Whoops, we can't. It failed yesterday by one vote, 66-34. Sheesh, can't Bill Frist get anything passed anymore?

    The constitutional amendment would not have banned flag burning per se, but would have given Congress latitude on anti-flag-desecration matters: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." The intriguing thing would have been the SCOTUS interpretation of how far "desecration" extends, and at what point 28th Amendment laws would interfere with the 1st amendment. (I wonder if all those frayed mini-flags on the antennae of SUVs would be violations? With American flags everywhere, including our clothing, it's sure been a long time since Abbie Hoffman's star-spangled adventures.)

    Of course all the instances of flag-burning and desecration we see on TV happen overseas, where conveniently our Constitution doesn't apply. A telling quote of just how terribly dire the flag-desecration situation is here in the states, from Dana Milbank's WaPo column:

"The Citizens Flag Alliance, a group pushing for the Senate this week to pass a flag-burning amendment to the Constitution, just reported an alarming, 33 percent increase in the number of flag-desecration incidents this year. The number has increased to four, from three."

    Milbank also makes the good point that a lot of recent incidents of flag-desecration also would fall under existing vandalism statutes.

    Good work, Congress: we voters will dutifully reward you in November for all your hard work and dedication to those most-pressing issues of our day!