America, love it or admit that you don't
Monica Hesse, another left-liberal added by the Washington Post to its op-ed section, takes on what she calls the “lazy insult” that American liberals hate their country. Hesse insists that she loves America. She cites her affection for pop tarts, McDonalds, Fourth of July picnics, national parks, Thanksgiving Day parades, and Mission Impossible movies.
This reminds me of what George F. Kennan said in one of his books. “I’m not oblivious” to the greatness of America, he wrote. But Kennan added that, for him, that greatness consisted mostly of the country’s natural beauty. Kennan went on to admit that he considered himself less an American than an inhabitant of an arc that runs from Scandinavia, though parts of Northern Europe, to the upper Midwest where he was born (in Wisconsin).
Kennan was honest about his view of America. The same cannot be said for some of today’s American leftists.
I’m not saying that Monica Hesse is one of them. She might well love America. But Hesse errs when she denies that plenty of American leftists don’t love, or even like, their country.
A 2024 Gallup poll found that only 34 percent Democrats are “extremely proud to be American.” The percentage of left-wing Democrats who fall into this column is surely lower.
Is it possible to love America and not be extremely proud to be an American? I think so. But I doubt that it’s possible to love America and not be at all proud to be American.
Thus, it’s significant that in a 2025 YouGov poll, only 58 percent of Democrats said they are proud to be American. 24 percent of Democrats said they are not. The remainder were unsure.
This polling supports the view that many leftists do not love, or even like, America.
Beyond polling, there’s the fact that current left-wing dogma is almost impossible to reconcile with love for, or even non-hatred of, America. If you believe that the advent of American slavery, not our founding documents (for example), is the defining moment in American history and that, even after all this time, America remains a racist country, can you love America? I don’t see how.
If you hold these beliefs is it possible not to hate America? Maybe. But I think that if you hold them, it’s more likely than not that you hate the country, or at least strongly dislike it.
Michelle Obama gave the game away when, as her husband was surging towards the presidency, she said that for the first time in her adult life she felt pride in America. It’s pretty clear that Michelle Obama did not love America before that time. It’s also hard to say she loved it thereafter. Genuine love of country is not contingent on the electoral success of family members.
Many on the left view America as more of a force for ill than for good on the world stage. It would be difficult to love a country like that.
Many on the hard left view America as a force for ill on the world stage, not because of mistakes we’ve made, but because our intentions are evil — colonial, imperialist, racist, etc. It would be hard not to dislike a country like that.
I can speak from first-hand experience. When I believed (mistakenly) that America was waging an imperialist war in Vietnam — a war that killed more than a million Vietnamese and tens of thousands of Americans — and that America was denying basic rights to its black citizens, I did not like America.
I’m pretty sure I didn’t hate America. (Bill knew me during this period and can fact check me on this.) I always stood for the National Anthem, unlike more than a few of my contemporaries who attended Golden State Warriors and Washington Bullets games in the early-to-mid 1970s. But this was mainly out of respect for those who had served and sacrificed for the U.S., not out of affection for America.
Intellectually, I couldn’t have it both ways. I couldn’t subscribe to a radical critique of America, one that denied its basic decency, yet still like the country. I wasn’t into pop tarts (did they exist back then?) and McDonalds, but I loved baseball, many American movies, and the national parks I had visited. That wasn’t enough.
I don’t think those who, these days, subscribe to a radical critique of America can have it both ways, either. Maybe there are some saintly souls who can like a country that they consider incorrigibly racist, patriarchal , imperialist, or whatever, but there can’t be many of them.
Most liberals aren’t that radical. I assume that many of them love, or at least like, America. Yet the polls I described above suggest to me that many don’t.
Hesse is correct, of course, that participating in protests doesn’t entail hatred or dislike of America. But she’s wrong to deny that hatred, or at least strong dislike, of America animates many on the hard left.
When I run into these people like to point out 3 things. 1. Passports are cheap, 2. Air Planes are leaving this country every day, 3. find a country you like better...Go There.
The most common factor among all leftists of the Western world is that they love every civilization except their own. Thus their hatred for the United States and Israel two western countries where a majority of the citizens believe the nation is to be defended.
The vast majority of Democrats are perfectly patriotic Americans. But their party and thus they themselves are being manipulated and controlled by the leftist radicals that hate Western civilization. Its actually a little shocking to me how thoroughly the radical left has taken over the Democratic party such that the party leaders bend the knee to them. I used to be a Democrat. I first began to turn against the party after 9/11 because I thought the Democrats penalty. I still find them penalties. But starting with Obama in 08 and continuing right through to this very day I still cannot believe the extent to which moderation has been purged from the party with a few notable exceptions. The Republicans aren't great which is why Im an independent. But they are nowhere near as bad as the Democrats. In the GOP the true insane extremists are still marginalized (Though Trump should do more to publicly disassociate from them)