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Removal of flag in Amherst draws comments
Daily Hampshire Gazette ^ | 11/9/04 | NICK GRABBE

Posted on 11/17/2004 3:50:28 PM PST by gringo_in_Akita

http://www.dailyhampshiregazette.com/storytmp.cfm?id_no=110900952004

AMHERST - The Puerto Rican flag is flying in front of Town Hall again, two days after a woman mistook it for the flag of Texas and removed it from the flagpole.

Patricia Church, of South Prospect Street, was attending a peace vigil on the town common Sunday when she noticed a new flag flying under the usual United Nations flag. Someone at the vigil said it was the flag of Texas, she said.

Church, still upset over the re-election of President Bush last week, said she thought someone had raised the Texas flag as a prank to taunt supporters of Sen. John Kerry. She called the police. But before officers arrived on the scene, Church, a Town Meeting member who chairs Amherst's Solid Waste Committee, undid the ropes and took the flag down, and later brought it to her house.

She was unaware that the flag was raised there last week, before 100 people, as part of the Amherst Puerto Rican Association's eighth annual cultural celebration.

The flags of Texas and Puerto Rico are similar. Both have white five-pointed stars on blue backgrounds on the left, and white and red horizontal stripes on the right. But the blue part is a triangle on the Puerto Rican flag and a rectangle on the Texas flag, and while the Puerto Rican flag has five alternating red and white stripes, the Texas flag has only two.

''I'm mortified,'' said Church when she learned of her mistake Monday. ''This makes me really embarrassed.''

She immediately asked a friend to fetch the flag from her house and take it to the police station, she said. Town Manager Barry Del Castilho said it would be returned to the flagpole today, she said. Police said today they would not pursue charges.

But the matter didn't end there. Vladimir Morales, the School Committee member who is president of the Puerto Rican Association, says he has demanded a formal apology from Church. The two were active in the campaigns of rival candidates in the Democratic primary for governor's council, said Church, who had not yet responded to Morales' request Monday night.

Removing the flag would not have been justified even if it had been the Texas flag, Morales said. ''You have to respect any flag, no matter where it's from,'' he said. ''Flags are flags. They're symbols.''

And he expressed surprise that a participant in a peace vigil had taken matters into her own hands by removing the flag. ''They're there for peace, for heaven's sake,'' he said.

''The elections are over,'' Morales said. ''Bush won. They have to let it go and get on with their lives.''

Staff writers Tom Marshall and Scott Merzbach contributed to this report.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Massachusetts; US: Texas
KEYWORDS: amherst; flag; massachusetts
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To: gringo_in_Akita

Well, I'm only 700 miles away now. But I'll never go back.


41 posted on 11/17/2004 5:18:39 PM PST by buccaneer81 (Rick Nash will score 50 goals this season ( if there is a season)
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To: gringo_in_Akita
Hey, remember what happened to Cosmo Kramer when he stole a Pureto Rican flag...
42 posted on 11/17/2004 5:24:34 PM PST by Doctor Raoul (KERRY IS A POODLE: #1 He's French, #2 He's A Rich Woman's Pet, #3 He Won't Protect You)
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To: gringo_in_Akita
''They're there for peace, for heaven's sake,'' he said.

Bzzzzzzt! Wrong answer, Vladimir. It's much more likely that they're there in support of Communist tyranny...

43 posted on 11/17/2004 5:29:08 PM PST by Zeppo
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To: hellinahandcart; MeekOneGOP; gringo_in_Akita; Doctor Raoul; Zeppo

Puerto Rican Flag




Cuban Flag

I can't see how anyone could confuse the Puerto Rican flag with the Texas flag. It would be much easier to confuse it wit the Cuban flag.

44 posted on 11/17/2004 6:18:52 PM PST by Paleo Conservative (Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Arlen Specter's got to go!)
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To: gringo_in_Akita
". A group of lesbians came up to us and physically assaulted us (or at least our signs), ripping the sign right out of one of my buddys' hands and punching my sign."

Dude...assaulted by lesbians? Got your sign punched by lesbians?

There are quite a few humerous comments that...uhh...'spring' to mind. But in the nature of good Freeperology I will not make them....lol...:-)

45 posted on 11/17/2004 6:43:16 PM PST by Khurkris (That sound you hear coming from over the horizon...thats me laughing.)
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To: hellinahandcart
It would be easier to confuse Puerto Rico's flag with Ohio's

And Texas' with Chile's! I am told that the Chilean flag flew over the State House for more than a week back in the '80s, the consequence of a frat prank.

46 posted on 11/17/2004 6:49:45 PM PST by Snickersnee (Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket???)
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To: gringo_in_Akita

I wonder if they fly the Massachusetts flag in Amherst. It features an Indian, but the Indians in Massachusetts were largely wiped out or sold into slavery by the colonists in King Philip's War. To be correct, their flag should feature a ball and chain around the Indian's leg.


47 posted on 11/17/2004 7:54:23 PM PST by rustbucket
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To: Khurkris

I think I know what you're getting at there bro, and apparently you've never been to Northampton (no real loss to you). We aren't talking Howard Stern/Playboy Bunny lesbians, we're talking 245-lb short spiky hair flannel shirt wearing patchouli oil smelling pissed-off looking bull-dy.. er I mean lesbians.


48 posted on 11/17/2004 7:58:21 PM PST by gringo_in_Akita
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To: gringo_in_Akita

I hear ya'...just a bit of good natured ribbing.


49 posted on 11/17/2004 8:06:20 PM PST by Khurkris (That sound you hear coming from over the horizon...thats me laughing.)
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To: Velveeta
Memo to Patricia Church: Someday you're going to google your name and find this thread. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Doh!

LOL

50 posted on 11/18/2004 12:43:22 AM PST by FormerACLUmember (Free Republic is 21st Century Samizdat)
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