The hand that feeds ya

They are free to find jobs elsewhere

THE LADY wasn’t exactly a Trumpeteer looking for a fight. She was family, she was polite, she was Southern. Also, being from the deep South (even deeper than Arkansas), she was a football fan.

But, during one of her visits here last fall, an NFL game came on television. And she politely went into the other room. Nope, not gonna watch it, she said. “The anthem thing.”

Even little (not so old) ladies have opinions on NFL players kneeling during the national anthem. And, like most Americans, those opinions are strong. The National Football League had one heck of a PR problem last year, and the TV ratings showed as much.

The commissioner of the nation’s most popular professional sports league thought he had it all figured out months ago. So he issued a new rule/policy/decree: Let the players do whatever they want during the anthem—in the locker room where no cameras are allowed. But if they’re on the field when Oh, Say Can You See starts up, they must stand.

That way, the NFL saves face, and the players still can walk around with their rights on.

It sounded like a good compromise to many of us. Players have all the right in the world to kneel during the national anthem. And the league has all the right in the world to fire them if they do so on an NFL field. (This isn’t a First Amendment issue.)

Jerry Jones, the top Cowboy, said after this policy was announced: “We’re going to respect the flag. And I’m going to create the perception of it. And we have.” He said, with no room for doubt, that players who kneel during the anthem—publicly, where the rest of us can see them—won’t play for his team.

Now, less than a month away from pre-season games, the NFL players’ association has been heard from. And, as is often the case with the NFLPA, it’s making more noise than sense:

“Our union filed its non-injury grievance today on behalf of all players challenging the NFL’s recently imposed anthem policy. The union’s claim is that this new policy, imposed by the NFL’s governing body without consultation with the NFLPA, is inconsistent with the collective bargaining agreement and infringes on player rights.”

No, it doesn’t. Players still have the right to kneel during the anthem—and on the field, to boot.

But NFL owners and the league itself have rights, too.

Just as you, Gentle and Employed Reader, have the right to go to your boss this morning and give him what-fer. Call the boss any name you like. If you don’t get too loud or too threatening, you won’t be arrested for saying any of it. Give it a go!

The thing is, your boss might fire you for it. Actions have consequences.

THE NATIONAL Football League is a going concern. And right now it’s concerned about its TV ratings, which could affect revenue one day. It can’t have its employees offending a good part of its customer base, any more than McDonald’s or Walmart or Major League Baseball can. (Google “John Rocker” for MLB’s version of this debate.)

However, the constitutional expert and All-Pro safety for the Philadelphia Eagles, Malcolm Jenkins, took offense to the new rule: The NFL is seeking to “thwart the players’ constitutional rights to express themselves and use our platform to draw attention to social injustices like racial inequality in our country,” he argued.

If it please the court, he argues wrong. The First Amendment right to free speech only refers to what the government can do. It doesn’t protect anybody from consequences you might pay for insulting your boss or your wife or your golf buddy or the big guy at the end of the bar. The NFL players have the right to kneel. And the NFL has the right to fire them for it.

Rights all around! What a country!

Now then, it’s less than a month until the first Fantasy Football drafts. We’re thinking about taking Alvin Kamara in the first round. What think?

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