Who the Hell Cares About the NFL, It is America We Are Talking About

Today saw a remarkable show of unity among football players and owners.

70% of the players are African-American. A few have followed a practice initiated by Colin Kaepernick before the election of kneeling during the national anthem in response to police assaults of blacks nationwide that began before the election.

NFL owners, all of whom are white and extremely privileged and who have since remained largely silent, were put in the unfortunate position of needing to take a side on this matter as a result of Trump’s extraordinary intervention when he stated in Alabama on Friday night:

"Wouldn't you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, 'Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. He is fired. He's fired!'"

The President actually believed that he could put NFL owners in the untenable position of kicking their players out of the league purely for expressing their opinion on the field, and in believing that he could bring about a boycott of the NFL if they didn’t!

Of course, the players and the owners have very different positions and football is a dying sport as result of the damage that it does to players’ bodies. NFL owners now are, by and large, being reactive because they need to be - to have responded to Trump’s directive would have precipitated the immediate end of their sport and the value of their franchises.

At this point, one needs to question the integrity of NFL owners who are only acting when their own interests are so clearly attacked. Likewise, it is time to question the intelligence of anyone who is – only now when it cannot be denied anymore – questioning the motives of a man who has been poisoning our society for 2 years by trying to turn Americans against each other.

The appropriate time to question whether the President was a racist and a divider was when he announced his campaign and when he filled stadiums full of people riled up and looking to attack minorities. It is too late here and now. Our fabric is torn.