Indeed. 50 years ago I was a young child. That half century has seen a lot of change with respect to the flag. I remember my older brother, now deceased, warning me to be oh so careful not to let my toy flag touch the ground, else it had to be destroyed. He was deadly serious. It was a profound, pervasive respect, the very air we breathed, and young people alive now do not really understand what it was like before the war protest years. Such respect does not come cheap, and if it is ever restored, it will be through the the relentless commitment and sacrifice of both our men and women at arms, and patriotic civilians like Sarah Palin.
I remember how horrified, truly horrified elderly people that I knew were when protestors during the Vietnam War were burning flags. My own father really thought they should have been tried for treason and shot. I was a teenager and I really believed the protestors would get in serious trouble for disrespecting the flag the way they did, I was amazed they weren’t.