My conservative friends never fail to amuse me. Prior to this week, none had interrupted my drinking of a Bud Light to ask me, "Hey, did you see the women's soccer team on that obscure cable channel last night? They really took it to those gals from New Zealand, didn't they?" Not once.
So, I was taken aback when all sorts of hullabaloo on social media erupted after the U.S. Women's National Team lost to Sweden in an overtime shootout this past Sunday and were thus eliminated from this year's FIFA Women's World Cup competition. Conservatives everywhere, from the atrociously self-centered Megyn Kelly through the usual nasty social media suspects like the insufferable child Charlie Kirk and all the way down to a number of people that I know fairly well have all taken time to make this past week a living upside-down cake.
All those so-called patriots actually took time after the World Cup loss to root against America. That's correct: shame and hypocrisy are the bedmates of modern conservatism. The trigger was that the soccer loss came when star U.S. winger Megan Rapinoe shanked a last-chance penalty shootout kick that sailed to the right and above the Sweden net. With her miss, the match ended with Sweden taking a victory lap.
It wasn't long before our conservative patriot brothers and sisters began their laughable tirades against Rapinoe, the U.S. women's team and, by blind-eye extension, our country, thereby revealing their own dismal relationship with the land of the free.
It's not rocket science—that game of soccer. It's a game where players far more fit than I am run for about three hours taking turns kicking the ball, falling down and bending over to catch their breath. That is my summation of soccer. I don't understand the strategies or tactics, but I love watching it, especially when the soccer ball sails past the goalie and into the net, and especially in a tight match, when that goal results in a Spanish-speaking announcer coming out his shoes exclaiming, "G-o-a-a-a-l-l-l-l!"
I suspect that my understanding of soccer and that of my conservative friends who are searching for their wits this week are similar. What is not similar is that I respect Megan Rapinoe—she being not only one of the greatest female soccer players of all time, but someone who is also the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
That award remains pretty stout, even if Rush Limbaugh is also a recipient. Dolly Parton, another person I highly admire, turned the award down twice, by the way. The conservative right cannot abide that Rapinoe, a stalwart for gender equality, is thusly honored.
They can abide even less that while they weren't paying attention to the game—only its aftermath—Rapinoe took a knee during the playing of the national anthem. She wasn't the first, she won't be the last. But it was all the sugar needed to send conservatives from coast to coast into a hyperbolic diabetic coma.
Have they forgotten—or are they blind?—that nearly everywhere you look at a conservative gathering, there are plenty of folks who sully the "flag and all it stands for" far worse than Rapinoe.
Those folks were actually cheering the fact that America lost at a game they can't even spell. Yes, celebrating that America lost. Good God, what is wrong with them?
Call me old-fashioned, but I much favor an independently minded person who feels so strongly about an issue that she is willing to face the scourge of angry and less-brave people who do not color their hair purple or report as openly gay, than the persons who use facsimiles of the flag to wipe the snot of their noses or fashion it into all sorts of revealing, crack-crawling beach wear.
Never mind that all those nose-wipers didn't care a whit about Rapinoe or her causes until this week. Had they looked up from their TV dinners, they'd have seen that Rapinoe is no stranger to taking the knee (primarily in support of racial equality) dating back at least to 2016. Where have those folks been? At a rally or something?
And what happened in 2016—that event that launched hatred and vitriol across the land? Yep, the Trump presidency. Cry about gas prices all you want (thank you for keeping them so low for so long, Obama), but I cry more for the rising cost of lost friendships, lost personal and business relationships and the loss of our nation's very soul. Most everyone I know has had it up to here with the nonsense that America is "failing." No, it's not. If you believe that America is failing, then I pity you, but I don't feel sorry for you in the least.
It is no surprise then that former President Donald Trump—on authority as being the world's greatest golf cheat (look it up)—chimed in with his own shallow but ever-effective divisive commentary.
After the Sweden victory, he wrote on his failing social network, Truth Social, "The 'shocking and totally unexpected' loss by the U.S. Women's Soccer Team to Sweden is fully emblematic of what is happening to the our once great Nation under Crooked Joe Biden. Many of our players were openly hostile to America—No other country behaved in such a manner, or even close. Woke equals failure. Nice shot Megan, the USA is going to Hell!!! MAGA."
Huh? Really? Blaming Joe Biden? Let's not have an election. I want a soccer shootout between Biden and Trump. Ten kicks each for the crown of presidency.
It won't matter, he'll still lose in the end, but watch for a Trump minion to cheat kick for him. His supporters adore that crap.
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