Oh, Reason Not the Flag!

Christopher Hitchens, whom I greatly admire, is against the amendment authorizing Congress to forbid burning the flag. His point, don't clutter up the Constitution, is persuasive, but not on the larger point: why is this being made such a big deal of by either side? Goofy court decisions interfering with democracy do as much to clutter up and dishonor the Constitution as such amendments do. They're all amendments, after all. The court just doesn't have to get more than 5 votes.

The flag IS a symbol, but that doesn't mean it should be meaningless to deface it or use it to offend offend people. It's not as though anybody ever really needed to use flags in their protests. They use it to get attention, not to express anything they can't say in some other way. That's not a Constitutional right. Sorry.