Whose Flag Is This, Anyway?

Starting about the time of early Ronald Reagan, the Republican Right played capture-the-flag with Old Glory. If you were a true patriot, you gave all your speeches before massed American flags and wore the symbol of one in your lapel. And, of course, to be a true patriot meant also that you were a member of the Republican Right. No other Americans admitted to the brotherhood and sisterhood of patriotism.

Predictably, this would come to an accusation -- what substitutes for serious debate these days -- that Senator Barack Obama was not wearing a flag pin and therefore, ipso facto, was no patriot.

So, here's a modest proposal. All of us who support Barack Obama for president should now wear flag pins. This will signal that we are all just as patriotic as anyone on the right. And it will signal that we are all for Obama. If we all do this, then when we see a flag pin we will know we are seeing another Obama supporter.

Go right out now and buy a pocketful of flag pins. Give them to all your friends. Show your support for America and for Obama. I've got mine on. It's our flag too!

But, you might ask, what about those flag wavers on the right? That's their problem.

Comments

[Pragman]

I think Obama should show up at the next debate wearing TWO flag pins on his lapel. He can then say, "See? According to your logic, I'm now TWICE as patriotic".

[magen]

I'm gonna get a Flava Flav clock sized lapel pin.

[ReElectNoOne]

As freedom of expression dictates, to wear or not wear is protected and anyone who would chastise any one from that expression is, in it's self un American.

Those on the wrong ( right ) who speak ill of any American who expressed his or herself by not wearing a flag dishonor the flag they are wearing.

I respect Obama for being an individual and not a "me to" patriot. Actions speak louder than pins.

Bush, I'm sure, wore a pin every time he trampled on our Constitution.

[flatus]

The only way that we would be able to wear a flag pin and not be mistaken for a neocon is to make sure that we do not groom ourselves to the point of being anal about it.

[genseric13]

Why not fly the Confederate flag instead. After all, slavery existed under the US flag for 90 years and the British flag for about as long. Slavery never existed under the Confederate battle flag and only 4 years under the Confederate government flag.

[Durango]

I started flying the American flag back in the Reagan period.

I didn't want the bastards to think they had a lock on patriotism.

The American flag is not a fascist symbol. It is every bit as much mine as it is yours.

No matter what your political affiliation.

[Bluedanube]

Republicans merely tap into a rampant virile nationalism in the American psyche. Hitler did much the same thing in Germany.

[Bluedanube]

We wear flag pins and the Republicans begin wearing arm bands. We put on arms bands and the Republicans begin wearing uniforms. Where does it end?

[KPinSEA]

Are there Constitution lapel pins? Because if there's a symbol I'd like to show my affection for, it's the Bill of Rights, not a battle flag.

Democrats in general aren't good little Party members that march in lockstep to leadership's wardrobe suggestions. I hate the very idea of linking patriotism to a flag pin, and validating the ugly notion that I'm only sufficiently American when I ape the behavior of others is surrender monkey mentality at its worst.

[skibum49]

Constitution Lapel Pins? Ask and ye shal receive

http://www.pinsforpatriots.com/constitution-goldplated.html

I'm sure there are many others that sell them. This just happens to be the first place the google gave me.

[emjay1954]

Oscar Wilde said it best. "Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious."

[sa]

the republicans have conducted
so much shiite in the name of patriotism
and the flag, that their lies have seemed
to spill over onto the flag.

the flag seems tarnished -
a lie, like republicans.

say what you will,
but republicans owning the flag
have given it a cancer.

i'm starting to cringe when i see it
because it seems now a tool for lying.

[shades3]

AND the Chinese manufacturers of the pop-metal flag pin need to boost their sales.
They will be laughing all the way to the bank.
Patriotism is not about pins, or putting your hand over your heart, or saying "We're #1" or an;y of the other superficial gestures that seem to be demanded by the Right.
Patriotism is about action, not empty, cheap gestures.
Thank you Mr. Hart for putting this whole ridiculous controversey into perspective.
President Bush and his gang o' thieves have been wearing flag pins while they sent men and women to war on a lie, and robbed the national treasury. That should say all you need to know about who actually loves their country.

[white mende man]

I don't need a friggin flag pin to show how patriotic i am nor do i need to wear my religion on my sleeve to show what a great christian i am. somewhere along the way the neo-cons have hijacked this great country and they have bankrupt it morally and economically. only my vote will put them in their place and i intend to let my voice do the talking not my lapel pin or my sleeve.

[OlongapoEd]

PATRIOT, n. One to whom the interests of a part seem superior to those of the whole. The dupe of statesmen and the tool of conquerors.

PATRIOTISM, n. Combustible rubbish read to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name.

In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.

---Ambrose Bierce

[3reddogs]

The only problem I have with this suggestion is that I doubt I could find a flag pin that wasn't made in Taiwan or China!