The American flag is offensive

[08Dawg]

https://www.katu.com/news/local/64059697.html

It seems it is now "offensive" to support the military and display a little patriotic feeling. I want to puke.

[Dupe]

There are quite a few Home Owner's Associations, covennants, and deed restrictions that restrict the flying of flags. I hate that crap.

[Guest JSpoon]

It just makes me think that a little bit of what makes this country great dies everyday.

[OverTQ]

I take offense to this stupidity.

[Ice Cream]

[aeroplanez]

I, for one, will never take down an American flag. I don't give a sh*t what kind of fines or whatevr they try to impose on me. From my cold, dead hands!

[60 driver]

Tell 'em how you feel about it.

[Stitch]

UFB, but this is in Portland so I'm really not that surprised.

I remember while stationed at Bitburg in the mid 80's reading in the Stars & Stripes about a similiar situation in a condo complex in Florida. Only this resident was a survivor of the Battan Death March. When he was liberated he vowed to fly a flag at his home for the rest of his life. His HOA said no and "fined" him so many dollars a day till the flag came down. He told the HOA to f*ck off and die, that flag was there to honor his country and his bros who died in on the march and in captivity. If they had a problem with that then they could kiss his ass (or words to that effect) so after some time and a sh*tload of bad publicity for the condo complex they caved and rewrote the HOA rules to allow the flag.

HOA rules are not written on some mountain side by the hand of God upon stone tabets. Residents can and should get rules changed if they're bullsh*t rules. Granted this is an apartment situation and ROEs for renters are different. So I say have everyone fly a flag and get kicked out of the complex. It'll be a different story for management when they can make mortgage payments on the complex with a sh*t ton of empty units.

Hey apartment management dudes with no nutsack

For the apartment dwellers who understand freedom and the price it costs to be free.

[Guest Rubber_Side_Down]

Tell 'em how you feel about it.

The negative press goes on for pages! The property manager will probably get fired over this.

[HerkDerka]

Update to the story...

ALBANY, Ore. -- Flags are OK again at an Albany apartment complex after the property manager reviewed the policy and decided she didn't have the legal standing to ban flags from the exteriors of apartments and vehicles parked at the complex.

"If people want to fly any flag of any nationality, it's their right," said Barb Holcomb with Oaks Apartments.

KVAL News also contacted the American Civil Liberties Union to ask whether the policy banning flags from the apartment complex violated any laws. The answer from the ACLU: No.

But Holcomb said she received different legal counsel that led her to believe she is wrong to ban the flags.

"When a tenant rents the unit, the inside of the unit belongs to the tenant," Holcomb said Wednesday. "All automobiles and things attached to the automobiles are the personal property of the tenant."

Holcomb said the flag ban was based on interpretation of two sections of the rental agreement all tenants sign.

"What we were trying to do was to keep the peace," she said, declining to say whether a specific incident sparked enforcement of the ban. "Obviously, we were wrong. If the peace needs to be kept, it belongs to the police department."

She said her boss has stood by her -- both when she enforced the policy and when she lifted it.

"I made a policy. I was wrong," she said. "My boss is a wonderful man. He backed me 100 percent -- even when I was wrong."

The story garnered national attention because of the ban on American flags, although the policy did not specifically single out the U.S. flag and allow the flags of other nations.

The result for Holcomb: Numerous phone calls from the media.

"If they want to speak to me, they speak to me," she said of the calls. "If they want to yell at me, they yell at me."

KVAL News asked whether she had talked to the resident who originally went to the media with the story. Holcomb said no, although she said she would talk to him -- and would have talked to him before he went to the media. Holcomb said he did not approach her before talking to KVAL News partner KATU.

"He's just a romping, stomping patriot," Holcomb said.

---------------------------

That last lined killed me. I find it offensive that she singles a partiot out like it's a bad thing.

[sky_king]

I don't know. If we allow people to fly flags, maybe they'll start standing up when the flag passes them in parades or start taking the pledge of allegience in elementary school again. Who knows, people might take some pride in their nation and work to keep it the greatest country in the world. I'm just saying, it's a slippery slope.

[old crow]

I don't find the American flag offensive at all...

[sky_king]

OH... MY... GOD... Please people in that video, DO NOT choke yourself regardless of the comments about to follow. I will gladly buy an airplane ticket and do it myself.

... and yes, I know it's fake.

Edited October 15, 2009 by sky_king

[BQZip01]

KVAL News also contacted the American Civil Liberties Union to ask whether the policy banning flags from the apartment complex violated any laws. The answer from the ACLU: No.

But Holcomb said she received different legal counsel that led her to believe she is wrong to ban the flags.

"When a tenant rents the unit, the inside of the unit belongs to the tenant," Holcomb said Wednesday. "All automobiles and things attached to the automobiles are the personal property of the tenant."

Be glad she didn't listen to the ACLU; she would have been sued and LOST. You don't give up your free speech rights just to live in an apartment. While they have control over the appearance of their property, they certainly have NO control over what car you drive or what it has on it.

"What we were trying to do was to keep the peace...Obviously, we were wrong. If the peace needs to be kept, it belongs to the police department."

The irony...

You ban the very symbol of peace and freedom from oppression...to preserve peace...

Typical liberal hippie nonsense and this is why the military is viewed as peacekeepers, not instruments of war.

She said her boss has stood by her -- both when she enforced the policy and when she lifted it.

"I made a policy. I was wrong," she said. "My boss is a wonderful man. He backed me 100 percent -- even when I was wrong."

In other words, he has no spine and won't tell you when you are right or wrong=the worst kind of boss.

[dontshavemyhead]

OH... MY... GOD... Please people in that video, DO NOT choke yourself regardless of the comments about to follow. I will gladly buy an airplane ticket and do it myself.

Don't listen to him! I'll buy a first class ticket, or charter my own Netjets plane to come and do it myself.

[Guest IslandBum]

Good thing the lady who, per the YouTube video, later became chairman of the select board is no longer on that board.

Yes, I said chairman.

https://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2008/06/longtime_amherst_select_board.html

Long-time Amherst Select Board member, Anne Awad, resigns citing 'threats,' 'stalking'

By Dwight B. Shepard

June 23, 2008, 5:45PM

File photo by Mark M. Murray / The RepublicanAmherst Select Board member Anne S. Awad, shown here at the Caring Heath Center Inc. in Springfield where she is the chief executive officer, plans to resign as a selectman Sept. 1. By DIANE LEDERMAN

dlederman@repub.com

AMHERST - Long-time Amherst Select Board member Anne S. Awad plans to resign from the board effective Sept. 1.

Awad submitted a letter to the Town Clerk's office on Friday.

"It is with sadness that I announce my resignation from the Select Board," she wrote. "Allegations to the contrary, I am still a full-time resident of Amherst and a legally registered voter in this town. It was my intention to serve by entire three-year term" which ends in March 2009.

But, she wrote "recent citizen activities that have included threats and stalking have been intolerable to me and I do not wish to serve under such conditions."

Awad and her husband, former selectman Robie Hubley, bought a house in South Hadley in April and Hubley filed a homestead document listing that as his main residence. She has been a member of the board since 2000.

Amherst town meeting member Larry J. Kelley, who is also an Internet blogger, has been calling for her to resign, has taken photographs of her gardening at the South Hadley home, and has posted a photograph of a real estate sign advertising an open house at the condominium in Amherst where the couple lives. He wore a T-shirt that read "Just Go" to Town Meeting.

"I would have been happier if she had done it a month ago," Kelley said when asked for comment. "The town would have been happier if she had done it a month ago."

He also said he would have backed off except for the fact that the couple wrote a letter to the local newspaper stating they were withdrawing their South Hadley homestead declaration and retaining it in Amherst.

He said he checked and that Hubley has not withdrawn that declaration.

"I don't think she's been getting a huge outpouring of support. Obviously public officials should be used to observations," he said. He also said that he said he never ventured onto her property.

"She's one fifth of the mayor," he said, pointing out that the five member Select Board is the executive branch of the town government. Selectmen earn $300 a year in Amherst.

The town may hold an election to replace Awad at the same time it holds the Sept. 16 primary, said Town Clerk Sandra J. Burgess, but it will have to be a separate ballot and separate election on the same day.

She said it will be considerably more work to do so but less costly for the town to hold the elections on the same date than it would to hold them on two different days.

"We see it as another challenge," she said. "Given the financial situation (it is better) to take advantage of an election already going on."

Special elections typically cost between $12,000 and $15,000.

[Chutdoggin]

Pennsylvania Firefighter Suspended for U.S. Flag on Locker

A Pennslyvania firefighter was suspended without pay for refusing to remove an American flag sticker from his locker, Myfoxphilly.com reported.

James Krapf of Chester, Pa., violated a department policy that states personal items can only be posted inside employee lockers when he stuck the flag on the outside. According to Myfoxphilly.com, the firefighters' union warned 11 others to remove personal items or face similar suspensions, all without pay.

The initial ban came after an incident in which some firefighters complained about a cartoon posted in the firehouse that they found racially offensive.

Krapf was suspended Thursday, and so far is the only firefighter to be hit with the penalty.

"I shouldn't have to remove the flag of the country I believe in. I love my country," Krapf told Myfoxphilly.com. "I love my job. I love helping people. I've been doing this 11 years in the City of Chester, so this is something I love to do."

Krapf said he wants to meet with the fire commissioner and the mayor to discuss the issue. The fire commissioner told local media outlets that banning all materials from locker doors was the simplest way to avoid bickering among the staff.

Just when you thought common sense was starting to rear its ugly nugget...

[sky_king]

What kind of pussy ass fire fighters are we hiring now-a-days?