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Media Desecration of the Flag Amendment
Flag desecration is being debated in the Senate. It must be close to the Fourth of July.
And once again, the media lapdogs oblige those who are against desecrating the flag, but clearly in favor of desecrating the Constitution.
It's hard to find a media lapdog more willing to let herself be used than Dana Bash. In her coverage of this story, she manages to use her "media math" skills, slant the story to Republican advantage, and give an example of flag desecration that isn't.
In the lead of her story she showed a Rock the Vote ad from the last century, with Madonna wrapped in the US flag, as an example of desecrating the flag, but the amendment being considered says nothing about wrapping oneself in the flag.
Why not show this picture of George Bush from a couple of weeks ago, writing his name on flags with a permanent marker, as an example of actual flag desecration that would be covered in the proposed amendment?
Her story is not just misleading. It's wrong.
http://tinyurl.com/fplnt
Thank you for posting that photo. It's just priceless.
I don't think this ploy is going to do the job the Rove machine thinks it will. I think they're 'misunderestimating' the American people, and that includes the ones they can usually count on. Because a majority of Americans are coming to the hard realization that our flag has been on fire since Cheney took control of West Wing.
How is this any different from athletes wrapping themselves in American flag at the Olympics, or US soldiers after battles...?
We keep regugitating the same drivel day after day, listening to the same pundits decide what they "really" meant to say was....voter apathy at all time high...I am surprised anyone bothers to vote anymore.
Once upon a time a great Man led this Nation, he wanted to break the chains that kept citizens down, he tried to remove control over our government by military and special interests, he tried to dismember the financial interests that create economic bondage.
He was shot dead in Dallas, and this Nation never recovered.
JFK was the real thing, and he scared the daylights out of the wrong people. As did Patrice Lamumba, MLK, RFK, and so many others. We have the government we deserve, because we dont stand up and ask why.
We dont ask why Every democratic senator refused to sign paperwork to investigate the fraudulent elections in 2000. If we had kicked them all out, i guarentee we would have fair and free elections from then on, and George W bush would be a bad memory.
We dont ask why a Sitting US Senator (Senator Tom Daschle) was the target of political assasination using anthrax manufactured in US military installation, and not a finger is lifted to investigate.
We dont ask why our congress is debating idiotic and meaningless issues when so many tragedys are occuring right now.
Why does congress act ineptly..? because we let them.
Republicans are doing what they learned long ago; spend, blame, create fear and terror. blaming them for the Nations situation is illogical. It is what they do.
We must kick out the democrats that refuse to offer resistance to Republicans and their policys. Those that allowed our Nation to be usurped, without a fight. Pitifull.
We used to lead the world out of the human condition, to raise people and become more than we are. We need to feel that again, the change that sweeps away the old guard and brings in new ideals, new thoughts and paths to great accomplishments.
We dont need Elections, we need an American Revolution.
Rush Limbaugh's Viagra Confiscated at Airport
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060627/ap_en_ot/limbaugh_viagra
Priceless.
Lou,
Good to see you again.
Casey,
Love the picture. Sure hope the dems will be using it when they start the commercials this year and they show what this Republican lap dog congress has done with their tax dollars.
Toolmaker,
Good to see you again as well. We do have a problem as you stated. We need a revolution; we need public financing of elections; and we need to take the corporations and their lobbyists out of any public officials pocketbooks.
Vic...
So what's up? (Or how's it hanging?) ahhhhhhhgggg I can't believe I just said that!
Vic...seriously!
Hope you're busy preparing for an influx of vocal DCP'rs.
LOU!!
Nice to see you here! Appreciate the comment about the amendment.
This Congress continues to amaze me in that they continue to fight tooth and nail for the symbology and surface of our country's democracy, and ignore that they seriously undermine its meaning and core.
An American friend of mine who now lives in Europe visited again recently and remarked how the news here is more like a cartoon than it is about serious information. Couldn't agree more.
Are we witnessing our country culturally and politically trivializing itself into obscurity?
Probably.
(HILARIOUS)
In the Senate, Covering Themselves in Old Glory
By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, June 27, 2006; Page A02
The Citizens Flag Alliance, a group pushing for the Senate this week to pass a flag-burning amendment to the Constitution, just reported an alarming, 33 percent increase in the number of flag-desecration incidents this year.
The number has increased to four, from three.
Sen. Arlen Specter spoke of bicycle rides as a youth in touting a flag-burning amendment. (By J Carrier -- Bloomberg News)
Washington Sketch
A national political reporter for the Post, Milbank writes Washington Sketch, an observational column about political theater in the White House, Congress and elsewhere in the capital. He covered the 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns and President Bush's first term. Before coming to the Post as a Style political writer in 2000, he covered the Clinton White House for the New Republic and Congress for the Wall Street Journal.
The naive among us may have trouble appreciating how four flag-burning episodes would constitute a constitutional crisis. But the men and women of the Senate, ever alert to emerging threats, are on the case.
"I think of the flag as a symbol of what veterans fought for," Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said as he opened the debate yesterday, "what they sustained wounds for, what they sustained loss of limbs for and what they sustained loss of life for."
In pursuit of this urgent matter, floor leader Specter mustered all manner of argument: the military service of his brother, Morton; his brother-in-law's service in the Pacific; his father Harry's service in the Argonne; his mother's emigration from Ukraine; his own stateside service during the Korean War; a pickup-truck accident his father once had with his sister; bicycle rides he took as a 7-year-old in Kansas; the "treachery of Mussolini"; the light casualties sustained during the Persian Gulf War, and a trip he made to VA hospitals 15 years ago.
"I think it's important to focus on the basic fact that the text of the First Amendment, the text of the Constitution, the text of the Bill of Rights is not involved," Specter argued. The Judiciary Committee chairman did not explain how he could add 17 words to the Constitution without altering its text.
Fortunately, the Senate will have plenty of time to discuss that matter. The chamber has scheduled up to four days of debate on the flag-burning amendment this week. If that formula -- one day of Senate debate for each incident of flag burning this year -- were to be applied to other matters, the Senate would need to schedule 12 days of debate to contemplate the number of years before Medicare goes broke, 335 days of debate for each service member killed in Iraq this year and 11 million days of debate on the estimated number of illegal immigrants in the country.
Unfortunately, the Senate has only 49 days left on its legislative calendar for the year.
[snip]
more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/26/AR2006062601321.html
Turdblossoms are in bloom...
WASHINGTON - President Bush, urging the Senate to pass the line-item veto, on Tuesday criticized House Democrats who didn't back the measure even though they've called for federal spending restraint.
A line-item veto would allow the president to cut certain provisions in spending bills without vetoing the entire measure. The House passed such legislation last week 247-172. Thirty-five Democrats joined with most Republicans in voting for the bill.
"I was disappointed, frankly, though that more Democrats didn't vote for the bill, especially those that are calling for fiscal discipline in Washington, D.C.," Bush said in a speech to members of the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank based in New York. "I mean, you can't call for fiscal discipline on the one hand and then not pass a tool to enhance fiscal discipline on the other hand. You can't have it both ways, it seems like to me."
more...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13574619/
lou,
please call home. we miss you.
on flag burning, i am SOOOOO tempted. Someone stop me....
A xerox of the flag. What do you think? Arrestable offense if I burn it in front of the Senate?
"I mean, you can't call for fiscal discipline on the one hand and then not pass a tool to enhance fiscal discipline on the other hand. You can't have it both ways, it seems like to me."
more...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13574619/
Posted by: monkey at June 27, 2006 01:23 PM
Wouldn't that require some evidence of fiscal discipline on the part of the line item vetoer...oh never mind!
Posted by: monkey at June 27, 2006 01:23
Hmmmm...a line item veto would be a handsome way of forcing both parties to vote the way you want them to, even against their own constituents' wishes.
Just what he needs. Another bully pulpit.
Does anyone else think of the fact that our tax dollars are paying for 4 days of this flag burning crap!
I can't help wondering whose children will starve so that his/her parents can pay the tax man.
Speaking of starving:
Cindy Sheehan, Dick Gregory, Susan Sarandon, Sean Penn and Hundreds More
Launch Hunger Strike to End the Iraq War
The ³Troops Home Fast² will begin after a final meal in front of White House
PRESS CONFERENCE: 5pm, July 3, 2006 Penn. Avenue between 15th and 17th
On July 3, 2006, CODEPINK: Women for Peace, Global Exchange and Gold Star Families for Peace will announce a historic hunger strike against the war in Iraq. At 5pm, they will sit down in front of the White House to eat their last meal and hold a press conference before beginning the fast at the same location in the morning of July 4 at 10am.
³We¹ve marched, held vigils, lobbied Congress, camped out at Bush¹s ranch. We¹ve even gone to jail. Now it¹s time to do more,² says peace mom Cindy Sheehan. ³While others are celebrating July 4th with barbeques, we¹ll be showing our patriotism by putting our bodies on the line to bring our troops home.²
Hundreds of celebrities, veterans, mothers, and concerned citizens across the country will participate in a rolling fast. Strikers include musicians Willie Nelson and Michael Franti, actors Danny Glover, Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon, Gold Star parents Cindy Sheehan and Fernando Suarez, legendary faster and comedian Dick Gregory, environmental activist Diane Wilson, Iraq war veteran Geoffrey Millard and Gulf War vet Michael McPherson, labor leader Dolores Huerta and CODEPINK cofounders Medea Benjamin, Jodie Evans and Gael Murphy.
The organizers call on a long history of fasts for political purposes, claiming their place among the Suffragettes, Mahatmas Gandhi and Cesar Chavez. In honor of this rich history, the fasters will gather at the Gandhi memorial statue a Massachusetts and 21st NW on July 3 at 3pm, then march to Pennsylvania Avenue for the meal and press conference at 5pm. In other parts of the country, people will engage in rolling fasts, passing the fast from person to person every 24 hours.
Diane Wilson, who has engaged in several hunger strikes in her history as an environmental activist, says she will not set an end date to her fast. ³My goal is to bring the troops home. I don¹t know how long I can fast, but I¹m making this open-ended,² she says. ³I plan to take this as far as I¹ve ever taken anything in my 58 years. I fear our future is at stake, and I¹m ready to make a major sacrifice.²
The fast will last until September 21, International Peace Day, when activists around the country will initiate a week of nonviolent actions against the war as part of the Declaration of Peace.
For more information, including a full list of fasters, please see http://www.troopshomefast.org.
#30#
BERKELEY
Council vote tonight on impeaching Bush
Carolyn Jones
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
The famously liberal city of Berkeley is expected to become the first in the nation to put forth a ballot measure calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
The City Council will decide tonight whether to put the measure on the Nov. 7 ballot, at a cost of about $10,000. The measure, if approved, would create a task force to monitor the president and vice president, who backers of the initiative say should be impeached because of the Iraq war, federal wiretapping and other issues.
Dozens of cities, including San Francisco and Oakland, have approved resolutions advocating impeachment, but Berkeley could be the first to let voters decide.
The initiative by the city's Peace and Justice Commission and backed by Mayor Tom Bates, first arose in 2004 but never made it past the City Council because some thought it distracted from the presidential election.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/06/27/BAGDOILN991.DTL
I believe the Chicago Tribune has a flag printed on every edition. So what happens if I decide to use a Trib to get the wood going in the fireplace? These morons really know how to waste time and money. There is a symphonic beauty to their incompetence.
FYI...
a new report on the vulnerability of voting machines out ... here's an article from USA Today about it. I know nothing about the background of the organization that issued it, the Brennan Center for Justice, but the article definitely points out problems for future elections.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-06-26-e-voting_x.htm?csp=34
The worst desecration and violation of the US flag was done after 9/11, when unquestioning sheeplike Americans plastered the image onto cups, towels, t-shirts etc. and sold them for profit (many made-in-China).
Hundreds of thousands of Americans left flags out in the rain to shred and fade, and displayed them at any old time from any old place rather than from official buildings on designated days, as connotes true respect of the flag and what it represents.
Faking patriotism (some sadly not even realizing it), they whipped up nationalistic furvor. Sadly, it was a fad, and within 1-2 months, everything was marked "50% off" in the malls.
True love of country looks much much different.
Tragically, many unthinking individuals put no more thought into their flag than they do their food choices (fast food), body (morbid obesity and sedentariness), culture (whatever is on) or who they vote for (whoever gets media blitz).
Step 1 http://t.hackett99.home.comcast.net/img/bush_flag.jpg
Step 2...
From the United States "Flag Code":
§176. Respect for flag
No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
(d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed to fall free.
http://www.usflag.org/uscode36.html
Karen
There used to be a virtual flag burning site.
I suppose they'll crack down on the rainbow flag, the corporate flag and the distress flag.
While they're at it, how about the Confederate flag, and flag depictions that aren't flags (cups, t-shirts, towels etc). Is wiping yourself on a flag towel a desecration? Is it just burning.
This is the most ridiculous thing in the world.
What will they do when they realize Warren Buffet's new charity gift to the Gates Foundation indirectly cuts into their anti-choice movement? His wife's foundation trains medical personnel who support choice.
The problem with the flag amendment, I read on Ted Kennedy's site that it could come down to one vote. That makes the whole thing a hot potato for the mid-term elections.
Also heard that an abortion case will come up before the Supreme Court "in the fall" (the "partial birth" one) and that will be trumped up right before the mid-term elections, I'll bet.
This country is heading backward in time.
one more comment
Bravo Berkeley!!
& hi Lou!!!
LOU!!!!
Posted by: dwahzon at June 27, 2006 03:05 PM
Our county election commission has been presented with all kinds of evidence showing these machines are as reliable as Pez candy dispensors, but they have a cozy relationship with the manufacturers. No matter what we do, including having the State threaten them with possible prosecution for not following the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act), it doesn't matter. They are smug and certain that they will continue to get away with their cheating and lying. I just can't wait for the day that all hell breaks loose.
I think it is all about respect and dignity. An Olympic athlete who is caught up in a moment of pride and wraps herself in the flag for a victory lap, is acting with American pride.
An American President should know better than to use the American flag as a signature pad. It is unpatriotic. The flag should not be signed by any man. It just shows how he feels about himself in relationship to this country; as the King, I am good enough to sign the sacred flag. Have other presidents done this?
I also feel the flag should not be hung upside down, beneath the Mexican flag or misused in any other way.
We should respect the flags of other countries as well. There are so many other things ways to express your feelings. I was proud when we carefully folded the flags that were draped over the cardboard coffins at the White House in honor of the 2,500 soldiers who have died in this war. None of the flags touched the ground. The coffins may have been cardboard, but the respect for the dead and country were real.
As for as the printed symbol. Is that really a flag? Are all 50 stars present? Is it the full flag or a symbol? How big is it? I think the rules apply to a cloth flag, it gets really sticky when you get into the printed flag. I have no idea how to deal with that.