Please stop calling the issue before the U.S. Senate the "Flag Burning" amendment.

The precise wording makes it illegal to "desecrate" an "American flag."

So first off, define "American flag."

Is there an official description of an American flag? Must it be made out of cloth? How about those cheap plastic flags you see flapping from the antennas of autos? Must it be of a uniform aspect ratio with regard to how porportional it is in terms of width relative to length? How about the colors of the American flag? Is there an official mix of colors in the red and the blue, like a CMYK or an RGB percentage or can it be any old color you like?

How about the stars? Older flags have various numbers of stars. Some are arranged in rows and ranks, some are arranged in a circle. Will the good Congresspersons please make it clear exactly what they are talking about when they talk about the American flag.

Is it really an "American" flag if it was manufactured in Communist China, as so many of them are made?

Say I've got a plastic flag made in China and it's slightly more square than rectangular, and the color of the red is more like a rose-red than the official dark red? Let's say also that the Chinese Communists also screwed up and made the little stars sort of like diamond shaped instead of five-pointed ones. Is this an American flag that I can be prosecuted for desecrating?

Speaking of desecrating, what exactly is that, anyway.

Now if I take my plastic Chi-Com American flag and I'm crusin' down the old Interstate at 70 m.p.h. and the wind is making the damned thing flap so hard that it's being torn to shreds, is that desecration?

How about if I'm at a Forth of July picnic this year and the host has stuck those little bitty paper American flags on toothpicks and stuck them in the hors d'oeuvres, and I see somebody strip the ham and cheese off the toothpick with their teeth and throw the American flag in the plastic-lined trash bin with the dirty paper plates and empty no-return plastic beer bottles, is that something that maybe I should report to the police? After all, a crime is a crime.

I know other letter writers here have mentioned using red/white/blue objects that are very flag-like, for everything from ass-wipe to snot rags, but really, shouldn't it be a crime to own any object of red/white/blue that so very many of our Fallen HEROES have bled and died to defend? I mean, doesn't it just piss you off when you see people throw away the Sunday advertising sections of a newspaper around the end of June announcing all those Fourth of July sales events? I mean, those pages are going to go right in the trash or the recycle bin where they are bound to face desecration.

We need to make it illegal in this country to possess anything made of red/white/blue material unless it is officially sanctioned as a bona fide American flag. Then it will be real easy to identify lawbreakers and punish them with the full force of the law.

God Bless America! Now there's a phrase worth defending too. We need to pass a constitutional amendment requiring everybody to say God Bless America at the end of every conversation and use it in closing any written message, or face charges of treason.

God Bless America!