I know I said I'd cool it on the politics for awhile, but then someone makes a decision to mess directly with my first love. And so:
In the 40 years my family has held Philadelphia Flyers’ season tickets, I can only once remember politics entering the arena of play. That was January 11, 1976, when the Soviet Red Army team came to town, and my mom and I and 17,000 of our friends went down to the Spectrum to collectively say, “Not in our country. And certainly not in our house.” It was the Cold War; we were united that day. The Flyers won the game, and with it, the respect of the league.
Now they risk losing the same, as Flyers’ owner Ed Snider waves a bright red flag of another kind, invoking politics in our house and inviting Republican VP nominee and “hockey mom” Sarah Palin to drop the puck at Saturday’s Flyers-Rangers tilt — bringing public scorn and ridicule to what is otherwise one of the classiest organizations in all of sport.
Shame on you, Mr. Snider. Your childish, bald-faced pandering during this bitterly divisive election may play well to your Republican base, but it will not to that of your Flyers.
We’ve seen the pictures of you palling around with Governor Palin during her last Philly visit, and that’s fine. We don’t begrudge you or any other public figure their political beliefs. But do not shove them down our throat.
Admittedly, I happen to disagree pretty strongly with Sarah Palin's political views. But this is not a question of partisanship, it is about you horning politics of any shade into our world of leisure and escape — a privilege, by the way, for which we pay you handsomely. Not only through ticket sales, but through our Comcast premiums.
Forty years ago, I was born into the Flyers community, and into a love for hockey that continues to this day. Flyers’ games, and the Spectrum in particular, were arguably the spiritual temple of my youth — and like the globally respected notion that war must not enter places of worship, we fans should be able to check our politics at the arena door.
I won't be at the game on Saturday, but my folks will. They won’t boo, because they'd argue that Governor Palin doesn’t deserve name calling and the sort of spleen that my family generally reserves for, say, the Rangers. Their 20,000 friends, of course, will be another story.
So there you have it, Ed. You want to trot out your show pony to start off the season? May you both reap all that you have sown.
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