Fair warning – Don’t click through if you don’t want to read something political in nature.
I’m sensitive to those that don’t want to read that sort of thing, hence the fair warning. Nothing bad here, just a curiosity and I’m wondering if other people in the USA are doing the same thing, so testing it on WUWT’s wide readership will likely help answer it.
I have seen upside down US flags twice now in my town. The first time I just thought it was self commentary, now seeing it a second time in a different part of town, I stopped along E. 5th Avenue to get this shot. I wonder, how many people across the United States are doing the same thing after November 6th? In case you don’t know, flying the flag upside down is a sign of distress or emergency. Flying at half staff is respect for the fallen in service of our country. Combined it makes quite a commentary on the Benghazi incident, the fallen soldiers and ambassador, and the election. Checking the Internet I find there are others doing the same thing now, such as this fellow in South Bend, Indiana. Then there’s the story about an upside down half-staff flag at McDonald’s which has angered a lot of veterans even though it was claimed to be a mistake.
The U.S. Flag code says in section 8:
The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
Some people consider it flag desecration such as is on par with burning it as political commentary.
I wonder though, if this sort of visual political commentary I’ve seen in my town is being quietly repeated elsewhere since many people now see the USA as being in distress?
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mr boehm, what document contains this statement:
“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.”?
(hint- it was not the Declaration of Submission)
mr boehm – if you count yourself a happy taxpayer, you are among those to blame for this because you finance the harassers, plunderers and devourers of human life.
without the contributions of the faithful and cowardly submissive, this massive plundering would be impossible – it wouldn’t pay. it would be unsustainable ™
when you and the rest stop paying for it, then and only then will it stop.
who hires the hit man is an accomplice. it is just that simple.
your taxes are your contribution, your vote, your assent.
alan greenspan estimated that citizens see a return of about a nickel in value on every dollar paid in taxes.
to imagine that nickel is a gift is outrageous mischaracterization.
or will you be praising john wayne gacey’s clown costume and jeffrey dahmer’s appetite?
tom:
i can only speak for myself, but perhaps we are angry because politics is deadly and we love life?
mr boehm.
i have not filed since 1976 after i read Atlas Shrugged.
i don’t take stolen goods.
i falsify your premise.
there are others like me.
and more to come.
ujagoff says:
November 9, 2012 at 7:59 pm
….My point is that science, as it was taught to me, requires an absolute lack of bias in analysis of data, in the goals of the studies themselves, and in the way the results are communicated to the public. I’d believed that discussions here focussed on the science, and didn’t require rhetoric. And the comments here do not speak to unbiased analysis….
__________________________
There are people on this site who I disagree with on politics but who I respect greatly when it comes to science. Unfortunately Climate Science has gotten badly tangled up with politics and the corporations who want to make a buck by ripping off the tax payer. That has nothing to do with right/left politics it just is. WUWT did not do it so if you want to complain send a complaint to you reps in Congress and to the UN.
I am convinced that if the Democrats had not supported CAGW then the Republicans would. Heck it was Bush II that got Maurice Strong into Kyoto as chairman!
At 9:00 PM on 9 November, Gail Combs had written:
I beg strenuously to differ. It has absolutely everything “to do with right/left politics,” and there is no way to argue otherwise unless one confuses the Republican Party with the “right” in American politics.
This the Republican Party has never been.
Categorizing the “right/left” split in American politics as a contest between the Red Faction and the Blue Faction is a false dichotomy, presented as a way to foreclose consideration and action on the basis of substantive differences in the role government – the police power, the agency responsible for “breaking things and killing people” – properly and viably function in the civil society of our republic.
This is so fundamental a consideration that it should seem obvious to anyone reading here, whether drawn to WUWT for the “science” of the AGW fraud or because of the AGW fraud’s role in political “legal plunder.” (see Bastiat, The Law, 1850).
Unfortunately, most people reading here are either ill-educated (actually maleducated, deliberately taught falsehoods) or bloody idiots, providing demonstration of the fact that a Stanford-Binet IQ score of 100 – i.e., pretty goddam stupid – is the statistical average, meaning that at least half of our countrymen in the republic are dumber than that.
Makes participatory democracy something of a farce from the git-go, doesn’t it?
The “marching morons” effect aside for the moment, the real difference between the “left” and the “right” in American politics is that real American conservatism defines the legitimate role of government (again, keep focus upon the police power) so narrowly as to make its potential for adverse impact very low.
That attitude is expressed in an observation traditionally attributed to George Washington, that “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force,” and force, like fire, is a deadly servant and a terrible master.”
The American “left” hold that government is a wonderful means to do “good” in American society, chiefly by holding Americans at gunpoint and forcing them to behave as the politicians of the American “left” have determined they should.
This says nothing, of course, about the ability of those leftie politicians to figure out what’s “good” for the people they’re holding at gunpoint.
Under the ministrations of the American “left” we get Vox populi, vox dei (or, as Mencken once put it: “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard”).
Ms. Combs had gone on to write:
Because the Republican Party is in no genuine sense – at all – a genuine political expression of the American “right” (i.e., those of us who see the benefit of federal governance limited by rule of law as strictly defined in the U.S. Constitution), this is absolutely and incontrovertably correct. As I’d said, the Republican Party has never supported the rule of law, and has been since its inception the “court party” in American politics.
To the extent that the “man-made climate change” hysteria can be made to benefit the interests served by the Republican Party – the false front employed today to obliterate the political presence of the genuine American “right” in government at all levels – the poo-bahs of the Red Faction would embrace this preposterous bilge with all the enthusiasm of any other species of snake-oil salesman intent upon gulling the marks out of the pelf in their pockets.
Back to Mencken again for the close? Why not?
gnomish:
Continue to rant about things I never wrote about. You can’t help yourself. I understand.
.
joelshore, my favorite strawman assembler! Point out where I ever mentioned anything except federal income taxes. Otherwise, as usual you lose the argument with your strawman fallacy.
If you would stick to the points I made, you would be in way over your head. So you changed the subject. No wonder you have no credibility.
I think they’re just saying that, with the reelection of Obama, America is we knew it is all over. It’s going to be just another socialist state whose people have no conception of the principles of limited government on which America was founded. Anyone want to buy some carbon credits?
gnomish says:
“i falsify your premise.”
Not really.
You know, I might even agree with your point of view, if I understood it.
To falsify my premise, you only need to provide one verifiable identity of someone who pays no federal income taxes, but who also takes no taxpayer-provided loot. Name just one.
All the rest of the comments, both yours and joelshore’s, are an army of strawman comments, arguing with something I never said. [Not that I’m comparing you with joelshore. I’m not trying to be derogatory.]
A book that can be of help understanding the new reality is Dinesh D’Souza’s “The Roots of Obama’s Rage”, or start with the movie “2016: Obama’s America”.
Who is John Galt?
I am a liberal and was very pleased with the election results on Tuesday. I am also a skeptic when it comes to climate change. I come to WUWT for updates on new scientific research as well as the immeasurably convenient data pages that Anthony has put together. It distresses me to see this place become overtly political. I understand that climate change has been hopelessly politicized and avoiding politics is impossible… but what the heck does people desecrating the American flag in a fit of post election woe-is-me boo-hooery have to do with climate science?
I think a better strategy is to try and appeal to liberals who believe the CAGW hype. I think you can make a compelling argument using data and scientific research to convince people without having to demand conservative purity as part of the bargain. I like Barack Obama and I like science that is unfettered by ideology.
@John
Unlike some of the other country’s represented here, the D’s haven’t taken the R’s guns away, yet. The supreme leader of the D’s is trying to collapse the country to bring about his socialist utopia. Things won’t end well for the D’s.
The GOP lost because their message (at least the part the MSM allowed) sounded just like the Democrat message. The only difference was Obama played Santa Claus (thanks Rush) to his selected diversities. What Mitt ignored was that he had a much better “message” to promote: the GOP platform. Instead of running on that platform, however, he ran FROM IT every time he was challenged about a Conservative principle!
Any GOP “geniuses” reading here: next time actually have your candidate run on the platform and forget trying to entice the Latino vote, or the woman vote, or whatever. Also, make it a MAJOR part of your ads to explain your opponent’s DISMAL FAILED RECORD! Those of us of a more libertarian bent, and likely many independents, would have gladly voted for a true Conservative. Instead we got John McCain warmed over with an energy drink in his hand! Sheesh!!! I had to bite my lip almost as hard as I did for McCain to cast my vote for Romney.
Now we are in a true Constitutional crisis and flying the American flag inverted is desperately appropriate! Next to it in my yard is the (right side up) flag of the Republic of Texas! (and the aforementioned Gadsden flag) Send assistance quickly!
Another note to the GOP geniuses: the GOP boat sank already! You can stop shooting holes below the waterline!
The problem with the ideologues on your side of the political spectrum is that you have abandoned all connection with reality, facts, and science. If the poll numbers don’t tell you what you want to hear, you find pollsters who do or you “unskew” the polls to correct them so that they tell you what you want to hear. If the scientists don’t tell you what you want to hear, you find a few who will or you invent your own “science” to tell you what you want to hear. If the weapons inspectors don’t tell you what you want to hear, you ignore them and invade Iraq anyway and get your nation into a quagmire costing thousands of American lives.
How’s this all working out for you?
———————————————————————————————————————-
I heard a segment today on how the Republicans and Fox were really convinced the math and science of the polls were biased, and they expected that Romney would win by five points.
Meanwhile Jon Stuart had a statistician on who got it right.
I know enough about science, math and stats to know this is not the case on CAGW. Got to admit though, it does not help our arguement.
u.k. (us) sez:
“Your attempts to stir the pot, have gone for not.”
…………………….
Guess I’ve gone against The Consensus.
Look. I’m not trying to “stir” anything. I guess I’m just disappointed. I thought I knew who to trust. Now I’m questioning everyone. As I guess I should.
DesertYote says:
November 9, 2012 at 5:41 pm
[“from” Maddow? Mod]
###
Yes.
ah, mr boehm…
one doesn’t give out personal info on the internet.
loot is a good choice of words, though.
is it that you really don’t know anybody who is not a looter like your verifiable self?
While many may interpret the election as a cause for the Nation to be in distress, this Nation has been in distress since at least 9/11/2001, and probably a decade or two before that.
Simply considering the national debt, unfunded liabilities, and energy problems are just the start of the interpretation the distress.
IMHO, WUWT is not doing itself any favours by associating itself with political extremism as exhibited in various posts above. Anyway, in for a penny, in for a pound:
As someone who followed the US election with a great deal of interest from Australia several things struck me as being, well, different from we would expect as normal or reasonable here:
(1) The Republican candidate nominee process dragged the GOP way off-centre. From over here some of the candidates who got a trot looked plain bizarre. From a party point of view, extreme social conservatism means you get the extreme social conservative vote. The rest gets turned off.
(2) The successful nominee then, inevitably, had to drag himself back to the centre to some extent. This inevitably meant that the successful nominee had to have had at least two positions on everything. Lots of voters noticed that despite 6 years of Romney presence, they still didn’t really know what his policies were or which of his policies on an issue was the real policy. Deadly stuff for a candidate, IMHO.
(3) Mr Romney talking about the Mount of Olives being split in two come the judgement day just would not cut it Down Under. Lots of sensible folk here would have been thinking, ‘Is this guy for real?’ They certainly wouldn’t be giving him the trigger to enough nukes to destroy earth.
(4) It is little wonder that Mr Romney frightened off a lot of the women’s vote. That had nothing to do with ‘marxism’ (really? have you read Marx?), debt, taxes or war. It had everything to do with women not wanting a bunch of old guys regaining control over women’s bodies. I notice that every candidate who made some sort of weirdo-type rape statement lost… I wonder how many votes they dragged from Romney?
(5) Post election the Republicans are talking about star hispanic candidates. I’ll give them the real clue: they are going to have to stop hassling hispanics and latinos as if they are not welcome in the US. And if, to the Republicans, latinos and hispanics are not welcome, well then, they are not going to vote for the Republicans, are they?
(6) You have an economy that is staggering under the weight of huge debt with a very, very fragile recovery. What does Mr Romney do? Promise a trade war with China. Right. Good idea.
There is a generally accepted truism in politics here that oppositions don’t win elections, governments lose them.
IMHO, Mr Romney turned that back-to-front. This election was for the Republicans to win. They lost it by seriously putting the frighteners into afro americans, latinos, hispanics and women. If the Republicans don’t want to learn that lesson this time, fine. The statistics are brutally honest on this. If the GOP ignores the stats, they will get the same lesson again in 2016.
Banging on about flags, Sandy, the MSM, marxism or any of that sort of rubbish won’t change any of that at all because it is irrelevant.
As for upside down, half mast American flags: I don’t care. Not my flag. We have our own flag and I have never seen one upside down. If you hung your flag upside down here people would think you have a funny sense of humour and probably that you are not treating it properly.
OTOH, half mast is usually only for when very important people pass away and it is a national, not a personal signal. It is sometimes used to signal to other nations that we are in national mourning and, if I recall correctly, Australian flags flew at half-mast as a mark of respect to the US following September 11. I prefer this approach to the upside-down half mast stuff that you have discussed above.
These are my thoughts: Citizens must communicate – no.1, whether by flag or somehow else (non-violent, please). My flag was out everyday – until 9/11-2012, whereupon I retired it for a better time. After such an event as our own Administration encouraging the development of a situation leading to the violent killing of our own Ambassador and citizens on our own official foreign soil, then not sending any effective support for them as they were attacked and/or for the immediate reclaiming our soil (therefor leaving the scene to be irreversibly disturbed and desecrated), I could no longer display any support for such an Administration but work for it’s replacement. My flag will be at the ready to be flown when justice is finally done.
I will fly the flag on days specific, of course, such as on Sunday – Veteran’s Day, just not daily. The lawmakers and Administrators must once again earn enough of the people’s respect before my flag flys.
Yes, the economy must recover, however, many of us see severe difficulties for some time while the Left agenda continues to be achieved. Economic recovery will happen when responsibility and accountability returns to U.S. society at recognizable levels. Unfortunately, I believe this may be difficult to achieve.
Responsibility and accountability is much more difficult to elicit in a society where “free stuff” has become the “new normal”. This has nothing to do with race, gender, age, religion – it has been, and is, universally applicable generally to nearly all humans in various degree.
The U.S. Constitution has been abused (the “commerce clause”, etc.) and our laws irresponsibly micromanaging.
Without borders we have no country. Border defense must be another primary achievement. It can be a reality. Eisenhower made it happen, it can be achieved again – maybe a little differently, but as effectively.
Much must be recovered, even though the distractions (like AGW) abound to divert attention from the real challenges.
The U.S., as an ongoing experiment, must remain cognizant of our history and our hisorical struggles in order to grow – within the guidance of our carefully constructed Constitution.
Our Will will continue to be be severely tested for at least another couple of years, but Congress and the People must demand principled limitations to further “Totalitarian” overreaches around the Constitution and our Laws.
As struggle usually must precede success our reward may be truly great, perhaps as great as GW’s (George Washington’s) at Trenton allowing the rallying of troops leading to a decisive, successful promotion of reward through sufficient effort, responsibility and accountability.
Thank you, Anthony, for this opportunity
ujagoff…one of the amazing things about the era we live in is that the information you require to make your own mind up is freely available.
For example, when Warmists start squealing about Arctic Sea Ice, anyone can check the latest satellite data from Universities and Government organisations and even the US Navy!
When Bill Mc Kibben or Al Gore rant about extreme weather – simply refer to the US Bureau of Meteorology statistics which clearly show they’re lying.
Better still, if you’re really worried about who to trust, do a word search for the term ‘fudge’ on Climategate2 emails!
I may well hold views on certain issues that you find utterly repellant and vice versa but I don’t read WUWT to have my bias confirmed, I don’t belong to or wish to belong to any issue tribe.
Maybe you should ignore the comments section from now on and simply study the excellent scientific information in the side panels. Quiet sun, Arctic ice rebounding, Antarctic ice at record highs, Global temp anomaly at 0.3 C, El Nino/La Nina neutral etc etc.
It doesn’t matter what your political views are on other subjects. We don’t care here. They’re your business.
Trust yourself and be thankful that WUWT gives you the tools you need to make your own mind.
We are in a state of distress. A real state of emergency. The flags may fly upside down for the next four years, for all I care. My countrymen have betrayed the best interests of this country by re-electing the fool Barack the Usurper.
Gail Combs says:
November 9, 2012 at 8:46 pm
Tad says:
November 9, 2012 at 9:14 pm
I knew if I read far enough down this unusual (for this site) thread, I’d find that somebody was saying what I was thinking.
Gail Combs says: November 9, 2012 at 5:16 pm
Gail, I respectfully disagree. My experience is that such people tend to fall into one of two categories: Those whose experience of the media is rooted in the era during which one could actually trust such media and have failed (for various and sundry reasons) to recognize that the media paradigm has changed dramatically (if not significantly!) Others do so because they have grown up in an era during which the development of critical thinking skills has been conspicuous by its absence.
But, apart from the fact that I find labels unhelpful (although I confess to having used them myself on occasion), I wouldn’t call one who falls into either category “an idiot”. Gail, there are lots of intelligent people out there (including some of my best friends!) who are not connected to the Internet or who lack the skills to take advantage of what it offers.
As for the topic of this thread … As a Canadian, I had no vote; that being said, I do have an interest in how my neighbours vote, and I must say that I was very disappointed in the outcome.
IMHO, any country’s flag is a symbol in which its citizens can take pride (viz Olympic medal ceremonies, for example). So the view from here (so to speak!) is that those who have chosen to invert the flag at half-mast might well represent a flicker of the views of – permit me to invoke a phrase from the distant past – “the silent majority”.
Even though I doubt that I would ever have rooted for the one who – or whose speech-writer- popularized it, I never trusted tricky Dicky any more than I would trust the word of anyone who for twenty years sat silently and admiringly in the church of Rev. Jeremiah Wright..
But I digress …
Anthony’s observation of this symbolic gesture is one that I can appreciate and understand far more than whatever the over-hyped (in no small measure, thanks to the MSM’s unwarranted attention) “Occupy …” antics might have been intended to convey.
WUWT is the internet’s crown jewel prototype for passive (and sometimes active) citizen participation in good science. Ordinary people learn by watching you guys do what you do. The mix of politics and science seems about right.
That said, I’ll take this rare opening Anthony provided to agree with Peter Hodges and the 14 minute video he recommended. For those who missed it:
I was always told to fly a flag at half mast you raised it to the top and then down one third not have it halfway up the mast. This was the mistake many in the UK made after Diana died.
As M Courtney says:
November 9, 2012 at 8:19 am about “our flag” I thought that it was the blue touch paper for Europe.
James Bull
.
One of the great problems of the modern age, is that is such scrutiny of politicians and they are so poorly rewarded, that only a fool would strive to go into politics. Why face all that press intrusion and scrutiny, when you can become a CEO of a company or a banker, and earn ten times as much?
Thus the quality of politicians on both sides of the Atlantic has diminished with each passing generation.
.
hro001 says:
November 9, 2012 at 11:51 pm
….Gail, I respectfully disagree. My experience is that such people tend to fall into one of two categories: Those whose experience of the media is rooted in the era during which one could actually trust such media and have failed (for various and sundry reasons) to recognize that the media paradigm has changed dramatically (if not significantly!) Others do so because they have grown up in an era during which the development of critical thinking skills has been conspicuous by its absence…..
_______________________________
I figured out the Media was deliberately lying to the public before I was twenty and that was back in the 1960’s. In the USA we have not been able to trust the media for about 100 years. This was made very clear in the U.S. Congressional Record February 9, 1917, page 2947 by Congressman Calloway, a member of the [defense appropriations] committee.
Perhaps it is the US teachers of American history I should be annoyed with because here in our U.S. Congressional Record is information about important events leading up to the US involvement in WWI that is never ever taught in school.
Here is a more recent comment by historians Steve Fraser & Gary Gerstel, in the Chronicle of Higher Education (4-1-05):
The destruction of the US has been long term and deliberate. The news media and education were primary targets in this process.
However as WUWT shows, the strategy has only worked to some extent so the transformation process has been taken a step further by pronouncing our gifted students as having ADHD ( Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) otherwise known as being bored silly in state schools.
From The Scientific Review of Mental Health Practice
Also see http://www.ritalindeath.com/ and http://www.cchrint.org/2010/11/15/adhd-ritalin-–-brain-damage-heart-attacks-hallucinations-liver-damage/
So you are correct they are not idiots they have been deliberately brainwashed. Brainwashed not by ‘socialists’ but by the moneyed elite hiding behind the mask of socialism as a means of transferring wealth from the pockets of the man on the street into the pockets of the wealthy. The fact that some is allowed to dribble into the hands of the poor as a hook is only incidental to the real purpose.
See Archer Daniels Midland Co. for an example of what I mean.