He could always come back with a snappy rebuttal.

Is this just your opinion, or do you have a crystal ball?

Said the guy supporting the candidate who has made scandals an art form.  Bill had the charm to handle it... Hillary not so much.  And Obama has nothing to swiftboat.  

I had an interesting conversation about this subject with an individual yesterday. We were at a political event. She remarked that in her upbringing they weren't allowed to put their hands over their heart.

The point of all of this is that there is no "official" or correct explicit orthodoxy when it comes to public displays of patriotism. And if there were, who decides what that is? If someone is respectful, what's the problem?

Just right wingnuts perpetuating idiocy...

How so?

It appears to me to be a tempest in a teapot stirred up by right wingnuts. The orthodoxy they insist on is antithetical to the principles of our nation.

Gentlemen absolutely must remove their hat for the national anthem.  Everything else is negotiable.

But, they don't. There's a major league franchise in my area. I've attended a small number of games over the years. I've been amazed at the number of gentlemen who don't remove their hats for the national anthem. I've also been amazed at the number of people who continue to go about their business during the national anthem. Walking to their seats, conversing, buying concessions.

The fans of the local NFL team make a habit of singing the end of the national anthem thusly: "...land of the free and the home of the [name of the football team]."

My point is that the high dudgeon directed at someone who presented a respectful demeanor at the singing of the national anthem is indicative of the nasty political world we live in.

Cruising the Internets to spam your pseudo legalese I see.

Do you see how the opposition operates, grasshoppers?

This is how one answers them:

Not exactly, eh?

This code is the guide for all handling and display of the Stars and Stripes. It does not impose penalties for misuse of the United States Flag. That is left to the states and to the federal government for the District of Columbia. Each state has its own flag law.

Criminal penalties for certain acts of desecration to the flag were contained in Title 18 of the United States Code prior to 1989. The Supreme Court decision in Texas v. Johnson; June 21, 1989, held the statute unconstitutional. This statute was amended when the Flag Protection Act of 1989 (Oct. 28, 1989) imposed a fine and/or up to I year in prison for knowingly mutilating, defacing, physically defiling, maintaining on the floor or trampling upon any flag of the United States. The Flag Protection Act of 1989 was struck down by the Supreme Court decision, United States vs. Eichman, decided on June 11, 1990.

While the Code empowers the President of the United States to alter, modify, repeal or prescribe additional rules regarding the Flag, no federal agency has the authority to issue 'official' rulings legally binding on civilians or civilian groups. Consequently, different interpretations of various provisions of the Code may continue to be made. The Flag Code may be fairly tested: 'No disrespect should be shown to the Flag of the United States of America.' Therefore, actions not specifically included in the Code may be deemed acceptable as long as proper respect is shown.

Learn what precedent and stare decisis mean when it comes to the law of the land.

Your "memo" has the same force as one of those Congressional resolutions about mother and apple pie.

Please feel free to cite any federal cases which have taken place concerning violation(s) of "Title 36 Chapter 10 Section 171".

[sound of crickets]

Here's a little history for you in a time of war:

WEST VIRGINIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION ET AL. v. BARNETTE ET AL., 319 U.S. 624

Justice Jackson wrote:

...The Board of Education on January 9, 1942, adopted a resolution containing recitals taken largely from the Court's Gobitis opinion and ordering that the salute to the flag become 'a regular part of the program of activities in the public schools,' that all teachers and pupils 'shall be required to participate in the salute honoring the Nation represented by the Flag; provided, however, that refusal to salute the Flag be regarded as an Act of insubordination, and shall be dealt with accordingly.' 2 [319 U.S. 624, 627] The resolution originally required the 'commonly accepted salute to the Flag' which it defined. Objections to the salute as 'being too much like Hitler's' were raised by the Parent and Teachers Association, the Boy and Girl [319 U.S. 624, 628]  Scouts, the Red Cross, and the Federation of Women's Clubs. 3  Some modification appears to have been made in deference to these objections, but no concession was made to Jehovah's Witnesses. 4  What is now required is the 'stiff-arm' salute, the saluter to keep the right hand raised with palm turned up while the following is repeated: 'I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of [319 U.S. 624, 629]   America and to the Republic for which it stands; one Nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.'...

...Symbols of State often convey political ideas just as religious symbols come to convey theological ones. Associated with many of these symbols are appropriate gestures of acceptance or respect: a salute, a bowed or bared head, a bended knee. A person gets from a [319 U.S. 624, 633]  symbol the meaning he puts into it, and what is one man's comfort and inspiration is another's jest and scorn....

...Whether the First Amendment to the Constitution will permit officials to order observance of ritual of this nature does not depend upon whether as a voluntary exercise we would think it to be good, bad or merely innocuous. Any credo of nationalism is likely to include what some disapprove or to omit what others think essential, and to give off different overtones as it takes on different accents or interpretations. 14  If official power exists to coerce acceptance of any patriotic creed, what it shall contain cannot be decided by courts, but must be largely discretionary with the ordaining authority, whose power to prescribe would no doubt include power to amend. Hence validity of the asserted power to force an American citizen publicly to profess any statement of belief or to engage in any ceremony of assent to one presents questions of power that must be considered independently of any idea we may have as to the utility of the ceremony in question....

....National unity as an end which officials may foster by persuasion and example is not in question. The problem is whether under our Constitution compulsion as here employed is a permissible means for its achievement.

Struggles to coerce uniformity of sentiment in support of some end thought essential to their time and country have been waged by many good as well as by evil men. Nationalism is a relatively recent phenomenon but at other times and places the ends have been racial or territorial security, support of a dynasty or regime, and particular plans for saving souls. As first and moderate methods to attain unity have failed, those bent on its accomplishment must resort to an ever-increasing severity. [319 U.S. 624, 641]  As governmental pressure toward unity becomes greater, so strife becomes more bitter as to whose unity it shall be. Probably no deeper division of our people could proceed from any provocation than from finding it necessary to choose what doctrine and whose program public educational officials shall compel youth to unite in embracing. Ultimate futility of such attempts to compel coherence is the lesson of every such effort from the Roman drive to stamp out Christianity as a disturber of its pagan unity, the Inquisition, as a means to religious and dynastic unity, the Siberian exiles as a means to Russian unity, down to the fast failing efforts of our present totalitarian enemies. Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard.

It seems trite but necessary to say that the First Amendment to our Constitution was designed to avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings. There is no mysticism in the American concept of the State or of the nature or origin of its authority. We set up government by consent of the governed, and the Bill of Rights denies those in power any legal opportunity to coerce that consent. Authority here is to be controlled by public opinion, not public opinion by authority.

...If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us....

"...no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion..." Powerful words. To believe otherwise would be, well....un-American.