I can almost guarantee you the reason I’m bothered by the POW/MIA Flag Flap isn’t the same reason it bothers or does not bother you. Here’s the situation. Back in 1972 the flag was originally designed to recognize missing and imprisoned US service members, primarily associated with the Vietnam War. In 1990 a law was passed that it must be displayed on certain days. In 2019 the law was amended to insist that be displayed prominently every day.

It was originally displayed atop the Rotunda but was recently moved to a location dedicated to the purpose which can only be seen from select angles outside the White House. This move is being used for political purposes, largely by Democrats, to show how President Trump disrespects servicemembers. That’s the flag flap that bothers one group of people but not me.

I’m upset that legislation was enacted to force the flying of a flag in the first place. I’m not unsympathetic to the cause of missing and captured prisoners of war but the law and its update in 2019 are clearly the work of people who want you to think they are aligned with you. That’s the pattern of flag wavers in general. Look, I’m waving this flag really vigorously and that means I really care, that I’m really doing something.

Frankly, I find the entire need to show off your allegiance to a cause by making pledges, wearing lapel pins, and flying flags suspect from the beginning. The more you need to pretend you care, the more likely it is you simply don’t care at all. It’s a convenient and easy way to pretend and fool the easily duped, or more precisely, those who are willfully obtuse, who eagerly beg to be lied to in order to satisfy their view of the world.

Here’s the reality. Flying the POW/MIA flag is way for politicians to pretend they care. Another reality is that while there are technically 82,000 missing service members who this flag represents, all of them are dead. Countries like North Korea and Vietnam have large-scale scam operations designed to separate bereaved families from their money much like such operations fleece Christians in Turkey looking for Noah’s Ark.

This is a Flag Flap designed, from the beginning, to enflame political passions and achieves nothing else. The entire thing is a setup to gain support for one politician or another. There should be no laws regarding flags. If you want to display the flag, do so, I will use my constitutional rights to defend your freedom to do so. I understand you are passionate about the POW/MIA situation and you have every right to think the way you do.

Just remember; if the government can require flying a certain flag, you are ceding it the right to enforce it must not be flown. Both laws are wrong, the government should not have this power.

Tom Liberman