"Ask the men and women who stood on top of the (World) Trade Center," said Rep. Randy (Duke) Cunningham, R-Calif. "Ask them and they will tell you: pass this amendment."
But Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said, "If the flag needs protection at all, it needs protection from members of Congress who value the symbol more than the freedoms that the flag represents."
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One of these arguments is based upon liberal democratic principle and reason. The other relies upon emotion and vengeance.
I would find Cunningham's words extremely offensive if I had lost a loved one on 9-11. To use disaster as political capital is always poor form; to use it to bolster an illiberal measure is dispicable. And it is giving the terrorists exactley what they want - more discontent, less liberty in the Land of the Free.
