Can’t tell from the news article, but my gut tells me that the “offenders” probably wore the American flag gear just to get under the skin of the school administrators and perhaps that of the Cinco de Mayo celebrants.

Golly! Teenagers doing something just to piss off authority. What is this world coming to? Better start building that addition onto San Quentin, tout suite.

Seriously, I think that this whole deal is based on a not-so-smart, little thought-out decision by a school administrator, and it should have been treated as such. It should have been limited to a discussion between the school district and the local Board of Education. And, perhaps, the dimwitted official should have been ordered to write a four- or five-page paper on why he set the policy and what he expected to accomplish by it.

Instead, the local news picks it up. The outrage builds. The story spreads to the news services, who make sure that it’s on the show agenda of every talking head they have on the payroll. It leaches out to tens of thousands of message boards. Finally makes its way into a vitriolic email carrying a barely recognizable, much more inflammatory version of the incident, that I’ll still be receiving five years from now.

Can you say “Polarization”?

As far as I’m concerned, I think that I will hold onto my outrage, and use it for something more deserving. It’s almost time for Glenn Beck, Chris Matthews, and Lou Dobbs. They’re sure to come up with something that will raise my blood pressure past the levels of human tolerance.