It's not just yours...

The other day, a neighbor of mine decided to fly the flag upside down, feeling that the country is in distress. I won't lie; this pissed me off. Big time.

Sure, our country is in a mess right now...but it's mostly a mess that we brought upon ourselves. Are we in distress? Hell no. Most of our problems are easily fixed if We The People WANT to fix them...but we don't...otherwise we would.

Before I go any further, allow me to attempt to demonstrate what the flag means to me. I've spend some fair chunks of time overseas. When I return home, I, admittedly, get a lump in my throat when I see our flag. That's right; OUR flag. It is a symbolic representation of our country, it's people, and it's history.

When I was a kid, I was in the Cub Scouts and the Boy Scouts. At that point in time, I'd have recommended the experience for every boy. It was a positive experience for me. Aside from studying history in school and at home, I learned more in the scouts. One of the many things we learned was flag etiquette. We learned when and how to fly the flag. We learned that it's not to touch the ground. Most of all, we learned to respect the flag and what it symbolizes.

My senior year in high school, they had us take the ASVAB (Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery) exam. I scored ridiculously high on it. So high, in fact, that I was asked to take it again in a different format, just to see if my score was as high as it appeared. It was. I was planning on a military career. I hated school and mostly wanted to be a musician, so I figured the Air Force Band was the route for me. All of the branches of the military openly and actively tried to recruit me. Top 3rd of my class, with honors, and a super high ASVAB score made me look like a mighty good catch to them. My father had been a captain in the Army, my uncle a captain in the old Army Air Corps, and dad had even been physician to the Eisenhower family. Alas, it wasn't meant to be. I was disqualified due to health issues.

This didn't dampen my love and respect for flag and country. It was a different time then...but not so much different. Reagan was in the White House. Anyone who remembers Reagan as anything but a puppet president, doing the bidding of his hidden corporate handlers, is a fool. Don't believe me? Listen to some of the old early 80s punk rock. You'll get your history lesson right there.

Lots of my friends went into the military. It made sense. Where we grew up, the steel mills were already vanishing and jobs were becoming scarce. The military, which is voluntary, was a good career path for many. It opened up doors that would have otherwise remained closed to many of these kids. Some went career military, like my best friend, and some just did short 4 year stints.

I've been lucky in that I've always had a lot of friends. The only downside to this has been that over the years, I've had to bury many of them. Most have died in ways that they shouldn't have. Some were in accidents, some with diseases, some through foul play.

Sadly, some were killed in active duty. Some had the misfortune of stepping on a land mine. More sad still, some came home from the wars, and couldn't cope. Booze and/drugs numbed the pain for some. For some, even that wasn't enough. They came home and eventually took their own lives.

It's for all of these friends and more that I dedicate this.

To those of you who feel that hanging OUR flag upside down, which is a distress signal, is in any way, shape or form, appropriate during these times...you couldn't be more wrong. Look into the eyes of a veteran suffering from PTSD and ask yourself if they'd appreciate your actions. If they didn't slap you, they would probably, at the very least, call you a whiney fucking cry baby. And they would be right to do so!

Because, that's exactly what you people are. You feel that you're not getting your way, so you throw a tantrum. You love to complain about the situation but never have a solution. Worse yet, you do nothing to improve the situation. Instead, you do stupid things like fly the flag upside down. This shows you for who you are.

The morons in Congress were elected by YOU. The idiots who have financially shut down our government were elected by YOU. They too are whiney, sniveling motherfuckers who aren't getting their way, so they act rashly. This behavior is NOT in the best interests of this country or it's people.

When I see you fly the flag, OUR flag, upside down, it infuriates me. I take it as a slap in the face to every veteran I have ever known. I see it as spitting on the graves of my fallen friends. I take it as a personal insult as an American.

Americans are not quitters. That's NOT who we are. That's not how we're raised. When things get tough, WE get tougher! We don't just sit at home and bitch, moan, and complain and then go hang OUR flag upside down in defeat. Yeah...that's what you're doing. You're being quitters. Or worse, attention whores.

Sure, you'll argue that you're "patriots" and "real" Americans. But you just don't get it...do you? You're an angry, loud, messy minority. You're angry because it takes being more than white to get along. You ramble on about your nationalistic pride while driving your foreign cars, watching foreign-made TVs, and spewing your nationalistic vitriol on foreign-made computers and cell phones. What you seem to forget is that the people that you claim as heroes are the same ones who sold our country to the highest bidders. The exact same people who outsource American jobs and hire illegal immigrants to work American jobs. The same people who have gone out of their way to destroy American unions. If you had any clue of the history of this country, you would be ashamed of yourselves and your actions. But no...you don't. It's EASIER to complain than to actually do something. Rather than read an in-depth article on local and/or foreign affairs, you take a quick glance at sensationalized tabloid headlines. Rather than DO something productive, you'll watch "reality TV" and laugh at the goons and hillbillies...all the while not realizing that you're laughing at yourselves. Because that's who you are.

I don't say that you all are bad people. I don't believe that for a second. But you've allowed yourselves to be roped in by bullshit. These are scary times, for sure...but don't believe in the boogey man because someone tells you to. There is no boogey man...and currently, no reason to hang OUR flag upside down. The US is NOT in distress. We're having a tough time...because we all allowed it to happen. If you voted for these morons, take some responsibility. Quit trying to say it's the other guy's fault. The GOP in the House of Representatives shut down the government. No one else. Our President (yeah...guess what, he's YOUR President too) isn't going to play the game and he's showed a rare bit of balls so far in his dealings with Boehner & Co. We ALL want a solution for this mess but we're not going to negotiate with political terrorists who are threatening the future of this country because they're not getting their way. And it's still no reason to fly OUR flag upside down.

P.S.

I didn't name names simply because I really do like the people mentioned above. I don't necessarily agree with you but I still like you. I just don't like you disrespecting OUR flag and OUR country and it's people by doing so.