Disgusting, Disgraceful, and Disturbing...

Actually, to show how little you know. One, a half mast flag shows respect for something that has just died, in this case our nation. Two, upside down means there is an emergency, our nation is in a crisis now that bush is back in office.

Maybe so Ryen.. .but that fucking tie dye jetpack.... man that shit just pisses me off!

For christ sake, you know how hard it is to match your shoes to that?? It's fashion terrorism I tell you! I mean it shows a total disrepect for the Fab Five for a start.. and I think the creator should be hung from the Arc-De-Linden by his left testicle for it!

Siggy.

*snort*

Right there with ya, Siggy -- I can't stand tye-dye in any permutation!! Having said that, I think the US flag shown as displayed in a state of both half-staff, and in distress position is a dignified and appropriate use of the flag (whether one agrees with it's message or not)

I'm far more offended when I see the American flag being used as clothing, which is against US title code usage of the flag. The distress and half-staff signal are infact legitimate methods of display. A US flag as a bikini (no matter how attractive) is not.

I've already placed an upside flag in my front window in RL as a PATRIOTIC display of my concern for the direction this nation has taken. As a proud American it's my choice and duty.

I would just like to point out that Bush was never elected the first time. He was appointed by the Supreme Court. So this would be the first time he was elected. IMHO During the first four years the ppl around the world who many ppl here say hate americans probably didnt hate the american ppl but instead hated the administration of Bush and his crime family. With it now apparent that a majority of the voters are stupid( i pray that its just a majority of ppl who voted and not an actual majority of the population of the US) they have every reason to hate the ppl of the US also. Bush is destroying this country and if you dont see it you deserve to be drafted to go die for the oil loving whores in the white house. I on the other hand will be in brazil (when the draft is brought back, not if, WHEN) content in the knowledge that i voted for the other guy. You may say Bush and Kerry where the same when it came to their policys but for four years i have seen the path bush has been putting this country on and if you dont think things will be diffrent with Kerry as president your insane.

I would like to leave you with a list of 110 reasons from Air America Radio's Morning Sedition why the bush crime family should not have been elected.

Morning Sedition's List of 110 Reasons Bush Must Go

On Iraq – He failed to build a real international coalition prior to the Iraq invasion, forcing the US to shoulder the full cost and consequences of the war.



On Terror – He allowed several members of the bin Laden family to leave the country just days after 9/11, without being questioned by the FBI.



On Homeland Security - He focused on missile defense at the expense of counter terrorism prior to 9/11, and continued to do so despite the poor test results.



On the Environment - He limited the public challenges to logging projects and increased logging in protected areas, including Alaska’s Tongass National Forest.



On Tax Policy – He passed successive tax cuts largely responsible for turning a surplus of 5-trillion dollars into a projected deficit of $4.3 TRILLION



On Education - He froze Teacher Quality Grants, cutting training to 30-thousand teachers and leaving 92-thousand fewer teachers trained than promised in his 2000 pledge to the nation.



On Foreign Policy – He ignored the Middle East Peace Process, which has deteriorated with no strategy.



On Health Care – He was dishonest to Americans regarding the cost of Medicare - saying it would cost $400 billion, although it’s real cost will be $500 billion over a 10-year period.



On Fiscal Discipline – He spent 6.5 BILLION dollars on nuclear weapons - 50% more than during the cold war - but cheated our troops out of body armor.



On Economics – He pledged a “Jobs and Growth” package that has fallen roughly one million jobs short of his promise.



On Iraq – He chose to include discredited intelligence concerning Nigerian Yellow Cake in his 2003 State of the Union, in order to sell the war to the American people.



On Afghanistan – He failed to provide security outside of Kabul, leaving nearly 80% of the population unprotected from warlords and militias.



On Intelligence- He allowed Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld to create “The Office of Special Plans” in order to provide politically advantageous intelligence.



On Foreign Relations – He sided with trade-partner China against a democratic referendum by Taiwan.



On Nuclear Proliferation – He claimed John Kerry would let Europe determine America’s defenses, then allowed Europe to lead the anti-Iranian nuke efforts.



On Job Creation – He signed a report that endorsed outsourcing, with thousands of American workers having their jobs shipped overseas.



On the Economy – He issued inaccurate budget forecasts with proposals to reduce the deficit, leaving out the cost of the war in Iraq, Afghanistan reconstruction and the funding of Homeland Security.



On Education – He under-funded his own “No Child Left Behind” program by more than 25-billion dollars



On Taxation – He passed tax cuts for the top 1-percent of income earners in the country.



On Chemical Terrorism – Instead of finding the culprit behind the 2001 anthrax mailings, he encouraged his administration to find any possible link between Iraq and the attacks. He continued to do so even after scientists determined that the lethal germ was an American strain.



On Iraq – He ignored the advice of General Eric Shinseki regarding the need for more troops in Iraq.



On National Security – He denied documents to the 9/11 Commission and only relented after a threatened subpoena.



On Afghanistan – He relied too heavily on locally trained troops to fill the void once US forces were relocated to Iraq.



On Osama bin Laden – He refused to commit ground troops to the capture of bin Laden when he was cornered in Nov 2001.



On Intelligence – He opposed an independent inquiry into the intelligence failures regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction.



On Foreign Policy – He failed to develop a specific plan for dealing with North Korea, a rogue nation that possesses WMDs.



On Trade – He instituted steel tariffs, deemed illegal by the World Trade Organization.



On Education – He broke his campaign pledge to increase size of Pell Grants, which are awarded to students based on need.



On the Environment – He abandoned the Kyoto Treaty, without offering an alternative for reducing greenhouse effect.



On Public Health - Allowing loopholes to persist in Mad-Cow regulations, while relaxing food-labeling restrictions on health claims.



On Iraq – He made the case for war based on incomplete, coerced, and ultimately erroneous intelligence about Weapons of Mass Destruction.



On Support for Troops – He did not equip our armed forces in Iraq with adequate body armor or armored humvees.



On Foreign Policy – He derided “nation-building” in the 2000 debates, then engaged American troops in one of the most explicit instances of nation building in American history



On Terrorism – He failed to pay attention to an August Sixth, 2001 PDB named “bin Laden Determined to Attack US.”



On Drugs – He allowed opium production to soar after the ouster of the Taliban.



On Fiscal Policy – He ran up record-breaking foreign debt proportions that threatens the stability of the global economy.



On the Environment – He cut clean air standards for aging power plants.



On Education – He signed off on the Fiscal Year 2005 budget proposing the smallest increase in education in nine years.



On Science – He falsely claimed the restrictions on stem cell research would not hamper medical progress.



On Osama bin Laden – He first said that bin Laden would be captured Dead or Alive; then, when he couldn’t be found, Bush told the American people – quote - “I’m not that concerned” with bin Laden – and quote - “I don’t worry about him much.”



On Iraq – He made the May First, 2003 announcement that “major combat operations in Iraq have ended.”



On Diplomacy – He failed to give UN weapons inspectors enough time to certify if weapons existed in Iraq.



On National Security – Before 9/11, White House policy was that al-Qaeda couldn’t attack without state sponsors, ignoring evidence of a growing threat not associated with Iraq or North Korea.



On the Economy – He claimed his 2003 tax cut would give 23-million small business owners an average savings of two-thousand dollars – knowing that 79% of business owners would receive less than that.



On Terrorism – He undermined military operations against terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere with the pre-emptive invasion of Iraq.



On Jobs – He ignored requests to extend unemployment benefits just as long-term unemployment hit a 20-year high.



On Education – He froze funding for after-school programs nationwide.



On Prescription Drugs – He reduced restrictions on improper drug advertising by 80%.



On the Environment – He reduced inspections, penalties for violations, and prosecution of environmental crimes.



On Biological Terrorism – He pushed for distribution of the smallpox vaccine, which was not proven necessary and has killed some of those who took it.



On Iraq – He approved the demobilization of the Iraq Army in May 2003, which was a reversal of an earlier position. It left hundreds of thousands of armed Iraqis disgruntled and unemployed, contributing significantly to the massive security problems for American.



On International Diplomacy - He refused to cede any control of post-invasion Iraq to the International community.



On the War on Terror – He diverted 700-million dollars from operations in Afghanistan into Iraq invasion planning without informing Congress.


On Free Speech – He shut down an Iraqi newspaper for inciting violence, which led to street fighting in Fallujah, inciting more violence than anything the newspaper wrote.


On Inter-Cabinet Relations – He told Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan about plans to invade Iraq before telling Secretary of State Colin Powell.



On the Environment – He weakened environmental standards for snowmobiles and other off-road vehicles.


On Energy – He opposed legislation that would require greater fuel efficiency for passenger cars.



On Public Safety – He withdrew public information on chemical plant dangers, previously used to hold facilities accountable for safety improvements.



On Fiscal Policy – He cut grants to state and local Government in Fiscal Year 2005, forcing states to make massive cuts in job training, education, housing and environmental protection.



On Free trade – He nominated Anthony Raimondo, a supporter of outsourcing, to be the new Manufacturing Czar.



On Iraq - He sold the war to the American People by claiming that the U-S would be greeted in Iraq as liberators.



On Iraq – He intends to ask Congress for 70-billion dollars more in Iraq war funds, pushing the total cost of the war to 225-billion dollars, far more than the $50 billion that the administration initially said it would cost.



On Iraq – He turned down three chances to capture terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi because he feared it would undercut the case for war in Iraq.


On Iraq - He had members of his administration tell the American people that Saddam Hussein possessed aluminum tubes that were “only suited for nuclear weapons programs” despite the fact that nuclear experts had already told them that the tubes could not be used for nuclear weapons


On Iraq – He did not safeguard sites once related to Iraq’s nuclear program, which led to widespread and systematic dismantling of nuclear-related equipment.



On Iraq - He awarded a multi-billion dollar, no-bid contract to Halliburton in Iraq. Halliburton is now under investigation for gouging American taxpayers with exorbitant bills for work in Iraq.


On Iraq - He ignored plans drawn up by the Army War College and other war planning agencies, which predicted most of the worst security and infrastructure problems America faced in the early days of the Iraqi occupation.



On Iraq - He disbanded the Sunni Baathist managers responsible for Iraq’s water, electricity, sewer system and all the other critical parts of that country’s infrastructure.



On Iraq - He told the American people that Iraq would pay for its own reconstruction with profits from Iraqi oil.



On Iraq – He failed to secure a weapons site in Iraq, leading to the theft of 380 tons of deadly high explosives, then attempted to cover it up.



On Homeland Security - He authorized a State Department report that erroneously low-balled the actual number of terrorist attacks in 2003.



On Homeland Security – He failed to secure America’s ports, with 20-thousand shipping containers coming into the country per day and only one-percent of them being inspected.



On Homeland Security – He agreed with Congress on a specific number of federal sky marshals, then cut that number by 20-percent in the 2005 fiscal year budget.


On Homeland Security- He secured less material with nuclear capability in the two years after September 11th than was secured in the two years before September 11th. Unsecured fissile material still exists in more than 140 countries worldwide.


On Homeland Security – He failed to catch the terrorists responsible for the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings.



On Homeland Security – He has not required the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to toughen security regulations at Nuclear Power Plants, leading the Project on Government Oversight to conclude that nuclear plants in the U-S are – quote – “not even close to being prepared for a terrorist attack.”


On Homeland Security – He did not implement a proposed computer system intended to aid the tracking of domestic terror threats. It was supposed to be on-line in 2003 and may now be scrapped entirely.



On Homeland Security – He has not developed specific plans to address the security of hazardous materials moved by rail and the administration does not have a time frame established for completing such an effort.



On Homeland Security – He provided the nations first responders with only 15-percent of the federal funding needed to adequately respond to terrorist attacks.



On Homeland Security – He failed to capture Osama Bin Laden, the man he acknowledges was behind the mass murder of 3000 Americans.



On Iraq – He told the American people – quote – “We found the weapons of mass destruction. We have found biological laboratories” – unquote – when nothing has been found.



On Foreign Relations – He limited bidding on Iraq construction projects to coalition partners only, unnecessarily alienating important allies.



On the 9-11 Commission – He would not allow Condoleezza Rice to testify, then relented after public pressure.


On Foreign Relations – He abandoned the United States’ traditional role as a fair moderator in the Middle East Peace Process.


On the Environment – He lifted protection for more than 200 million acres of public land.



On post-9/11 clean-up – He forced the EPA to rewrite a report on the air quality around the World Trade Center site to fool New Yorkers into thinking the area was safe.


On Public Health – He weakened the effectiveness of the USDA testing program while downplaying the dangers of Mad Cow disease.



On Supporting our Armed Services – He under funded healthcare for troops and veterans.



On Health Care – Picked his personal friend David Halbert, who stands to make billions from prescription drugs, to write the draft of the new Medicare bill.



On Education – He under-funded the Title One Program for disadvantaged children by Seven-point-two billion dollars.



On Iraq - He threatened to veto the 87-billion dollar war budget authorization if it wasn’t in the form he wanted, then criticized John Kerry for doing the same thing.



On Diplomacy – He failed to convince NATO allies that invading Iraq was important, leaving U-S troops to bear 90-percent of the burden.



On Social Security - He depleted the Social Security Trust Fund surplus, despite making a campaign promise to not touch it.


On Government Spending - He promised to – quote – “attack pork barrel spending” – unquote – but has not vetoed a single bill while in office, despite the enormous amount of pork that has crossed his desk.


On Taxes - He told the American people – quote – “the vast majority of my tax cuts go to the bottom end of the spectrum" – unquote – while the top 20 percent of earners received 70 percent of those tax cuts.



On Conflicts of Interest - He appointed James Baker to seek forgiveness of Iraqi debt, despite Baker’s business ties to companies that are opposed to Iraqi debt forgiveness


On Health Care - He never established the 'Healthy Communities Innovation Fund' which would have provided grant money to health care programs, as he promised in his 2000 campaign



On Public Safety – Despite claiming to support it, he allowed the federal law banning the sale of semi-automatic assault weapons to lapse 10-years after the law was implemented and effectively reduced gun-related violent crimes.



On First Responders - He cut grants to the nation’s police and fire departments by nearly one-billion dollars in the fiscal year 2005 budget.



On Job Creation - He lost a net total of 833-thousand jobs since taking office in 2001, becoming the first president since Herbert Hoover not to create any new jobs.



On Afghanistan – He committed inadequate resources for the reconstruction of Afghanistan, providing a peacekeeping force of fewer than point-two people per 1,000 Afghans.



On Nuclear Proliferation - Bush undermined the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Treaty to halt nuclear proliferation by keeping 2000 US warheads on alert.



On Higher Education – Bush eliminated more than 66-million dollars of funding in his Fiscal Year 2005 budget that would have gone toward financial aid for students.


On Gun Safety - Bush failed to enforce federal firearm laws, which was followed by a national increase in the number of homicides committed with guns.



On the Death Penalty – Bush strongly opposed a national review of death penalty fairness.



On Domestic Abuse – Bush slashed funding for the Violence Against Women Act by 16-point-two million dollars in his 2004 budget.



On Crime – Bush drastically reduced funding of the COPS program which, under the Clinton Administration, had placed over 118,000 new officers on the street, reducing violent crime 40 percent.



On the Environment – Bush counted on a voluntary program to reduce emissions of harmful gasses-so far only a tiny fraction of American companies have signed up.



On Intelligence Spending - In the early days after 9-11, Bush cut by nearly two-thirds an emergency request for counterterrorism funds by the FBI.



On Taxes – According to the Congressional Budget Office, Bush’s tax cuts have transferred the federal tax burden from the richest Americans to middle-class families.


if you want to know the truth about bush and his facist friends go to Air America Radio and listen

Well said. George W. Bush is the worst creature to hold the office of President.

I will never ever respect George the second. He stole the election in 2000 and no telling what crimes he committed in getting elected this time around.

Nope, he does not get my respect and support, no way never ever.

Right on Cristiano.

Well said Ryen. I totally agree.

I entered in no way, any opinion towards my political views on our current President, or his politics. I chose to leave that out because I didn't want this to turn into a "I think this, you think that, and you're wrong" thread. This was not my intention.

I was expressing distress from something I saw that offended me. My call to President Bush himself in the text was mainly to point out that I personally took the message of the flag to mean something more than just emergency or sorrow for loss.

If I'd seen just a half mast upside down flag, I'm sure I'd have been taken back the same way, but at a loss for exactly what the hell they were trying to say. Because as you so kindly put, I know so little about all this.

So I wouldn't have assumed anything until I could have talk to the creator.

But when you add the 'down with Bush' to it and it starts to get a little more personal to me. Something similiar to namecalling, which to me suggests alterior motives than just expressing concern for the country. Something a little more adolescent and unnecessary.

Object Flag, 12 prims
Title: Pass this around to show your concern for the future of our country

Title: In mourning for our nation

Title: H o l y s h i t

OK

Something like that... I would have taken away a more reasonable message. Yes, I'd still have found the upside down flag disturbing. Mainly because I've been exposed to its use in very harsh dispicable ways. Maybe that makes me jaded. I don't care. I don't like it one way or another.

But I will bet you this man of "little knowledge" on the subject would get torn a new asshole if I had gone out and done the same thing with Kerry. And you know why? Because he was clearly the candidate of choice on here. And by god, those numbers of supporters wouldn't just stand idly by while I paraded by with my little flag.

----------

I wouldn't have done that though. My point in all of this was and is, regardless of who was elected or who will ever be elected, I just don't think it's right to crap on your country because of it. Or the very symbols that stand for that country. Or the person who now holds the responsibility of making right with it.

Geezus. If anything, I feel sorrow for the president himself. I can't imagine what it's like to stay positive and calm knowing that people out there dispise him. And I couldn't bare the thought of being in that position and seeing so much negativity towards me or going out and seeing our flag upside down and at half mast.

The MAN may not deserve an individuals respect, but the position he holds does. And he has a huge responsibility to uphold in that position. And I think that deserves some decency or at least discrimination in how one chooses to project angst or opposition to what he does. If for no other reason than to show at least some patriotic backbone and not complete dismissal of the next four years.

It just seems kind of petty and hurtful to intentionally do this. And especially hurtful to hear people's screams of "I'm going to Canada." What the hell is that, if not the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

Lack of faith and lack of etiquette is my problem here. Not what someone's opinions are or their right to express them. I don't challenge that, and never have. I just find certain executions of it to be tasteless. I'm not pissed anymore. That was gut reaction. I'm just somber now that I realize people are more concerned with pointing out "how little I know," or how they have the right to show what they do.

I never proclaimed to know anything other than how I felt, and I never stated that it was in any way legally wrong to express their personal opinion, but alas, it's what became top issue in this thread.

And for that, I will lower my flag to half mast for all of you who think this country is going to hell and want to escape it instead of strengthening it. Because my personal faith in PEOPLE has died.

I'll answer this one

as pointed out, flying a flag upside down or half mast is entirely within the national flag rules. What I find disgraceful is all the flags left out in the cold, dark, and rain after 9/11, left to be tattered, soaked, muddied, and sunbleached.

Flag bikinis I think are.... patriotic. of course if you disagree you could lobby for people to take them off! LOL *rimshot* okay, bad joke.


Any self-respecting President would not have run for reelection if he thought nearly half the nation outright think he has done a rotten job. Bush could have done the respectable Nixon thing and stepped aside gracefully.


I don't think mourning the fact that a person you believe who is a bad president being reelected is disrespecting the office. Instead, I believe it holds the office in high regard and laments the MAN in it disgracing it.

Faith is 2000. Bush has been weighed and been found lacking. Faith that he will change and get better is naievety.



You have an excellent point here. The real issue is that this country is split over fear, and this has been exploited by both major political parties. The people and the leaders are causing us to have problems, and this is certainly something to lament. =(

I find it interesting that my original post said nothing about what position or what candidate I stood for, yet we all seem to assume that I'm a Republican, or didn't believe Kerry would have been a better President.

So as much as I appreciate the response and time to type/copy all that out, it wasn't necessary. You don't need to convince me about George Bush, or John Kerry for that matter. My feelings on them are personal and will in no way expose themselves on these forums. I just find it interesting that everyone seemed to assume I was pleased with the election turnout.

Is it unthinkable to believe that I could have voted for the other man myself, and just find it distaseful and kind of sad to suddenly drop all my faith in the country and admit defeat? Kind of a, "well, whatever, this place is gone to hell, lets just leave."

Well, you'll never know my position. It isn't relevant or necessary. This was not the purpose of my post.

I was once playing football with some buddies. We had to pick a captain for our team. We voted best man for the job, and the guy I wanted didn't get it. I didn't sulk or refuse to play ball. We played, and I followed his plays all the way through. While he was not who I'd have chosen, I respected that he was now in charge. I played fair and pulled my weight in the game instead of half-assing it and being passively useless.

Well, we didn't win in that particular game. But that wasn't the point. We gave the other guys a hell of a game, and it would have been murder instead of a neck and neck victory for them if those of us who didn't want our captain in the first place had acted like buffoons and taunted him, ignored his insight and calls into the game, and just lacked overall faith in him.

I'm not saying the Presidency is as trivial as Football. Just making a reference to something a "simple guy" like me can understand and repeat. Which, I believe clearly illustrates how I feel about all this from a very base perspective. Not about candidates or political ideologies, but basic common sense. Strength in unification, support for those in command, and just plain decency in general.

Define decency? I won't. Everyone will have their own sliding scale of limitations to what's decent to them or not. To each his own someone else said on here. And I agree.

Just because my distaste for what I saw today doesn't sit well with most of you, it doesn't mean I have no right to voice what I found to be personally disturbing. I wasn't trying to convince or gather support for my views. I pretty much figured that along the lines of pointless.

I just regret now bothering with these forums for this. And understand now why I normally keep my posting limited to strictly SL related questions and advice.

So long,
Omen

How often do coaches in professional football get changed?
Quite often.
First of all, Bush isn't "in charge". The whole of the 3 bodies of government are, of which Bush was a part - the Executive Branch. Bush had his time, we respected his designated 4 year term, and it's now time we could have chosen a new captain.

Demand respect? I think you will find yourself getting something quite different the day you go demand people's respect.

And I repeat, I'm not trying to compare and contrast football and the Presidency as two things in the same. So comparing the cycle of football coaches to Presidents seems a little silly. And I'm certainly not calling judgement on people who think Kerry would have been a better candidate.

The point I so stupidly thought I was illustrating was that instead of bitching and being inactive, there's a time where you have to suck it up, and realize there is something more important here than one man - how about a country.

I don't care what you or anyone else here feels about Bush, Kerry, or football coaches. My base argument was simply that I felt negative emotion in the first place over this one larger concept. I would have felt the same way if Pro-Bush people had been bashing Kerry upon a victory of his.

Why are people turning this into something it isn't?

I refuse to even discuss or debate the "who was the better candidate." The country spoke, and a winner was determined. End of discussion.

It was not my discussion, and will not become my discussion. There are probably people out there that would love to debate your feelings or the similiar feelings of others about this. But I am not one of them. I know where I stand and who I stand with. And that's my business, and would I have wanted to debate this, the thread would have started out different.

Above all, it just boils down to a basic respect and admiration for the President and the country in a whole. And when someone does something to disrespect my country, my girlfriend, or anything I have even a remote passion about, I'm sure as hell not going to sit idly by and pretend I didn't see it or condition myself into just accepting it.

I wouldn't expect anyone here who expressed different opinions than I on this to just sit by and ignore it or accept it. If you feel passionately about the way you feel, express it, and many of you did.

But don't gangbang me on here just because I feel strongly enough about something to the point where I have to voice my thoughts on it. And don't change the topic at hand because that's not what this thread was about. Tangents, whatever. They happen. But when I'm repeatedly told and given freaking clippits about how Bush is so horrible, it's really straying a bit far off from topic.

It would have been different if I'd said: This pissed me off today because I'm strongly in favor of Bush and as a Pro Bush supporter, I think you suck for doing this and disrespecting the man I voted for in such a way.

Back to the original topic...



mmm. I agree with Christiano on this one. Bush was re-elected to office. He's not some fresh new president from the opposite party from ourselves. He has earned disrespect from half of America and from the rest of the world. It is a founding priciple of our country to disagree with our political leaders. Especially to disagree with ones who try to stifle dissent in the name of false patriotism.


Many people have abused our national symbol. When I see soiled American Flag stickers plastered on every pickup truck, tattered flags flapping in the wind from a minivan, hundreds of American Flags strung all over vehicle lots, American Flag pins on every politician's lapel, the flag absconded as a symbol for corporate logos, and everyone wrapping themselves in the flag to justify their actions, I'm upset too. The conservatives have abused the flag to push their own agenda. Don't be suprised if half of the country gets upset about it.

I think the rest of the world doesn't hate Bush, or the USA in general.

As a portuguese citizen, i shouldn't be concerned about US Internal political affairs.
But since those internal affairs, affect directly the way i live my life, such a concern is hard to avoid.

I understand Omen point of view. It's about respect and patriotism.
But as many posters have pointed out on this thread, respect is a subjective matter.

SL is expanding globaly like wildfire and i think that's A Good Thing TM.

With that growth of different cultures in SL respect must play a major role. Or trouble will arise.

An interesting situation would be, a chinese citizen opening a "restaurant" with some pictures of dog delicatessen.
I would think it's disgusting, disgraceful and disturbing.
But it's his right to love such things.

And there are other interesting concerns with the internationalization of SL.
But i wont hijack the thread.

Yeah but don't you see what Madiera said there, and it's the same thing I've been saying, that the position of presidency demands respect from people. Why is that so unreasonable to demand that of people? You can respect the position and the man in it, simply because you recognize that he is in that position right now. A person can differ with the man's politics but still respect that he is our President. And can choose consciously to agree to disagree with him but still respect and support the man's job and responsibilities as an American leader.

Sure. I understand how people feel about this. And as I've said, I haven't disclosed any particular opinions on the man himself. What I think about his politics, etc. Disagreement is inevidable, of course. And I'm not trying to suppress anyone's difference in opinion here. That person had every right to do what they did. And I had every right to get angry at it. This isn't false patriotism. This was simply one man's reaction to something that I feel strongly about.



Yes. I don't particularly like this either. But there were many of us who proudly displayed national icons and love for the country long before 9/11 and the collective conciousness of America started to kick in. I think it was good natured but unfortunate that it took such a travesty to rekindle American Pride. And also unfortunate that it has become commercialized and abused for other reasons you already listed.

Well, the conservatives started this with going after Clinton with such force and vitriol, they deserve it. They never gave Clinton respect. You should hear conservatives talk about Hillary as some kind of she devil. Demonization is a republican mainstay, so they deserve all the disrespect in the world for their candidate.

Not to mention Bush has EARNED disrespect. HE has disrespected the office of the presidenency. I don't think everyone has to be FORCED to respect a man for what he has done. I will not be muted by anyone who says that we are either with Bush or with the terrorists. This is more than a difference in political views; this man has consistently proven that he cannot lead and that he has contempt for people who disagree with him. I will not support this president. Period.

Oh..im sure it won't stop there..I got chewed out TWICE in one day yesterday on Election day for no real reason at all..im sure they were Democrats or they would have been in a good mood. I'd like to see the Statistics of how many people that have been fired at work and how many will be compared to normal because of this Election.

I'm sure quite a few people would also agree that President Clinton also earned disrespect for himself during his last term. But that's besides the point. The man was President and like any man had flaws. Like our President now, and all that come after him. They are flawed just like anyone else. But the amazing responsibility they hold is just something that I can't get past. As much as I may disagree with a man's politics in the office, I can't look at him and not admire him for simply BEING the President. They earned the position, and I believe deserve a great amount of respect just for that fact alone. What a man does with his time as President determins for me how much I respect them OUT of the Oval Office. I cannot look at our President and not respect the power and great responsibility they have. What, you say? Or anyone else. Bush has proven, blah blah this, blah blah that. I hear you. And I have formed my own private opinions. But while that man is leading our country, I will not look down on him. And will have faith in him as a great leader. And will take it personally when I see something that collides with what I believe.

We'll agree to disagree on this. I'm not here to change minds. It wasn't my objective. I really didn't have one other that expressing some emotion I felt towards a topic of discussion on here that I disagreed with. Albeit, a topic which comes with a lot of baggage and opinions.

George the Second will get no respect from me.

I will repeat again. George the Second will never get my respect. and until we have someone else in the office, I will not respect the office of President.

President William Clinton was one of the best presidents we had in recent times. Too bad we have a jerk and a child for president now.