No, could you please, in your own words, paraphrase the argument Kamiya is making?

A concise paragraph or two should do the trick.

What you've done there was to equivocate, because you present passages and your responses to them but you fail to offer some sort of coherence.

I'm asking you to demonstrate that you understand Kamiya's argument before offering your own counter-argument.

For instance, "Gary's central argument is that patriotism, or the illusion of patriotism, hampers our ability to make wise policy decisions, and in fact is a contributing factor to our making government making rather poor ones and our ratification therof...To illustrate his point, Gary points to A, B and C as evidence.

I disagree with Gary's conclusion because his evidence fails to address D, E, and F, or because his evidence is faulty, and here's how..."

Something like that, you know?

Yes, agreed.

"However, I do take exception to the educated vs the not educated part. In my experience, I have found that even the educated have a profound lack of common sense and common decency that many of the not educated seem to have in abundance. Hell, look at George W. Didn't he go to Yale, and then we have Newt Gingrich who has a PhD in something or the other."

A fair point, to which I can only offer that while Bush did literally attend Yale, that's not necessarily the same thing as having been "educated" there. But yes, your point is apt, especially because one of Yale's missions has been to churn out the ruling class.

So perhaps, perhaps, the problem is self-serving employment of education. I don't think that education necessarily makes people more moral or ethical.

I do think, however, it provides the potential to do so.

This is tricky, though, you're right. I often find myself overselling the value of education, most likely because I was raised to value it so highly. It was the one thing they could never take away from you, as my mother was fond of saying.

"Also, the most cosmopolitan, the very well heeled and well traveled, yes, they only have stamps in their passports, like Hillary, to boast of their having been to many countries. I know many people like that who have and will support narrow and excluding right wing policies."

Again, point taken.

Thank you for keeping me honest.

" If you want to save this country, shut up, wear the pin, say the Pledge and then work on solving the problems. Or suffer the consequences of another 4-8 years of Bush, war, suffering and political disaster."

Let's grant your premise, for argument's sake, which, as I understand it, is that resisting facile patriotism will throw the election to McCain.

Do I have that right? If so, it's a debatable point, but again, let's pretend it's not for argument's sake.

The question then becomes, are there any consequences, long- or short-term, to pandering to this patriotism or perhaps more generally, to "playing the game" as the game is currently played?

Because I believe a core tenet of Obama's argument is that the way the game is currently played is precisely the problem.

That's what he means by not only ending the war but ending the mindset that got us into the war.

He's saying that fear and jingoism and the like are the deep causes of militarism. Not the only causes, perhaps, but substantial ones.

The argument is that, as long as such flag-waving goes unchallenged, so long as we legitimate it by pandering to those who would do it, we will always be quick to find enemies and launch ill-advised wars against them.

The argument is that this variety of flag-waving constitutes a sort of siege mentality which itself is the problem.

As I see it, we can play the game as it's been played, but to do so and expect different results is pretty foolish.

How long until the next bogeyman crops up and the Republicans demand again that we all demonstrate our patriotism by signing off on an unnecessary war?

Am I making any sense at all?