One of the more persistent mischaracterizations of the national anthem protests that rose to a new level Sunday is that these demonstrations have "politicized" sports. That rests on the notion that sports were not political before. But as legendary sportscaster Bob Costas explained Monday morning on CNN's New Day, our sports have been politicized for years, infused with a particular interpretation of what it means to be an American patriot:

As Costas painstakingly repeats, honoring our military servicemen and women is a completely acceptable and commendable ritual at sporting events. But celebrating the troops has also become the only acceptable form of political expression in American sports, and has often been stripped of any kind of nuance to be a kind of, in Costas' words, "bumper-sticker flag waving." It has the air of the jingoism that pervaded the Bush era, when criticizing the ultimately disastrous war in Iraq, for instance, was conflated with criticizing the troops. It was not criticizing the troops, it was criticizing government policy that put them in harms way without justification or proper planning.

Now, a group of primarily black players silently demonstrating during a celebration of American values because they do not feel America is living up to those values is being denigrated as an affront to the flag, or the troops. Colin Kaepernick is not criticizing those serving in Afghanistan, he's protesting racial injustice in policing. In fact, he's exercising the rights that military service members fight to protect. Because what is great about America is the Constitution, not the flag. Criticizing the country's policies is patriotic, whether it's Kaepernick or the Tea Party doing it. It is an attempt to make America a better place.

"Patriotism comes in many forms," Costas said, "and what has happened is it's been conflated with a kind of a bumper-sticker kind of flag-waving, and with the military only. So that people cannot see that, in his own way, Colin Kaepernick—however imperfectly—is doing a patriotic thing."

"Colin Kaepernick—however imperfectly—is doing a patriotic thing."

You can contest the specifics of Kaepernick's argument, just like you could have with the Tea Party, although the statistics about racial inequality in policing and the justice system are fairly conclusive in his favor. But he certainly did not politicize sports. As Costas pointed out, they don't play the national anthem before Broadway plays—even Hamilton, a story of the nation's founding. They normally don't play the national anthem before sporting events in other countries. It is played before those events here because people are eager to honor the military, as they should be, but also because they want to tie sports to a particular vision of America. It is an inherently political vision. As a pithy line that's been making the rounds recently goes, if you think something in our culture isn't politicized, it's probably because you agree with its politics.

Jack Holmes Politics Editor Jack Holmes is the Politics Editor at Esquire, where he writes daily and edits the Politics Blog with Charles P Pierce.

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