This is opening weekend for the National Football League and fans across the country are dreaming dreams of a Super Bowl crown.

After a long offseason, players are ready to spit lightening and crap thunder. Some may be thinking once again of taking a knee during the anthem. If they do, it is probable that more fans will become so disgusted at this display of disrespect that they’ll change the channel on the TV.

It’s also probable that the teams and the league will do nothing to stop them.

In the spring, owners actually looked like they had grown a pair when they adopted a policy that would have punished players for protesting during the national anthem. But that resolve slowly dissipated over the summer until today, when ESPN reported that the “new policy is going to be no policy — at least for this season.”

Too many people have stances too strong to figure out a compromise, but an NFL official insisted Sunday morning that there is continuing dialogue on the topic as the league looks for ways to address social justice issues. Players began sitting or kneeling during the anthem in 2016 to protest racial inequality, police brutality and other issues. The protests have become a divisive topic of debate, and the NFL and players’ union still haven’t said whether players will be punished this season if they choose to kneel or demonstrate during the anthem.

Game TV ratings are still in decline:

NBC ratings for the Atlanta Falcons–Philadelphia Eagles season opener Thursday were down 13 percent, but the kickoff was delayed by more than 30 minutes due to rain, pushing the broadcast later into the evening. NFL ratings were down 9.7 percent overall for the 2017 regular season, though Nielsen data shows that the 20 of the 30 highest-rated shows on television in 2017 were football games.

There’s very little to be said about this lack of an anthem policy except that it’s obvious the inmates are running the asylum. Does it do any good to say that not only is protesting the anthem the wrong way to express dissent but that a football game is the wrong place?

I guess when you make millions of dollars a year to get your head bashed in, it takes a toll on your common sense and logic centers.