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Flags Are Divisive Claim from NYT Resurfaces Just in Time for 4th of July

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  July 04, 2021 1:00 PM

Here we go again. The New York Times has to try and ruin America's birthday party with their take on the American flag. They pulled the same nonsense last month.

As Julio covered, last month NYT editorial board member Mara Gay bemoaned to MSNBC's "Morning Joe," that she found it "disturbing" to see so many American and pro-Trump flags when visiting Long Island. After she got called out, as she totally deserved, the paper claimed "the attacks on her... are ill-informed and grounded in bad-faith." 

This latest ridiculousness comes in the form of July 3's "A Fourth of July Symbol of Unity That May No Longer Unite," by Staff Reporter Sarah Maslin Nir.

"Politicians of both parties have long sought to wrap themselves in the flag. But something may be changing: Today, flying the flag from the back of a pickup truck or over a lawn is increasingly seen as a clue, albeit an imperfect one, to a person’s political affiliation in a deeply divided nation," she writes, in reference to the title.

But then she launches into blaming the issue on Trump and Trump supporters. Honestly, I'm surprised it took her until the eighth paragraph to do so:

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Politicians of both parties have long sought to wrap themselves in the flag. But something may be changing: Today, flying the flag from the back of a pickup truck or over a lawn is increasingly seen as a clue, albeit an imperfect one, to a person’s political affiliation in a deeply divided nation.

Supporters of former President Donald J. Trump have embraced the flag so fervently — at his rallies, across conservative media and even during the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol — that many liberals like Mr. Treiber worry that the left has all but ceded the national emblem to the right.

What was once a unifying symbol — there is a star on it for each state, after all — is now alienating to some, its stripes now fault lines between people who kneel while “The Star-Spangled Banner” plays and those for whom not pledging allegiance is an affront.

And it has made the celebration of the Fourth of July, of patriotic bunting and cakes with blueberries and strawberries arranged into Old Glory, into another cleft in a country that seems no longer quite so indivisible, under a flag threatening to fray.

Byron York perhaps says it best.

The piece is peppered with stories of Long Islanders, from both sides of the aisle, and their thoughts on the American flag. These stories are completely overshadowed by the NYT preoccupation with Trump, Trump supporters, and taking a dump on these Americans and their support for the flag.

Predictably, the piece got wrecked over Twitter.

A top comment, from a Uyghur refuge, got more likes than the piece itself, and serves as a beautiful reminder of what America is all about.

Other immigrants weighed in too.

There's plenty more.