Classy: OccupyCharlotte Protesters Burn American Flags

Classy: OccupyCharlotte Protesters Burn American Flags

Burn all the flags you want, asshats. Thats the way to win freinds and influence people.
You can also wrap the flag around your neck before lighting it, too.

Flaunt the Flag

Patriotic Americans all across the nation are being called on to 'flaunt the American flag' on Wednesday, May 12, 2010 by wearing patriotic-themed clothing such as American flag style shirts, blouses, ties or jackets; American flag lapel pins or brooches; and by displaying the American flag at home, on your car or at your desk at work. You can even carry an American flag with you as you make your rounds on Wednesday and really flaunt that flag!

This is being done as a show of support for the American families in Morgan Hill, California whose students attending Live Oak High School were ordered to remove their American flag style shirts so as to not offend Mexican students on Cinco de Mayo last week.

Offended Mexican students walked out of class the next day and staged a protest march demanding "respect" for "our holiday" by demanding Americans not display the American flag on American soil.

One protester, Luis Jimenez, was videotaped by KNTV-TV saying, "Yesterday, it was our holiday, Cinco de Mayo. All of, like, the Americans thought they could wear their flags and just flaunt them in front of us."

Another Mexican protester was videotaped by KRON-TV ripping an American flag out of the hands of an American that same day.

In response, please send this message: We Americans will flaunt our flag on our soil anytime we please. If some folks don't like that, we have an old saying for them, "America, love it or leave it!"

Please e-mail and post this call to action on blogs, Facebook, Twitter and send it to your local and national Tea Party groups and talk radio hosts.

(Note to all the race-baiting liberals and weak-kneed David Brooks types, this is not about race, or even about Mexico. This is about Americans standing up for America on American soil. If you can't handle displays of patriotism, the same message above applies to you too.)

If anyone asks who started this and why May 12, just say it was started by a TEA-ed off American and May 12 just seems like a good day to wear the red, white and blue.

Maybe Some ACORN Scum

H/T FreeRepublic

Vandals burn Marine's flag

Leah Ward's American flag stood at the end of her driveway in Colebook, a tribute to her husband, a Marine serving in Iraq.This week, someone burned it, the second act of vandalism involving the flag since June. Ward said it's a painful reminder that not everyone supports the troops. She's offering a $650 reward for information leading to the arrest of the person or people responsible.

Ward, of 113A Beech Hill Road, woke up Monday morning to find the flag at the end of her driveway destroyed by fire. All that remained was a smoldering wooden flagpole and a secondary flag, a charred plastic “Marines” banner.

“I couldn't believe it,” Ward said. “Everytime I looked at that flag, I thought of my husband (Gunnery Sgt. Daniel Ward). Right now, I struggle to look at it.”

Desecration of the American flag is a Class A misdemeanor in Connecticut, the most serious of charges before a crime becomes a felony, state police Lt. J. Paul Vance said Thursday. It's punishable by up to one year in jail or a fine of up to $2,000.

Even as opposition to the Iraq war has grown in recent years, Vance said that crimes that involve vandalism of the American flag remain rare in Connecticut.Vance said state police would try to identify the person or people responsible. Police analyze evidence at the scene, and look for potential witnesses. That may be difficult in this remote part of Colebrook near the Massachusetts line.

The same flag was torn down and thrown in the woods in June when Ward, a 16-year member of the Air Force reserves, was in South Korea for training. Anyone with information can call State Police Troop B in Canaan at (860) 824-2500.

Mark Alexander on Colonel Barfoot

Profiles of Valor: Col. Van Barfoot

This is not the usual profile of valor. This is the story of a highly decorated 90-year-old World War II and Vietnam vet fighting his homeowner’s association to keep his flagpole. Col. Van Barfoot has been awarded more than 20 medals, including three Purple Hearts, the Bronze Star, the Silver Star, the Legion of Merit and the Medal of Honor, and is thought to be the most decorated living combat veteran.

Barfoot recently placed a flagpole and U.S. flag outside his home near Richmond, Virginia. The homeowner’s association guidelines don’t expressly forbid flagpoles but say they must be “aesthetically appropriate.” Apparently, that means only short poles on porches. The association issued a statement saying, “This is not about the American flag. This is about a flagpole… We are a neighborhood of patriotic Americans, many of whom have served our country in the military as Col. Barfoot has done…” They might try serving it again by dropping this outrageous request.

Barfoot’s story is also quite a contrast with that of our current commander in chief, who, while at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska, refused to be photographed with the F-22 that he fought so hard to cancel.

Some Sentences Shouldn't Even Be Written

Read this sentence and tell me why you should not be reading it:

One of this country's last remaining WWII Medal of Honor recipients is being asked to remove a flagpole from his property.

Take the Poll

Gathering of Eagles: NY
Fighting the Insurgency at Home
Should WWII Medal of Honor Hero Be Allowed To Fly His Flag?
December 3, 2009

Col. Van T. Barfoot, Rtd., is a 90 year young veteran of WWII, Korea and Vietnam. Never a shirker from his duty he is fighting one more war today, the Battle of Henrico County.
One note of warning to the Sussex Square Homeowners Association; “I think you picked a fight with the wrong guy!”

MoH Recipient Has Flagpole Issues

WWII MEDAL OF HONOR WINNER FACES SUIT OVER HIS FLAG-FLYING
By Zinie Chen Sampson The Associated Press
RICHMOND

A 90-year-old Army veteran who won the Medal of Honor during World War II is battling his neighborhood association for what he says is his right to fly the American flag from a pole in his front yard.
Col. Van T. Barfoot says he erected the 21-foot flagpole in September, raising the flag daily at sunrise and retiring it at sunset.
The Sussex Square homeowners’ association told him recently that the free-standing pole violates the townhouse neighborhood’s aesthetic guidelines and ordered him to remove it by 5 p.m. Friday or face a lawsuit.
“I don’t have any qualms with their authority, but the thing about it is that I cannot get enough conversation out of them where we can try to work out a solution,” Barfoot said Wednesday in a telephone interview.
The homeowners’ association said they denied a previous request by Barfoot to erect the flagpole but that he put it up anyway, according to a statement issued by its lawyer Sandy Bowen. The statement says Barfoot can display an American flag, as long as it’s in a way that conforms with association rules.
“This is not about the American flag. This is about a flagpole,” the statement reads. Barfoot, who moved into his townhouse in June, won his medal for actions near Carano, Italy, in 1944 and is one of about 90 surviving Medal of Honor winners. He also won the Purple Heart and other decorations, and served in Korea and Vietnam before retiring from the service in 1974.
“I’ve flown the flag at my home as long as I can remember,” said Barfoot, who lived in rural Amelia County before moving to suburban Richmond. “This is the first time in the last 36 years that I’ve been unable to put my flag up on the same pole, the same staff and take it down when it’s time to come down.”
Neighbors largely have expressed their support, but he realizes that ultimately it’s up to the nine-member association board whether they will grant an exception to the rules.
“Emotional torture is what they’ve done to my father,” said his daughter, Margaret Nicholls. “He has lost sleep; he worries about it constantly. He just doesn’t understand. He thinks that if it’s on his property they can’t tell him what to do.”

Henrico County MoH Recipient Has Flag Issues

Homeowners Associations are like this, yeah they are.

The Barfoot family is accepting donations from supporters but wants the money to go to the USO, the military service organization.
"We want the money to go the families of servicemen, not us," said Margaret Nicholls, Col. Van T. Barfoot's daughter.
The homeowners association in his western Henrico County community wants Barfoot, 90, a Medal of Honor recipient, to remove a freestanding flagpole that he erected in his yard, and from which he flies the American flag daily.
Checks should be made out to the USO and sent to: Stand Tall for Colonel Barfoot, c/o The Hoople Group, 12105 Browning Court, Richmond, Va. 23233.
The Hoople Group also is serving as a clearinghouse for telephone calls, letters and e-mails of support

Governor Timmeh is a credit to Virginia....

Governor Timmeh is the DNC Chairman. HIS employees determined that the above piece was worthy of being a "finalist" in their contest.

HE is one of the judges. Will he make a comment about the flag desecration?

From Politico:

According to the Organizing for American Web site, the 20 finalists in the “Health Reform Video Challenge” were chosen by a panel of “qualified” Democratic National Committee “employee judges.”

According to the OFA Web site, the 20 finalists will be judged by the public and a panel of experts that includes DNC Chairman Tim Kaine, Obama campaign chief David Plouffe, Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), singer will.i.am and Hollywood stars Rosario Dawson and Dule Hill.

This Is A Great Video

Flying Old Glory

If you are moved to patriotism, especially this Memorial Day, and wish to display the Flag,
here are the rules......

Although it's unlikely that anybody will raise a fuss about how you fly the flag, its display and even your conduct regarding it is codified in national law. If you want to read the specifics, see U.S. Code, Title 36, Patriotic Societies and Observances, Chapter 10, Patriotic Customs.

So if you're flying the flag this Memorial Day--rather, if you're displaying it, that's the proper term--it couldn't hurt to display by the rules. Here, then, follows a brief summary of the U.S. Flag Code.

Flag Holidays
Memorial Day is a flag holiday--one of 17 days specifically designated in the code on which citizens are encouraged to display the flag, if they're not in the habit of doing so daily.

Flag holidays are as follows:
1. New Year's Day - Jan. 1
2. Inauguration Day - Jan. 20
3. Lincoln's Birthday - Feb. 12
4. Washington's Birthday - third Monday in February
5. Easter Sunday - (variable)
6. Mother's Day - second Sunday in May
7. Armed Forces Day - third Saturday in May
8. Memorial Day (half-staff until noon) - last Monday in May
9. Flag Day - June 14
10. Independence Day - July 4
11. Labor Day - first Monday in September
12. Constitution Day - Sept. 17
13. Columbus Day - second Monday in October
14. Navy Day - Oct. 27
15. Veterans Day - Nov. 11
16. Thanksgiving Day - fourth Thursday in November
17. Christmas Day - Dec. 25

The code also urges citizens to display the flag on additional days that are proclaimed by the president of the United States, on days that commemorate the date in which their state was admitted to the union and on specific state holidays.

Manner of Display

• The flag should be hoisted briskly at dawn and lowered ceremoniously at dusk. The flag should be displayed at night only if it is lighted dramatically, as from below. To fly the flag at half-staff, raise it briskly to the top of the pole, keep it there for a moment and then lower it to half-staff. Before taking the flag down for the day, return it briefly to the top of the pole.

• The flag should not be displayed on days when the weather is inclement, except when an all-weather flag is used.

• When the flag is displayed from a staff projecting horizontally or at an angle, the union (the blue rectangle on which stars are embroidered or fastened) should be at the staff's peak, unless the flag is being flown at half-staff.

• When displayed horizontally against a wall the union should be to the left of the observer, looking from the street or in the audience. The same holds when a flag is displayed horizontally in a window. When the flag is displayed vertically against a wall, the union is also to the observer's left. Likewise, when a flag is hung vertically in a window.

• When displayed directly over a street, the flag is hung vertically, and it is centered in the street with the union aligned with the north or east. In a north/south street, this means the flag is hung across the street with the union on the east side of the street. Conversely, on an east/west street, the union is on the north side of the street.

• For visual reference on all of this, visit the American Legion Web site.

Prohibitions

• Never use the flag for advertising purposes, as drapery, linens or as clothing, or print it on items soon to be discarded--napkins and paper plates, for example. It should not be used as part of a uniform--athletic or otherwise, unless you are a member of the military, a patriotic organization, police force, fire department or rescue/ambulance squad.

• Never attach a flag directly to a vehicle or drape it over a vehicle. Instead, the flag should be attached to a staff secured to a vehicle's chassis or to the right front fender. The flag should be displayed on floats in a similar manner. When bunting is used for patriotic display instead of a flag, the colors are arranged from top to bottom: blue, white and red.

• Never display the flag in a manner in which it is easily damaged or with it touching the ground.

• Never display the flag upside down--as this is a distress signal.

In Patriotic Observance
In unabashedly old-fashioned and refreshingly blunt language the code calls on all those present to recognize the flag when it passes as part of a holiday parade:

• Stand.

• Place your right hand over your heart. And in particular, the code says: "Men not in uniform should remove their headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart." Military personnel in uniform should "render the military salute."

From Blackfive

The Wolf at Blackfive caught this.

From the Denver Post:
Eighth-grade patriot receives flag from Iraq. Go read it.

At the beginning of the school year, Jeff asked the principal if he could have the responsibility of putting the U.S. flag up and taking it down every day at school.

Brown Hound: Saluting out of Uniform

Brown Hound has some good news for vets and military members. Stand up and Salute!


Brown Hound: Saluting out of Uniform