Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg has long been revered as one of the political left-wing’s greatest successes. While she wasn’t the first woman to ever serve in the Supreme Court, she wasn’t far from it. And her work in pushing women’s rights in the workplace pretty made her a legend worldwide.
Naturally, her recent death has only pronounced this, giving her a near saintly status among her liberal tribe.
But as liberal as she grew with age, the infamous RBG, as she was commonly referred to, didn’t always agree with the far left. At least, not on everything.
Take the now seemingly commonplace tradition of liberal athletes to kneel during the national anthem, for example.
You might find it shocking that RBG didn’t actually agree with it at all. And she even said as much once.
In 2016, Ginsberg was being interviewed about her recent book, “My Own Words,” by then-Yahoo News journalist Katie Couric. Now, if you can remember, then San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick had just begun his career-ending stunt of kneeling when the National Anthem was sung or performed at his football games.
According to him, this was a way to bring awareness to racism and his opinion that black Americans, such as himself, were not treated equally or fairly.
Now, since RBG spent the better part of her career fighting for equality and fairness, especially in the workplace, you’d think this topic would be dear to her and make her want to stand, or should I say kneel, with Kaepernick.
However, you would be wrong.
When asked about her thoughts on Kaepernick’s and others’ actions during her book interview, RBG responded, with little hesitation, that she thought the whole thing was “dumb and disrespectful.” She even later added the words stupid to her description.
She said, “I think it’s really dumb of them. I think it’s dumb and disrespectful. I would have the same answer if you asked me about flag burning. I think it’s a terrible thing to do, but I wouldn’t lock a person up for doing it.”
Ginsberg added that being stupid and arrogant is not a crime, and, as such, these players do have the right to kneel if they choose. But it doesn’t make the act any less “stupid.”
“If they want to be stupid, there’s no law that should be preventative. If they want to be arrogant, there’s no law that prevents them from that. What I would do is strongly take issue with the point of view that they are expressing when they do that.”
You see, as liberal and progressive as RBG was, she still had respect for her country and her flag. She still honored what our nation stood for and what it was supposed to mean. And she thought it was extremely disrespectful to do anything less. I mean, she likened kneeling for the Anthem to flag burning, for heaven’s sake.
Now, quite naturally, some of her party members took issues with these harsh words. And so a few days later, the late justice was pretty much forced into an apology, insinuating that she hadn’t known enough about the situation to comment on and therefore shouldn’t have.
She told Fox News, “Some of you have inquired about a book interview in which I was asked how I felt about Colin Kaepernick and other NFL players who refused to stand for the National Anthem. Barely aware of the incident or its purpose, my comments were inappropriately dismissive and harsh. I should have declined to respond.”
Note that she didn’t say she had changed her mind on the topic after learning more about it, nor did she even say she was sorry for saying it.
Instead, she said that she should have kept her mouth shut, probably for no other reason than staying in the progressive left’s good graces.
Personally, I’m glad she didn’t. It helps to give me at least some semblance of the idea that liberals, at their very core, maybe don’t hate America as much as they appear to. Then again, given RBG’s age, it could be more of a generational thing, especially seeing how all the liberals that are left seem not to care who they spit on so long as they get their way.
At least RBG understood on some level that some actions, even if done for the right reasons, are pretty ‘dumb and disrespectful.’
