What's Really Important?

I received an email from a high school classmate today that forwarded a diatribe by some Repugnican whack jobs righteously indignant about some students in California flying the Mexican flag over the American flag on a high school yard. The diatribe that accompanied the pictures was right out of a Sean Hannity passion playbook. They were flying this flag on "American soil". Have they no shame? Standard "War on Christmas" sorts of tripe.

After I read the email and then hit the delete button, I sent my high school friend the following email. I hope she follows my suggestion and forwards it to the wankers who sent her the message in the first place:

Dear "X"

The truly sad thing about the story you sent accompanying pictures of the Mexican flag over the American flag in a school in California is this.

Why are these people getting so righteously indignant about the symbol called the flag?? This is a classic Repugnican passion issue. If the people putting that together actually cared about something they would be sending around pictures of American kids coming home in boxes from a war based on lies. They would be saying things like "Why is the President allowing our kids to be killed for oil??" They should be pissed about that. If these people want to get upset about the way the American flag is draped why are they not screaming about all of the American flags being draped over the coffins of American kids who die for no noble cause in Iraq?

Instead there is a constant stream of "horror stories" like the one you sent out dripping with indignation and disgust about a non issue, and feeding the mentality of the Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity crowd.

I wish the same people who are upset about some kids in California flying a flag would come out to Washington this summer and march on the White House to demand our withdrawal from Iraq. Why are these people not outraged by the destruction of American foreign policy and our credibility in the world? I wish those same people would ask themselves why they elected George Bush twice and continue to elect Repugnican congressmen and Senators who wholeheartedly support and defend a indefensible war for lies in the Middle East - a war that has so thoroughly tarnished the name of the United States it will take generations for us to regain our footing in the world community.

Why are these people worrying about a flag when this nation is now the number one administrator of torture in the world? We have a human rights record WORSE than Iran and China. We now have a policy of using torture that we have never used since George Washington was president. Why aren't these people righteously indignant about that?

If they want to get involved with something that matters, encourage them to write those kinds of letters about the run away budget deficit that Bush and the Repugnicans have created....while giving $630 BILLION in tax breaks for the top 1 percent of the population of the country. Most of the people who bitch about kids in California flying a Mexican flag are PAYING for the tax breaks that Bill gates got from Bush. Why aren't they indignant about that.

The email you sent me is a classic example of what President Al Gore talks about in his new book "The Assault on Reason." We fight many battles but lose the larger, more important, war in the process.

If you still have the original email that came in ...please forward this to everyone on the list who saw the "they're flying a Mexican flag" talking point email. Maybe it will cause some of them to think. My guess is it will not.

The attached pictures are of things that America should be actually worried about and being righteous about...not whether someone somewhere flew the Mexican flag above the American flag.