physical prime could find this a sympathetic view, as many of them too frequently find themselves in direct conflict with America\u2019s police forces due to alcohol and testosterone fueled incidents of physical violence, often involving their wives or girlfriends. However, the more important consideration is that BLM\u2019s campaign against cops is not one that finds wide favor among the citizenry at large, the folks who support the NFL with their fandom.<\/p>\n
And that, folks, is the issue here. The owners and the NFL commissioner chose to permit these demonstrations against America\u2019s police forces to continue in spite of the fact that it was further alienating a large segment of a fan base already disaffected by the injection of leftist political views into media coverage of their game broadcasts. If you think I\u2019m exaggerating on alienation, just Google up some images of the recent SF 49R\u2019s-LA Ram\u2019s game<\/a> and look at all those empty seats. This may be the worst case of no-shows to date, but it\u2019s a growing occurrence at other stadiums and television viewership is down as well. The American people are speaking, telling those defiant football players that America supports law enforcement, not black criminality, and to its ultimate peril, the NFL owners and management are ignoring them, even upping the ante after the president\u2019s words. Readers need to keep this truth in mind as the liberal media, and that includes sports media, do their best to convince you this is some high-minded civil rights protest.<\/p>\n Somehow, I thought folks like Jerry Jones, Robert Craft and Tom Benson<\/a> understood their fans better than this. By the way Jerry, I was conflicted about going to Ol Heidelburg<\/a> for dinner tonight when we stop in Huntsville, Alabama, rather than eating in the room and watching your Cowboys. I do believe a Jaeger Schnitzel and some cold Bitburger Pilsners will probably win this contest and, who knows, maybe even start a trend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"