Flag Burning

Streak's Blog alerted me to this event going on in our congress. A few highlight of the article are

"Ask the men and women who stood on top of the [World] Trade Center," said Rep. Randy [Duke] Cunningham, R-California. "Ask them and they will tell you: pass this amendment."

and

But Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-New York, said, "If the flag needs protection at all, it needs protection from members of Congress who value the symbol more than the freedoms that the flag represents."

Of all the things our country needs to be spending its time on the best we can come up with is an amendment banning flag burning. I'd be interested to know the cost of putting this through even if it doesn't get passed. Here is a site where you can see how the vote came out. I think we need to make sure we write some letters letting our reps know how rediculous it is for us to have men and women dying in combat for freedom and we're spending time, money, and political capital to introduce an amendment that would LIMIT rights. Evidently congress has decided that the bill of rights now needs to be used to LIMIT rights rather than protect them. Protection of an object, even if it is a symbol, over the civil rights of our citizens is an amazing place for us to be.