{"id":1703,"date":"2005-07-16T02:36:34","date_gmt":"2005-07-16T06:36:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wordpress\/2005\/07\/life_in_rightis\/"},"modified":"2005-07-16T02:36:34","modified_gmt":"2005-07-16T06:36:34","slug":"life_in_rightis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/2005\/07\/life_in_rightis\/","title":{"rendered":"Life In Rightist America"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Tenn. Teen Jailed for Burning U.S. Flag\" href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/uslatest\/story\/0,1282,-5144023,00.html\">Fighting the enemy within<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>MARYVILLE, Tenn. (AP) &#8211; A teenager was jailed for nine days after being accused of burning an American flag on the Fourth of July, and he faces trial next month.<br \/>\nWhile the case could test a state statute against flag burning &#8211; an act the U.S. Supreme Court says is protected under the First Amendment &#8211; prosecutors said Andrew Elisha Staley has yet to argue that he was exercising free speech rights.<br \/>\n&#8220;Bottom line is, the kid got drunk,&#8221; said Lisa Lee, his mother. &#8220;He&#8217;s never been in trouble before.&#8221;<br \/>\nStaley, 18, is accused of taking the flag from a residence and setting it on fire. His father said the teenager &#8220;has no reason for anger against the United States&#8221; and could easily have ignited a garbage can instead of a flag.<br \/>\n. . .<br \/>\nThe teenager was released from jail Thursday on his own recognizance while he awaits his Aug. 2 trial on charges of desecrating a venerated object, underage drinking, littering, evading arrest, burning personal property and theft.<br \/>\nThe Tennessee flag-burning statute makes the crime a misdemeanor, punishable by less than a year in jail and up to $2,500 fine.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>If the guy took and destroyed someone&#8217;s property, charge him for that.  Why file a special charge because it was a flag?  Or, more pointedly, why do we even have a law about desecrating a flag?  I assume the statute at issue is <a href=\"http:\/\/198.187.128.12\/tennessee\/lpext.dll\/Infobase\/19462\/1a614\/1a761\/1a7c9?fn=document-frame.htm&#038;f=templates\">this<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><b>39-17-311. Desecration of venerated object.<\/b><br \/>\n(a)  A person commits an offense who intentionally desecrates:<br \/>\n(1) A place of worship or burial; or<br \/>\n(2) A state or national flag.<br \/>\n(b)  A violation of this section is a Class A misdemeanor.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Why do we have a law protecting the Tennessee and United States flags?  Because people place more stock in symbols than in their supposed principles.<br \/>\nLet freedom reign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<a href=\"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/2005\/07\/life_in_rightis\/\" rel=\"bookmark\" title=\"Permalink to Life In Rightist America\"><p>Fighting the enemy within: MARYVILLE, Tenn. (AP) &#8211; A teenager was jailed for nine days after being accused of burning an American flag on the Fourth of July, and he faces trial next month. While the case could test a state statute against flag burning &#8211; an act the U.S. Supreme Court says is protected [&hellip;]<\/p>\n<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1703","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"h-entry","8":"hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1703"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1703\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brianarner.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}