For the wages of sin is death

This entry is written in chronological order, but since there's no real transition between items, I'm going to write it as a numbered list.

1. Yesterday at work, there was an alarm, and we had to evacuate the building. Security apparently never found out why it went off. Weird.

2. The Moon last night seemed to have a bit of a reddish tent, which put me in mind of Revelation 6:12. Actually, though, I think it was a little more yellow than red. So no apocalypse yet, I suppose. {g}

3. Last night, bethje and I watched Se7en. (Isn't it cool that I spelled it that way? {g}) That's a movie that everyone seems to like (according to Beth, it has a Netflix rating of 4.75 stars), and I was no exception. I liked how it incorporated all of the Deadly Sins, with a creative murder method for each sin.

4. Today, I bought the new Laura Cantrell album at Borders. It took me a while to find, though, because someone apparently thought "Cantrell" belonged between Mariah Carey and Belinda Carlisle. I have to wonder why the alphabet seems to be so difficult for some people. I mean, the best of us make organizational mistakes on occasion, but come on! Anyway, I haven't listened to the album yet, but I thought some of my readers might be interested to know that John Flansburgh and Robin Goldwasser are thanked in the liner notes. Expect some thoughts on the record in the near future.

There's a lot of flag-burners who have got too much freedom

Apparently, the House of Representatives has passed a proposed Constitutional amendment against flag burning, and the Senate will debate it after Independence Day. Now, I've never burned a flag, nor do I have any intention to start doing so. For that matter, who IS still burning flags? It doesn't exactly strike me as a widespread form of expression in this day and age. In a way, that makes the whole thing all the worse. Does the government REALLY care that much about a flag, or are they testing the waters to see what other kinds of expression they can outlaw? I mean, it would be obviously be a blatant violation of the First Amendment. Not to mention that singling out this one action is pretty trivial for a Constitutional amendment. Not like that one about not having to quarter troops in my house, which has saved my ass on numerous occasions.

All joking aside, though, the whole idea of an anti-flag-burning amendment pisses me off. Sure, the flag is an important symbol of the country to many people. But the key word is "symbol." Burning a flag isn't the same as burning the country. Honestly, the fact that so many people still ascribe so much value to this symbol puzzles me somewhat. I'm not too fond of the Pledge of Allegiance to this same flag, either. But that's just me, and it's totally not the point. The point is that, once the government starts outlawing things that some people find offensive, it'll eventually reach the point where no one can say or do anything that isn't officially sanctioned. And that's a lot more un-American than someone burning a flag, isn't it?

From what I understand, such an amendment has already passed in the House on a few occasions, but never made it through the Senate. I'm just hoping that's what happens this time as well.