These are the famous words, so beloved by uber-patriots everywhere, redolent as they are of exceptionalism, jingoism and all the other "isms" one might care to apply.
Like many tropes however, those five words do not tell the entire story.
For that we need to pole-vault the orange squiggle of freedom
In the interests of full disclosure and attribution, as spelled out in this excellent Diary, I have to tell you that I was first alerted to this on Facebook, by persons unknown :)
Carl Schurz was a US Senator back in the day. The day was 1877 to 1881.
He was German, and the first German-born American ever to serve in the United States Senate. There is a very good wiki detailing his life and career.
So what was it that prompted this accomplished man to display a degree of jingoism that would ring through the ages, to become the clarion call of authoritarian, xenophobic Americans some 130 years later?
Well nothing, is the short answer because he didn't say it. Well, he did say it but he said rather more. Despite Fox News simply being a gleam in the eye of Rupert Murdoch back in 1877, there were those laying the groundwork for lies and distortion that so many would be proud of today.
Here is what he really said:
The Senator from Wisconsin cannot frighten me by exclaiming, “My country, right or wrong.” In one sense I say so too. My country; and my country is the great American Republic. My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.
Not quite the same, is it?
Still, it's very good to see that traditions can be kept alive, and thrive even in this modern world:
"You didn't build that"
"Bitter people clinging to their guns and religion"
My, the 19th century would be so proud of how far we have come.
Carl Schurz was, by the way, a Republican.
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