Just how did that get up there? Up there - streaming in the tempest like a wound that never heals. Up there - whipping like a tortured conscience. It flaps in the wind as if in demented denial - or ecstatic affirmation. Is it an agitated futility resisting the wind of war? Does it flutter concupiscent affirmation in the breath of life? And what arm hoisted it there?

Up there it streams and whips, flaps and flutters. From the White House and the Kremlin, from parliament and knesset, from assemblies, senates, congresses and legislatures, it streams insistent as reminders and whips of admonition. From the homes of patriots it flaps threadbare as tatters of outworn disguise; and from gas stations it flutters spastic as injured birds, memorable as an abandoned afterthought. To the loftiest of perches where it streams and whips and flaps and flutters: what arm lifts aloft the flag?

Is it the long arm of the law that lifts our flag to stream and soar in the wind of our voices? Or is it the strong arm of the thug that hoists it up to perch, poised over our collapsing hopes, roosting contented our lives like so many broken eggs? If the strong arm of the thug jerks the rope that hoists the flag, then that same rope is knotted tight about our necks. As rises the flag so twitch our limbs. If that is the arm that hoists the flag then each time we salute, we twitch. Each time we fold it, we solemnly twitch. Each time we stand at attention, we twitch into rigidity. Each time it rises and we sing the anthem, we twitch and croak. And when in passing we raise our eyes, we twitch again.

Which arm raises the flag? We must know. More than one generation hangs twitching from flagpoles - and one is far too many. And we do know. Anything that moves us regardless of our say is the appendage of a thug. If we have not in some way, at some time agreed to be moved, then it takes the strong arm of the thug to move us. On the other hand, if we do not enjoy how we are being moved - even if we are moved by loaded guns at our heads or riflings groping in our pockets - but have in some way, at some time agreed, then it is only the long arm of the law that moves us.

Now we must discover whether we agree with the way we are being moved. Before another flag is raised, before we are moved once more, we must find out; if not, both flag and flagpole should be uprooted. From democracy we shall not be moved.