Two decades after 9/11, Harris and Democrats have reclaimed patriotism

Two decades ago, an American country singer called Natalie Maines touched off a firestorm in London.

Her band, then called the Dixie Chicks, was there on a world tour as the United States was beginning the invasion of Iraq.

As she and her bandmates began the song “Travelin’ Soldier” at the Shepherd’s Bush Theatre, Maines told the crowd: “Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas.”

The response was swift and brutal. Country music stations stopped playing their music. The hate mail flowed in from all corners of America, and the band lost promotional opportunities and sponsorship deals.

The “cancellation” of the Dixie Chicks was part of an atmosphere of hyper-patriotism that Republicans had successfully willed into existence around Bush and the Iraq invasion in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.

The GOP used the aftermath of those devastating events to redefine patriotism as a jingoistic, nationalistic virtue that required being a conservative Republican to be considered a “real” American. Bush used those feelings to win re-election, and Republicans have spent the last 20 years claiming that Democrats “hate America.”

The hyper-performative patriotism remained part-and-parcel of the GOP throughout the rise of Donald Trump and his presidency, leading Trump to claim “America First” as an alternative moniker for his “Make America Great Again” movement.

His supporters continued to claim the American flag as their own symbol, even using it to beat police officers as they sought to illegally keep Trump in office on January 6.

But after this year’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago,