Boy Scouts Burn American Flag
A sordid chapter in the saga of the 9/11 attacks came to an end this week.
An American flag that, it was claimed, had flown from a construction crane over the Penatagon on 9/11, was destroyed in a ceremonial flag burning by two Boy Scouts and the Loudoun County, Virginia, Boy Scout Commissioner. John Andrews, a construction contractor, had purchased it on Ebay with the plan of flying the large American flag above a new elementary school in a Virginia suburb, but decided instead to burn the flag to end a controversy over it’s authenticity.
The flag was obtained earlier this year by David Nicholson who placed it for auction on Ebay. It sold for a whopping $371,300 but the bidder backed out when Facchina Contruction denied flying an American flag from the crane when the attack occured. That’s when Andrews stepped in to snatch the flag up at the bargain basement price of $25,000. Nicholson, who is suffering from kidney cancer, says he needs the money to provide for his family when he’s gone, so he’s suing Facchina Const. for the difference.
Believe me, I sympathize with Mr. Nicholson. Terminal illness can be devastating to a family. But there is something cynical and downright tawdry about selling artifacts from the site of a massacre for personal gain. I would be embarrased to tell friends and family, for example, that I paid money to own a chunk of concrete from the Twin Towers.
If this particular American flag did, in fact, fly over the Pentagon on that day, it qualifies as part of that hallowed ground where American lives were lost at the hands of an enemy. Under the circumstances, I think that Mr. Andrews did the right thing in affording this flag the respectful disposal that all American flags deserve.