Soon, Old Glory will have to be born in the land of the free and not merely flying over it.
Congress has passed a proposal to require the federal government to purchase only American flags that have been completely manufactured in the U.S. The U.S. imports millions of American flags from overseas, mostly from China, and the sponsors of the proposal said it’s time for American flags to originate in the country they represent.
Supporters of the proposal, led by Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, said the change is more than just symbolic — they believe it will support American jobs and manufacturers while preserving the nation’s most recognized banner.
Fine. Then China will produce 99.98% of the flag and an American factory will put 2 stitches and a “Made in America” tag on it.
So you didn’t read the article and are just making shit up in your head? Got it.
Even with current rules, 50% of the flag has to be American made.
Typical.
A lot of people in here want to be angry and feel right rather than be informed.
I don’t get why people are tilted about this. The government should always buy US made unless the item literally cannot be found from a US manufacturer.
Tax payer money should stay in the country when possible. Yeah it’s a small issue but I doubt much time was spent on this
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Sounds very american to me.
Yep, even giving a shit where a piece of cloth was made is fucking weird
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but it does feel like a powerful metaphor to be importing our symbol of freedom from abroad
Freedom to buy from the lowest cost provider!
The current number of congresspersons, 435, was created in 1913. In the 1920 census the US population was 29,662,053.
29,662,053/435 ~= in 1913 there were 68,188 persons per member of Congress.
In 2020 the population was 331,449,281
331,449,281/435 ~= in 2020 there were 761,952 persons per member of congress.
One person can’t represent three quarters of a million people in a national assembly. That isn’t representation.
But do you think American flags should be made in America?!?
Perhaps one day we’ll finally ratify Article the First.
You think those numbers are bad? Wait till you look up the averages for each US Senator.
Why did I think this was already a thing?
You know what, for context for anyone late to the discourse.
All of this is about a bill passing through the Senate for the manufacturer of the government bought flags to go from 50% American manufactured materials to 100%.
Enjoy the ride.
How about we just fly fewer flags. I live in the center of the US and don’t need to be reminded by every public building, car lot, and bigot’s house of what country I live in.
Official federal and state buildings, those are fine.
I remember the vacation road trips of my youth, when our family would drive from Canada down into the US to go camping. We’d make a game of counting the American flags we saw. Occasionally there’d be some “game over” property with more flags festooning it than we could actually count before we drove past. It’d be a boring game to count Canadian flags in a similar way. There’d be one or two per day of travel.
This bill is literally about the federal government purchasing flags, not private citizens…
But what if you are walking between aisles in walmart, and suddenly become unsure what country you are in?
Oh my gosh, could you imagine? This problem is especially bad during early July. I just thank God they put reminders up. Otherwise I might forget and think I’m a communist or something!
The 400 woman on a mobility scooter blocking the isle will probably clue me in.
It will support one company that gets the GSA contract.
We have so much shit going on in this country and this is what we’re worried about?
Ohio, Maine, come get your senators. They’re drunk.
Ohio senators are probably high, it’s legal.
Senator Brown is a great senator and literally the only statewide Democrat we have other than a few state Supreme Court justices (who will be out soon now that Republicans added party affiliation to the court ballot). He will be far better for America than Bernie Moreno.
Im pretty sure Ohio is also drunk, and Maine is too busy dealing with eldritch entities and whatever is pushed out of the Maritime into the US.
Maine is also plenty drunk, somebody needs to cut off the Allen’s coffee brandy supply and let them sober up.
Maybe they should just elect one of those next time?
Yeah but elect Ygndolsofuk doesnt quite roll of the tongue, and im pretty sure the abominations from the Maritime cant talk after being curbstomped so as to stop them from whispering in folks brains.
I didn’t realize this is how it worked, where can i pick up Mr. Vance? I have some choice words for him
Oh just ask the secret service. It’s like a daycare situation. They’re literally just waiting for a parent or guardian to show up.
I remember all the cheap Chinese bumper stickers that people were slapping on their cars…an American flag with the words “THESE COLORS DON’T RUN”
Within a couple months most of the flag color had faded. It was so funny seeing a light pink and blue American flag with that contradictory phrase over it.
Well thank fuck they’ve started addressing such important issues.
You mean the end of outsourced labor and production of local goods? A key issue for may people on both sides of the aisle as seen by the bipartisan support?
Yeah I guess it is good then.
Right. If that’s what you want then this is about as effective as the TikTok bill.
Not quite the end, but certainly a step in the right direction.
The end? It’s an absolutely tiny symbolic gesture.
I feel like all this is going to do is raise government costs and line the pockets of selected contractors. We aren’t always going to be the relative best producers in cost/quality balance for every product and service.
If we’re going to subsidize any industry, it should be done directly and explicitly. Otherwise, it becomes another example of “inefficient” government that should be privatized.
Actually logistical costs and transportation is one of the highest expenses and some groups have already found that buying from local suppliers who get local raw materials (such as Climate Town’s merch Tees) can have competitive costs even when adjusting for higher labor costs just from the manufacturer being located near the farms that grow the cotton and shipping locally within the nation.
Granted the government purchased flags will likely be expensive but that’s mostly because of a quality requirement from the fact they need to be flown outdoors for some time without fading or damaging in any way. And that’s probably true currently since the flag needs to be made 50% in the country already.
Seriously look at the brownie recipe of the US military for how strict government funds are spent for specific quality requirements and you get why it’s slightly more costly than the imported flour with lead or insects in it.
It’s not about cost/quality being the best match but a good use of the funds and locally supporting business in an age when that matters is more important. Globalization and long distance transportation can not always be the answer.
Great, and where local is the best choice they should do that. But nobody can seriously argue that reducing the ability of government to shop around for the best cost/quality balance is a good thing. It’s not like the only options are buy everything American or everything from China. I’d like qualified experts making that decision, not legislators.
You create bad incentives if you artificially reduce competition like this. Not every good or service will have tons of American choices, so you end up with a handful of companies who know the government has no other choice.
We absolutely do not need foreign countries to produce all the materials for a flag at the cheapest cost. The price difference is likely negligible and shopping around can still be done.
Why is everyone so scared of taking back some production from China?
You guys are allamong weird assumptions that this is some million dollar lynching instead of just saying buy the materials you use to make from a local supplier. This counter argument is insane and literally doesn’t matter cause it passed.
I’m not quite sure how you’ve turned “we should have the option” into “we should buy everything foreign.” I think you’re having an argument you want to have rather than addressing the point I was making.
Because not everything should be bought foreign. There is no need or good reason to take something that can be easily and cheaply produced locally that is sold directly to the government and try to get the cheapest one abroad.
It’s asinine and completely against all the shouting that these communities literally do every week about local manufacturing being needed to combat outsourcing.
Your reasoning is flawed cause there is no reason to support foreign import either. Especially when the other option is to support the country they govern even if it’s just a little bit.
I truly don’t understand this hand wringing of this simple change unless you are paid for by Chinese interests. It’s not always about being cheap.
“Oh… okay. But did you want to do anything about that giant list of actual REAL problems over there behind you on the table?”
So, who’s the donor friend who owns flag manufacturing facilities?
On its surface that’s not a horrible position for a government to take.
It’s not unreasonable for the national government (in any country) to give some level of local preference to all procurement, not only something symbolic like flags. That would actually incentivize companies to onshore more of their manufacturing - or at least slow down their offshoring.
Yeah honestly national symbol items being made locally just makes sense for so many reasons if possible and this is definitely possible. Especially since it should be the purpose of the national government to support internal functions and business before external whenever possible right?
With of course like allowments for maybe raw materials or specialized things if it’s not possible. I would get this feeling silly for a country like Vanuatu but the US has resources aplenty.
Plus in times of broken down supply lines it provides at least one manufacturing plant to rely on. This is also true of the military already for those reasons.
God I fucking hate leftists.
We want manufacturing moved back into the country. A simple bill to move a point of national pride back to local manufacturing l, that while not a sweeping fix is a nice gesture to help make sure local companies can offer their services and employ Americans.
Ewww… Bullshit person with a cotton mill is gonna make money.
Booo! Why would anyone care about local manufacturing we need more local manufacturing
I just like to dog pile on things to complain about it to get my dopamine.
Seriously, be fucking happy for 30 seconds maybe? Then work on taking the next step forward? Instead of complaining how we took a nap for the last 4 decades we just get back in the race?
I hope local manufacturers use the income to be able to start more clothing production with quality cotton and we see an end to maybe fast fashion with moves like this. That’d be nice.
