The usual and customary whinage about the National Anthem from the usual and whiny leftie Bill Press (via Joe Newby):

“But it’s an abomination,” he said.  “First it ranges two octaves [actually an octave and a half] most people can only do kind of one octave. I mean when you think about it, it’s bombs bursting in air rocket’s red glare it all kinds of, you know a lot of national anthems are that way, all kinds of military jargon and the land there’s only one phrase ‘the land of the free’ which is kind of nice and ‘the home of the brave?’ I don’t know.”

Ever notice that this kind of stuff always, but always, comes from “progressives”?  The sort of people who anyway won’t stand up when it’s played?  The guff about the unsingability of “The Star-Spangled Banner” is a MacGuffin:  would they look more kindly on the more singable “Battle Hymn of the Republic”?  No, it’s meant to distract people from their real objection, that this country, its history and promise is honored.  So embarrassing!  What will the Europeans think?

Then there’s the secondary objection of militarism, not surprising from a group that thinks all those bombs bursting in air is too-too icky.  Yet I doubt any of them object to the bloodthirsty words in La Marseillaise, because its from (*eyes flutter*) the French:

To arms, to arms, ye brave!
The avenging sword unsheath,
March on, march on!
All hearts resolved
On victory or death!

What progressives want, if we’re going to have one at all, is the kind of National Anthem that celebrates what, to them, made this country not something to be proud of but tolerable:  community organizers, gender-studies professors, assistant directors of diversity and outreach, mimes.  “We know we’re not as good as France/We’ve failed in every way…”