Republicans are always going on about how important they think the Pledge of Allegiance is, as if Americans will stop having allegiance to their own country if they don’t recite the Pledge every day.
However, Republicans also have developed a hatred of any language other than English, as if the democratic values of the Constitution of the United States of America cannot be expressed in any ther language.
Sometimes, these two Republican nationalist obsessions bump up against each other, and their absurdity becomes apparent. The following item appeared in the congressional daily digest for August 1, 2008:
H.R. 6783. A bill to withhold Federal funds from schools that permit or require the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance or the national anthem in a language other than English; to the Committee on Education and Labor.
Imagine that: The Republicans are now introducing legislation against the Pledge of Allegiance. They don’t want school children to pledge allegiance to the USA, or to sing the praises of the United States, if they don’t do it in English. The Republicans in the House of Representatives are determined to actually punish schools that allow students to sing the national anthem or recite the Pledge of Allegiance in freedom.
Even failing to forbid the Pledge of Allegiance or national anthem in non-English could get a school’s federal funds taken away, under proposed law H.R. 6783.
The nationalist kooks in the House of Representatives who have endorsed this legislation are:
Robert Aderholt
Michelle Bachmann
Roscoe Bartlett
Marsha Blackburn
Paul Broun
Dan Burton
Joseph Pitts
Tom Tancredo
Joe Wilson
Sue Myrick
