Ravenwood - 06/04/03 09:45 AM
Flag burning, and desecration of the flag of the United States is a hideous act. I hold nothing but contempt for people that burn our colors. That said, I think that Republican's repeated attempts to ban flag burning are wrong, and should be stopped.
Flag burning is a form of political expression, that should be protected under the First Amendment. This is exactly the kind of unpopular political speech that the First Amendment was created to protect. (Too bad the First was repealed by the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Incumbent Protection Act.)
That is why it upsets me to hear that the House of Representatives passed a Constitutional Amendment that, if ratified, would decree: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States"
Fortunately, passage of this Constitutional Amendment to protect the flag is not likely. Although it passed the House, it still needs to pass the Senate with a two-thirds majority, AND be ratified by at least three-fourths of the states. Perhaps they could try attaching the William Jefferson Clinton Third Presidential Term Amendment to the measure as a sort of 'poisoned pill'.
Category: Amendment of the Day
Comments (4) top link me
"If the flag is the symbol of the United States, then burning it does not protest the actions of our government, it protests the existence of the American people. I consider it a personal death threat."
saw that in someone's signature once...sounds pretty good to me.
Posted by: Samkit at June 4, 2003 11:40 PMFlag burning is meant to offend those who take over the flag as their own property. It belongs to everybody, including snake-oil salesmen for that matter. The message is: patriotism is not as easy as you make it out to be, here I will show you. The right to offend in that way is and ought to be protected.
Posted by: Ron Hardin at June 5, 2003 5:23 AMPerhaps you were speaking in jest, but I would think that a libertarian would enjoy seeing an end to term limits. Actually, I was taught (obviously by a very bad teacher) in grade school that Clinton's propoal WAS how the law currently stood. That type of law would make sense to me. Carter vs. Bush vs. Bush vs. Clinton in 2004.
Posted by: The Rust One at June 10, 2003 1:24 AMRuston,
I was indeed speaking in jest. I've already gone on the record as saying I would love to see Clinton running again. I think it would be very humbling.
As for bad teachers, my sister's grade school teacher once showed the class plaster molds made of the ancient people of Pompeii, who were buried alive by Mt. Vesuvius. (The molds were made from the empty holes left in the rock and ash where their bodies used to be.)
The teacher said that touching molten lava turned people to stone, and then threatened to flunk my sister (who had been to Pompeii and Mt. Vesuvius) for contradicting her.
Posted by: Ravenwood at June 10, 2003 8:19 AM(c) Ravenwood and Associates, 1990 - 2014
