Tuesday, July 9, 2013

America, Is the "Union Down" ?

THE FLAG CODE
Title 36, U.S.C., Chapter 10 
As amended by P.L. 344, 94th Congress
Approved July 7, 1976

§ 176. Respect for flag: No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
(a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
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It was 11pm on Independence Day in Pittsburg, KS. There were 4th of July sounds of missiles, firecrackers, rockets exploding in the air and many flashes of light over the tree lines. And as my wife and I sat on our screened back porch in our quiet safe small town neighborhood, my thoughts turned back to what the people of revolutionary days when those sounds that were heard in the dark. In those days, actual weapons were being fired and American men and women dying on our soil to gain the freedoms that most of us take for granted.

What they struggled, fought and died for, we forget to easily and just assume that we will always have it. We wake up in the morning and have the freedom to explore, make money, produce art, speak freely yet we abuse those rights by forgetting what they cost. Too often we don't speak or don't stand because we are afraid of what someone else might think or say. My friends this nation is in trouble.

We have massive debt that we will NEVER be able to get out from under. More people are on poverty than in the history of this nation. The work force is getting smaller and smaller. Inflation is causing prices to go up and quality and quantity to go down. We are giving billions of dollars we do not have to Islamic extremest factions in the middle east. We are a more divided country. Politicians are corrupt liars that do not serve the will of the people but the will of the dollar. Those in politics that are honest and firm in their beliefs (aka Ted Cruz) are labeled as right wing wacko tea baggers. We get more upset about what Paula Dean said years ago than we get about the lies told by the President, Secretary of State and the UN Ambassador about what really happened in Benghazi. We have a Secretary of State that boldly scolds when asked for the truth lashes out "WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE!". We have politicians in Texas putting in a catheter so she can filibuster a bill that want to outlaw abortion after 20 weeks. Not to ban it completely but ban it only after 5 MONTHS. This list could  go on and on...

And while all of this is happening, God and religious faith is locked out of our schools, and town squares and our television. We have become so out of our minds that a baseball team that put a small cross in the dirt on the pitchers mound to honor one of their great losses, is ordered to remove it. My friends, this nation IS in distress and we sail along like nothing is wrong and we sit in the corner silenced. Wake up America. I know that sounds so cliche and is so over used but we seriously need to wake up.

The video below is from Glen Becks show in Utah on July 6. Hidden meaning? I don't think it's hidden at all. We are a nation in distress. Freedom is in distress. To the soldiers "raising" the flag it is normal, but for us watching, there is distress. Maybe we should all begin to hang our flags upside down? Please watch this, not only is it a beautiful version of "America The Beautiful" but it's almost a sad beauty based on the state of our nation today.

“Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”
―Dietrich Bonhoeffer




It is not a sign of disrespect but simple a sign of distress.