Part memoir and part cultural history, Skirmishes with Patriotism attempts to work out, in a tapestry of 10- to 15-minute riffs, the moral tangles implicit in an American shibboleth. Beginning as a reckoning with my “unpatriotic” response to the Vietnam War, the project evolved into a broader meditation on violence, duty, sacrifice, and national pride. While my intent is not polemical—and certainly not “anti-patriotic”—I do invite the questioning of nationalistic zeal, especially in its current guise of triumphalist bombast. I try to confront therefore not just the troubled history of the American experiment but the specific rancor of this fragmented moment.I dedicate this podcast to two American patriots: Union officer Silas Soule, who in 1864 refused an order to murder Cheyenne women and children at the Sand Creek Massacre; and my godfather, U.S. Army infantryman Paul Faraci, who in 1944 died liberating Italy from Fascist control.
