Controversy Over Flag Amendment

Patrick Buchanan has once again flaunted his superior patriotism, but this time ironically at the expense of his own party (Commentary, June 18). Using Bush-league campaign slogans (from 1988) he has linked the “black-robed shepherds” of the Reagan Supreme Court with the “ACLU’s America” for ruling the Flag Protection Act of 1989 as unconstitutional. Talk about being hoist by one’s own petard!

However, it is indeed fortunate that Buchanan is such an expert in the mental processes of the Founding Fathers when they wrote the First Amendment because by now he must surely realize that it is that amendment which guarantees his right to “hate” all expressions that differ from his own, and that, therefore, a desecration of it is far worse than a desecration of the flag that symbolizes it.

It is also fortunate for him that the ACLU exists to defend his right to “hate” (without necessarily respecting his “hatred”).

BURTON HENRY

Temecula