Is Jose Cardenal still around? He once went out to left field for a Cubs game, closed his eyes during the United States of America National Anthem, hand over heart as is expected of baseball players playing the national pastime. He might have only been closing one eye, the wonderful man. "Oh say, can you see? By the dawn's early light . . ." [one-eyed. wonderful. by dawn's early light.]
Similarly, burning a stupid piece of cloth on a stick should carry the same significance. Now, Francis Scott Key may have been the lily-livered patriot when he wrote that song, lovely and easy to sing as it is, but Jose turned it into something worthy of being emblematic of a nation. Is a stupid song or piece of cloth then necessary to express some sort of loyalty to an emblem? Yeah. Are they necessary to express loyalty to a community or a persona? I don't know. I guess the question is, just what is a nation? What should we give emblematic significance to, on a community scale or on a personal scale. I love Janet Jackson. Her songs have a personal significance for me. But if you hate Janet Jackson, I would take no offense at you destroying a worthless piece of plastic if that is what you want to do, after all, I have my own CD's that I revere and protect. And as in most things that affect the community as a whole, democratically elected officials [in a Republic] should not be too shy in making those decisions. Religious emblems, of course, are under the aegis of a church, by whatever governance each church sees fit to have. Religion is by definition [yeah, I am issuing the oft-repeated edict] a personal relationship with God, on a universal scale. Therefore [I am tired of using that word] religious emblems supported by institutions secularly recognized as legitimate churches should be respected by all. Notice that church and state are now separate, otherwise the preceding statement would make no sense. I realize this now gives churches a reason to exist, but I've already said, "words are cheap, keep your church" before. Islam claims that Church and State are one and the same. They also don't believe in interest on a monetary loan. There's a very nice disproof of that in one of the newsgroups, and I believe I wrote a paper using the example of hats on More's _Utopia_ that led to the disproof. And since I'm the one people seem to look to to make the really really hard decisions, I would say that Mohammed was delusional as far as economics are concerned. Draconian social laws may work, who knows, the Islamic countries seem to have lived with them for a long time [they had Jews to handle the money, boss]. Islam may have to trust me on this one, but I believe that the phrasing should be, "there should be no separation of God and State", which allows for separation of church and state and provides a mechanism whereby each secular institution (church, government) is a check on the other. God is still God, in each. As long as we're talking Elvis, it becomes clear to me that the art is to tell the truth with a lie, not to tell another lie with a lie, but Darwin will take care of that in time.
