Newsweek Columnist “The Spirited Atheist” Susan Jacoby whines about American Patriotism at Olympics

vote democrat its easier than workingI know Atheists have a big problem with those who enjoy holidays like Christmas, or actually believe in something they don’t (god), but now it’s also bad to Atheist nutjobs like Susan Jacoby of Newsweek that the coverage of the Olympics in Vancouver is only focusing on Americans who participating. Jacoby also goes on to whine that the United States is morally and culturally better than other countries calling that thought process a “real social disease” and “profoundly anti-intellectual”. I don’t know about the rest of you, but frankly the U.S. IS morally and culturally better than other countries, regardless of what progressive liberal nuts think. One thing I don’t understand from these people is if its so bad here, why don’t they just pick up and move to a more superior country? I’d be more than happy to help some of these people pack their backs, in an effort to “serve my country”. I’d even contribute some money to some of their plane tickets in an effort to help “spread the wealth.”

If you would like a graphic (literal and figurative) demonstration of our nation’s greatest failing, sit in front of your television set and watch NBC cover an international sports event, the Winter Olympics, as if only Americans were participating. Every time the Today show’s Meredith Vieira stumbles over the name of the Russian figure skater Yevgeny Plushenko (it’s pronounced exactly as it’s spelled, Meredith, with the accent on the second syllables) and giggles to show that it’s OK to be ignorant, I think about all of the announcers from Canada and Europe who pronounce everyone’s name correctly. Their employers care about getting it right, and NBC doesn’t. Not if the athlete isn’t one of us, contributing to the mounting total of “American” medals announced breathlessly every day. Why, anyone would think that these medals were more important than the performance of American students on international comparison tests of achievement in school. In case you’re interested, Finland was No. 1 and Canada No. 2 in the most recent international assessment of reading comprehension. The United States was No. 15. U.S.A., U.S.A….

This Olympic coverage matters because it offers a window into a deeply provincial, reflexively nationalistic mindset that hampers our understanding of the rest of the world and prevents any realistic assessment of American weaknesses and strengths in comparison to other countries. In a truly emblematic moment in the “We’re No. 1″ extravaganza, NBC showed a recap of the medals ceremony for the Men’s Super-G, an Alpine skiing event. Americans Bode Miller and Andrew Weibrecht won silver and bronze, respectively, but the network simply blanked out the gold medal podium, which was occupied by Norwegian Aksel Svindal. Well, who cares about a Norwegian? He’s just an athlete from one of those unhappy countries cursed by secularism and universal health care.

The conviction that the United States is morally and culturally better than other
countries–including other developed democracies–is a real social disease that hurts us more than it does anyone else. It is also a profoundly anti-intellectual. This cultural narcissim is what impelled Brit Hume to urge Tiger Woods to convert to Christianity because Buddhism (in Hume’s view) is an inferior religion that does not offer enough opportunity for forgiveness and repentance. Ours is the most religiously diverse nation on earth–our secular Constitution guarantees that–but Buddhism isn’t quite good enough, not quite American enough, for people still living mentally in the days when nearly every American (except, of course, for the people who were here when the first pilgrims landed) was a Christian.

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February 24, 2010 · Filed Under liberals


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