And, in the spirit of the day (and the flag-burning amendment currently simmering on the Senate floor), I offer a few related adjectives as defined by veteran and literary patriot (in the original sense), Ambrose Bierce, 1842 to 1914-ish. (Sorry Uncle Simon—you say you fought to defend the flag, I say you fought to defend the right to make fun of it.)

FLAG, n. A colored rag borne above troops and hoisted on forts and ships. It appears to serve the same purpose as certain signs that one sees and vacant lots in London—”Rubbish may be shot here.”

PATRIOTISM, n. Combustible rubbish read to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name. In Dr. Johnson’s famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.

JUSTICE, n. A commodity which is a more or less adulterated condition the State sells to the citizen as a reward for his allegiance, taxes and personal service.

(About that 1914-ish: In late 1913, the 71-year-old Bierce took a trip—he toured the Civil War battlefields of his youth and joined Pancho Villa’s army as an observer before vanishing. In one of his last letters, he wrote: “Good-by—if you hear of my being stood up against a Mexican stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease, or falling down the cellar stairs. To be a Gringo in Mexico—ah, that is euthanasia.”)