The link to Central Michigan caught my eye, about an hour from where I live, and I was amazed that there would be any problems with American flags in Michigan anywhere, and if there were, that it was not big news out here because a lot of people here go to CMU.
As I read the Central Michigan article linked below, it appears that they are protesting "condemned university departments for allegedly ordering the removal of patriotic symbols from residence hall doors Monday." Allegedly. And reading the whole article - which is not well written by the student writer - seems to say that this protest is about alleged incidents at other schools, Texas A&M being named, and that situation resolved. As far as flags in central and western Michigan, and at Grand Valley State University where I take classes on Thursday, flags are everywhere. 40-50% of all homes, and 75-80% of all businesses have flags up, and my home and where I work are included in those, and an ever increasing number of cars have flags, maybe up to 50% right now, both of cars included. The student parking lot at GVSU is a sea of flags, window flags as well as decals. Wherever I have traveled in Michigan I see flags everywhere; you might recall I took Gage to the UM game against Western and we brought flags, two of us amongst tens of thousands with flags (the attendance that day being 108,000). I was in Minnesota last weekend and was struck by the relative absence of flags displayed at homes and businesses, certainly a lack by Michigan standards. The cars however had a flags. For whatever it is worth. http://www.cm-life.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2001/10/24/3bd63a75540ef
