Support him, or don't, you just can't stick it to Obama over this

IT'S OFFICIAL. We're turning into a nation of pinheads.

For proof, look at that cringe-inducing moment at last week's Democratic presidential debate, when the television talking heads turned the questioning over to a woman from Latrobe, Pa.

"Senator Obama," she began. "I have a question, and I want to know if you believe in the American flag. I am not questioning your patriotism (odd, because that's exactly what she appeared to be doing), but all our servicemen, policemen and EMS wear the flag. I want to know why you don't."

Sheesh.

This is all because Sen. Barack Obama does not wear an American flag pin on his lapel. When, exactly, did that become mandatory?

I hoped the senator from Illinois would snap back, "Of course I believe in the American flag. It exists. What's not to believe?"

Instead, he gave a windy explanation about how he revered the flag and loved his country.

We suddenly have a national dress code. A lapel-pin litmus test. Venture out in a naked suit coat and you might as well tell the world you hate our country.

How did we ever get to this? America - the great nation that vanquished the British Empire, survived a brutal Civil War and crushed Adolph Hitler - is now filled with petty little people who are suspicious of those who don't pin flags to their suit coats.

Obama called the pin question a "manufactured issue." He's right. But Obama's bare lapels have been burning up the blogosphere ever since someone noticed that he once sported a flag pin and doesn't now.

I googled "Obama" and "flag" and "pin" and got 475,000 hits Friday.

Will someone call off the pin police? It's embarrassing.

Obama isn't the only American who waved the flag after the attacks of Sept. 11 and stopped later on. We were caught up in the moment, united in our grief and revulsion.

As time passed, the flags disappeared from our cars, houses and porches. That doesn't mean we stopped loving our country. It means life went back to normal.

I was one of the millions to slap a flag decal on my car. When I bought a new ride a few years later, I neglected to put Old Glory on it.

Driving a flag-less vehicle doesn't make me a bad American. Tooling around in a car with a stick-on flag didn't make me a patriot, either.

Same goes for the patriotic pins.

Want to see a U.S. senator sporting a flag pin? Go to www.thesmokinggun.com and search for Larry Craig's mug shot. Yup, looks like the senator from Idaho was wearing an American flag on his lapel just after he was busted in an airport men's room last year.

Look, I can think of reasons not to vote for Barack Obama.

His empty lapel isn't one of them.

Kerry Dougherty, (757) 446-2306, kerry.dougherty@cox.net