Look, let’s not blow smoke. (We have enough of that here in the PNW right now.) I am a cynical old fuck. I remember when Colin Kaepernick was run out of the NFL for quietly taking a knee during the pre-game national anthem.

Why did he do that? He thought enough of his fellow USians to believe that we could enforce the law without the same levels of violence and racism we currently see from US policing agencies. We were told that this was disrespectful to the flag and that while Kaepernick’s message wasn’t bad, during the national anthem at a football game was the wrong time & place.

Of course, when buildings burned in Minneapolis, we were told by those who argued that the US should do nothing to reduce violence and racism that any peaceful protest was fine, but arson isn’t peaceful. Therefore, the unstated – or sometimes stated – conclusion followed, we should not work to reduce racism & violence because if we do the arsonists will win.This message, that any peaceful protest is fine, clashed hard with the treatment of Kaepernick, whose symbolic acts were nothing if not peaceful.

So it’s not like this cynical old woman had been fooled into thinking that we were having an honest national dialog.

Even so, I am depressed and heartbroken in a way that shouldn’t be possible for such a relentless cynic because last night in Missouri, a place where my sister and her veteran husband have quite a nice little home, the NFL opened its season with both the national anthem and a separate moment of silence for racial unity, peace, and cooperation.

The fans – I’m surprised they allowed any in the stadium, but they did – the fans booed throughout the moment of silence

That’s all. I have no commentary. No wisdom to impart.

The football fans booed racial unity. The end.