For Colin Kaepernick and other NFL players protesting systemic racism, every play is first down and a thousand yards to go.
Friday night, the NFL at long last acknowledged its mistake in trying to silence Kaepernick and other protesters (though, notably, without mentioning Kaepernick by name). Sunday morning, Ben Carson, the secretary of Housing and Urban Development, once again trotted out the old “protesting is unpatriotic” line, despite the fact that it’s been debunked, destroyed and dismissed by anyone who’s been paying attention.
Speaking to CNN’s “State of the Union,” Carson echoed President Trump’s declaration that protests disrespect the American flag, but offered what appeared to be a conciliatory move toward the middle:
“My personal feeling is, if those players were to come out and say, ‘We love our nation, we are patriots, we love our flag, we honor the memory of those who died to give us our freedom, but we are protesting some of the brutality that has occurred, and that’s why we're doing this,’ I think it would solve the problem,” Carson said.