Flag Burning

So the GOP, in its current crusade to avoid its bitter defeat on Social Security, military and political doldrums in Iraq and their president's declining popularity, now want to save Old Glory from the torch. I guess symbolic victories are better than nothing.

It is, of course, a stupid idea, for a number of good reasons.

Flag burning is a matter of free speech. If we allow this, then it will open the door to other restrictions on symbolic speech. The GOP needs to think about this. What happens when those darn liberal Democrats return to power and call for a constitutional amendment for symbols they don't like? Bye bye, Washington "Redskins".

Most flags are private property. It's not our flag if I buy it, it's mine because I own it. If I wish to burn it, it should be within my property rights, as a good American, to do what I will with my property as long as no one else is harmed.

Finally, if the GOP stops to think about it, the amendment will just encourage more flag burning because protestors will get a symbolic arrest on top of the symbolic burning.

Word on the street is that this thing might actually pass the Senate this time. As a good Democrat, I suppose the good in this is that it means the GOP's not winning anything anywhere else if they're desperate enough to bother with this. So maybe there's hope for the Republic yet.