John Baer, “Ban on Pledge of Allegiance Is Just Goofy,” Philadelphia Daily News, June 27, 2002.
“Give me a break!” Philadelphia Daily News columnist John Baer begins, sounding like another John, ABC News free-markets freak John Stossel. Indeed, Baer (at least in this essay) borrows the in-your-face, liberal-bashing schtick of Stossel, Bill O’Reilly, and other corporate media-approved pundits du jour to excoriate the reason for a break: the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling June 26 declaring the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional due to that “under God” part.
Baer opines that in the wake of September 11 (a date that all but criminalized any left-leaning dissent forever), the country does not need “political correctness” from an elitist, nitpicking, unpatriotic court in “cat-brained California” that thinks “ ‘under God’ somehow violates the constitutional provision against ‘an establishment of religion.’ ” “Nobody’s trying to establish anything by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance,” Baer declares without elaboration before goofing on the judge who wrote the opinion, “Alfred T. Goodwin (a/k/a Alfred E. Neumann?)”. The latter name is actually Alfred E. Neuman, whom John Baer (a/k/a Johnny B. Lame?) must have hired to ghostwrite this about Goodwin:
“His academic background is the University of Oregon and the University of Oregon [sic]. In other words, a duck.”
In other words, a Commie hailing from, you know, academia. “If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck,” as Red-baiters used to say. Or maybe Baer means an actual duck, who knows?
An “atheist doctor/lawyer” named Michael A. Newdow filed the case because he didn’t want his daughter “forced to recite the Pledge” in second grade. “While it’s no surprise a doctor/lawyer’s an atheist” (those darn eggheads), all the case will probably accomplish “is guaranteeing future business for some therapist to treat his offspring”—Newdow’s fault, neither the educational system’s nor the government’s.
Maybe I shouldn’t waste my time vivisecting third-rate op-ed pieces. Unfortunately, Baer’s piece exemplifies the intolerant, reactionary, anti-intellectual tone characteristic of mainstream American political discourse, even more so today during this self-righteous undeclared war against Evil. The Pledge does violate the separation of church and state, does represent official government sanction for that (in my opinion) fictional character God. I know the majority of Americans worship this character, but I also know the U.S. is (allegedly?) a secular nation encompassing all religious beliefs, and all religious disbelief. Why let the Pledge furor distract from more important issues, such as the abolishment of habeas corpus for U.S. citizens the administration deems “enemy combatants”?
Yeah, right. Yawn.
July 2-3, 2002
DAVID V. MATTHEWS 