KK wrote:Today I've seen a number of people in comments pages mention that the US Military pays the NFL to fly over the stadiums and have soldiers etc. at the games; these effectively staged events, coinciding with the anthem, coming out of the recruiting budgets. I don't know if this is true or not though.
That does seem to be the case, the money might not be directly for pre game festivities but the US military does sponsor the NFL the same way any other company does, the NFL in turn supports the troops at every turn and is happy to make a big deal of these things. Its a mutually beneficial thing but I think this anthem thing is the first time the NFL has met any opposition to one of its military ventures and instead of taking a step back and looking at the issue before it, its has decided to with the fascists solution which is all kinds of stupid.
The easiest solution is to go back to the days when the players werent on the field for the anthems, just have it when the players are in the lock room and then bring them out, can still do all the pagaentry, youre just changing the order slightly.