The Conservative tools for keeping the Base too dumb and distracted to notice how thoroughly their party is screwing them over are passed proudly down from each generation of wingnut leadership to the next.
From me in 2006:
These are the wedge issues the GOP dredges up cycle after cycle to crank the Base of the Party up to Scared Shitless and White Hot Loco just in time for each election. It is why the GOP can fuck up whole countries and leave entire American cities to die without fear of being voted out of office 99-to-1 in every district everywhere. Because if you give mouthbreathers enough fags, burning flags and Terror Alerts around election time it’ll crowd the entire record of Republican perfidy, bloodshed and failure right out of their itty bitty heads.
From Don the Con today:
Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag - if they do, there must be consequences - perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2016
18 comments:
This is faux-patriotism at its worst. Is there some epidemic of flag burning happening in the USA? Of course not, but Trump likes this kind of issue so he can escalate into his comfort zone of belligerence.
This is exactly the defining difference between loving a symbol of the USA or the values of it.
How about this, if you burn an American flag or if you fly a Confederate flag you should either spend a year in jail or lose you citizenship. Both say the same thing, why not treat both equal in the eyes of the law?
Point taken, Drift. You/we have been onto them for lo, these many years.
I remember standing out on the street in Chapel Hill, N.C. nearly 50 years ago. I was in front of the post office on Franklin Street, the main drag, taking part in a 15 minute lunchtime "silent vigil" against the war in Vietnam. There were about 20 of us, including the as-yet-unsuccessful Dean Smith, the BBall coach at UNC. The peckerheads in the state legislature went wild, screaming for William Friday, the UNC president, to fire him. Much to his credit, Friday refused. Incidentally Smith went on to become one of the great college coaches, while running a clean program and graduating something like 90% of his players. (Not the same UNC these days, with plenty of grade-rigging and bogus "courses"…for blue-chip power forwards, etc…)
I keep telling my friends: "We're the meteor. They're the dinosaurs."
Jesse Helms, and most of his ilk from that era, are wormfood, but it seems like the petrie-dish keeps turning them out.
I can't recall seeing an american in power who is as overtly, arrogantly, full of crazed shit, as is Trump. This one is going to be tough to deal with.
BTW, I notice that Mr. Shit-for-Brains brandishing the placard in the middle of the photo for this thread, is wearing a tee shirt proclaiming that Glenn Beck is his hero.
Of some interest is that Beck is making some long overdue apologies for all of HIS bullshittery.
Not sure if his motivation has anything to do with guilt, for priming the peckerhead pump those years
at Fox, but after the disaster of the election, maybe there were a few vestigial conscience-peas rattling around in his head.
Tanbark, I'm not sure whether Weepy's genuinely afraid, or just suddenly aware that his creation has slipped the leash.
"Of course Donald Trump isn't the Republican Party. The proper term is 'the Republican Party's monster'."
-- seen on Tumblr
"Yeah, that's right, I'm a monster. I'm the monster society created! I'm the thing they blame for recession and social problems! I'm the scapegoat! If humans didn't want me, why did they make me?"
-- Naomi Armitage, 2179
Dear Neo; surely, some of both…we hope. If he has two brain cells to rub together.
That's it! He's discovered massive doses of B-12!
Indeed. Why pull flag burning outta his ginormous asshole at this point? I'm not aware of some rampant spate of flag burning going on.
My guess? This is Trump's red meat to toss to his brain dead minions because of all of the other stuff he's presently walking back and will continue to walk back. Like 100% of his "promises" during his campaign to "make Murka great again."
And so, Driftglass, you're right. Hey lookit meth-heads: I'll prosecute them damn hippy flag burners to within an inch of their lousy rotten lives!!11! And they all go: YEAH! USA! USA! USA!
Snap, crackle, pop.
Ugh.
So...if we catch the President-Elect (I hated to type that) peeing on a burning flag (to put out the fire, of course. Why else?), the procedure should be (1) get /p/h/o/t/o/s video, then (2) start agitating for the year in jail?
Wait; the coffee hasn't hit yet.
Isn't burning supposed to be the proper way to dispose of and old, worn-out, torn, or tattered flag?
The Boy Scouts of America better watch their shit come January 20th.
I wonder if this is Trump preparing us for seeing his motorcade driving past riot police and armored vehicles on January 20th. If losing the popular vote pissed him off, imagine what the reports of large protests organizing against him for inauguration day are doing.
Either way, once again, Trump proves his voters elected him to enforce a specific social order. PERIOD. FULL STOP. And there are levels of survival they are willing to accept in order to get it.
We shouldn't leave without pointing out that you can't revoke the citizenship of a natural-born American, and anyone who fails to understand both this essential aspect of US citizenship law AND the First Amendment protection of flag-burning rights as established in Texas vs. Johnson 1989 (with a vote on the side of freedom from Antonin Scalia, who Trump has defined as his ideal justice) should not be the president.
Isaac: Yes, it is:
4 U.S. Code § 8
….(k)The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning.
(Added Pub. L. 105–225, § 2(a), Aug. 12, 1998, 112 Stat. 1497.)
H/T Show Me Progress for already having this posted this morning.
-Doug in Oakland
You can take my burning flag from my charred dead hands...........
What next, flag lapel pins? Flag shirts going thru the washer?
I know, An executive Order from the Dear Cheeto that no one will manufacture the flag outside the United States by penalty of waterboarding once a week for 10 years while in Gitmo.
I have served, risk life and sacrificed for this country under 3 presidents. I believe I have the freedom to express myself. The only problem is that with my freedom. I differ from conservatives who will not use their freedoms with responsibility.
Because I can burn a flag doesn't mean that is the action or display I would take.
Stay tuned to see what Trump's next Executive Tweet Order is decreed. Possibly on punishment over state seceding and no more state rights.
There is nothing new about Conservatives out of federal power that go extreme in faor of state rights. Yet when they have Federal majorities. State rights are like EPA regs, just pestilence in their way.
Neo Tuxedo, for using that quote from ARMITAGE III....you get the win for best comment of the day.
AMEN!
As others have mentioned, burning a US flag is the proper way to dispose of it (you're also supposed to bury the ashes).
But here's the other part of proper flag etiquette that the far Right disobeys all the time. You aren't supposed to make clothes out of the Stars and Stripes. You aren't supposed to fly it from your fucking truck. And you're not supposed to fly it at night (unless illuminated, so if it's on your truck, you need to illuminate it, which makes it a moving violation, so double infrac). You aren't supposed to fly it in inclement weather (again, truck flags are a double infrac in rain). You may not wash the flag (so if it's on your clothing, that's a double infrac).
I, for one, welcome the Orange Overlord's plan to strip citizenship from all those faux patriots, alt-right, or whatever they're calling the scum these days.
Good morning, Mr. Glass.
"Oh noes! The flag's on fire! Smother it with that copy of the Constitution!"
Be seeing you.
All these tweets are smoke and mirrors. His intent is to privatize the Presidency, and legalize corruption. The rest is scraps thrown to the bobbleheads and media jackals to fight over while he accomplishes his task. Trust me, not staying focused on the conflicts of interest is missing the ONLY story.
Flag desecration? I give you Princess Sparkle Pony:
http://sparklepony.blogspot.com/2005/09/desecration-true-story-ripped-from.html
-Doug in Oakland
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