Dems entangled in Obama flag flap
Published: Wednesday, March 14, 2012
TAVARES
Theresa Campbell | Staff Writer
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Pre
sident Obama's face in place of stars on an American flag flying at Lake County Democratic Headquarters in Tavares irked a group of veterans on Tuesday, who found themselves engaged in a verbal confrontation and the threat of police action when they requested the flag be taken down.
The matter was resolved peacefully when Democratic party officials removed the flag.
The Obama flag had been flowing for two months underneath an American flag before it was noticed by the veterans, who argued that it was a desecration of the flag and in violation of three codes passed by Congress about displaying the American flag.
"We were given this as a gift," said Nancy Hurlbert, chairwoman of the Lake County Democratic Party. "We are proud of our president, we're proud of the United States, and we felt it was time to display that."
Leesburg veteran Jim Bradford recalled he did a double take when he saw the Obama flag with red and white stripes for the first time over the weekend.
"When I saw the picture on the flag, I thought this is wrong," he said. "I really hate seeing the flag not being respected, and to me this was not respectful."
Bradford took pictures of the flag and sent them, via email, to friends and veterans groups.
"The general reply has been this is not right," he said, adding politics has nothing to do with the issue.
"I really don't care what party it is. If it had been a picture of Romney on the flag, I would have done the same thing," Bradford said.
Korean War veteran Don Van Beck of Tavares spearheaded the veterans' visit to the Lake County Democratic Headquarters, where he was joined by a dozen veterans and media on the front steps of the Main Street building.
"There are laws against desecrating the flag," Van Beck said, right before he read out loud the federal flag code, public law 344, section 4G to Hurlbert: "The flag should never have placed upon it or any part of it, any marks, insignia, letters, words, figures, designs, picture or drawings of any nature. We would like to ask you to take it down please."
Hurlbert told Van Beck that she wanted to look up the code first.
"Well, we're here. I'll take it down for you," the veteran said.
"No, this is private property. You're not allowed to touch anything. I'll call the police," Hurlbert said.
"I wish you would," Van Beck said. "Would you call the police?"
"No, no, no. This is private property and I've given you the benefit of the doubt. I said I would definitely like to look it up," she said. "We will take care of it. We want to do it in our own time and we'll check it out."
"You're in violation of the code," Van Beck said.
"And I'm saying we'll check it out," she said. "Thank you very much."
Van Beck gave Hurlbert a POW-MIA flag to be installed in place of the Obama flag and offered for the veterans to put it up. Once again Hurlbert reminded Van Beck that he and the other veterans were on private property and if they touched the flag, she would call police.
"It would be nice if you showed respect for our flag," said veteran John Masterjohn, who voice disapproval for Obama.
"God bless America and our president," Hurlbert said. "You guys have a wonderful day. Thank you very much."
The veterans debated their next move before Hurlbert and another volunteer resurfaced to the front yard and began taking down the Obama flag.
"We didn't know it was in violation and so now we are taking it down," Hurlbert said. "If somebody had just called ahead of time, we could have avoided all of this."
Van Beck said he did try to phone to Democratic Headquarters on Monday and also Tuesday morning, but did not make contact with anyone.
Yet, he was pleased with the outcome.
"I'm very happy," Van Beck said. "I'm sorry it had to come to this ... You don't desecrate the flag, especially for the veterans who fought the wars and died for it. In dictatorships, they have a picture of their dictator on some of the flags, but we haven't arrived at having a dictator, yet."
And he never wants to see that happen.
Passerby Ralph Smith applauded the removal of the Obama flag, which he felt was in "bad taste."
"I'm sure Nancy understands that now," he said.
