I like Your article

I, as a Democrat, am extremely proud of our American flag. To me, it represents a symbol of all the good in this country. I AM A PATRIOT. To me, that does not mean I blindly follow leaders who are conducting themselves in such a manner as to desecrate the flag I love.

It’s not the person burning the flag in protest that bothers me, it’s the government who misrepresents and lies to its people. That’s the real desecration. When did the Conservative Right make our flag some untouchable religious symbol, something comparable to the crucifix.

The Republicans are always claiming to be for “less government”, except of course when they want to legislate the lives of homosexuals, eavesdrop on telephone conversations or American citizens, dictate what a woman does with her body, prohibit flag burning…blah blah blah.

If I see someone burning a flag, it offends me, indeed it hurts. But I do not expect everyone to feel the same as I do about it. If one chooses to burn a flag to symbolically make a statement, it is his or her right to do so. It does not diminish the meaning behind the flag for me. It is merely a SYMBOL of something much deeper, much greater than simply a cut of cloth.

“The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States,” the amendment reads.

Wayne and others, as desecration is undefined in the Amendment, Congress will be free to define the term in any manner it so chooses. So, yes, clothing, a bumper sticker, a printed advertisement, a button, anything with the red/white/blue motif could be subject to statutory proscription, and, even more important, what is the intent necessary for desecration to occur?

Is it desecration if you intend the message to be of protest? If so, then it is not about protecting the flag, it is about restricting protests against the Government. Is that the freedom and liberty our young men and women are dying for…to restrict the ability of people who disagree with the Government to speak out?

The fact is, laws prohibiting the “desecration of the flag” were stricken as an unconstitutional infringement on the right of free speech. The solution? Take away the right of free speech.

If nobody can complain about the Government, that will make everything alright.

Molly Ivins once pointed out that for George H.W. Bush’s birthday one year, they wheeled out a giant sheet cake decorated as a flag. As she said, “When you think about what ultimately happened to that cake, if that isn’t flag desecration I don’t know what is.” (or somethign like that.)

The point is, what will be considered a “flag”? A cake decorated like one? A T-shirt with a flag on it? A newspaper ad with all kinds of flag images in it? And how would they decide where the anti-flag burning part ends and the rest of our free speech rights begin? This is a stupid idea. You don;t like to see people burning the US flag? Too bad. I don’t like seeing the Republicans in Congress pass legislation benefitting nobody but the wealthiest among us, but I have to live with it. So do you with flag burners.

Count on it. :-D