What made the hairs on the back of my neck rise was when I read that he was advocating for jail time or stripping a protester of their citizenship, for burning the flag.

Many times I've thought about burning the flag.  I've seen the lie that is this country.  I've seen the dark and vicious reality it is to the poor, to minorities, and the way it protects the rich and their profits (while they destroy lives) while slapping flags all over the act.  Black Lives Matter didn't start in a vacuum, and their cause is just.  The MRFF didn't start in a vacuum.  My ancestors had their land, their culture, and their rights even to EXIST in their homeland stripped from them - we didn't get those rights back until years after I left High School.  While I may believe in the promise of America (and I do), the flag does not represent that promise.  It represents the reality.  It was proudly waved by the Klan (along with the Stars and Bars) after they committed atrocities against minorities and lynched black (and American Indian) people.  It fluttered over "battlefields" where American soldiers slaughtered peace-seeking men, women, and LITTLE CHILDREN (actually a fairly common occurrence throughout much of the first half of its history).  It fluttered from the mast of the US Navy warship that gunned and sank barges loaded with women and children from my tribe - after promising their menfolk that if they helped the US military against the Seminole, they could stay on the land.  It flew in the faces of people who were being oppressed and their oppressors were protected by the military raising that flag (because they served the interests of the 1% in this country).

That flag, for a lot of people, does not bring about pride.  It brings fear and hopelessness.  So many poor people in this country feel little hope - and so many of them (especially the homeless) commit suicide (while the hateful language they got from Christians ranting at them that "your SINS are why you're poor!" is still ringing in their ears) - yet people rant at them to be proud to be an American.  It flies from the flagstaffs of the agencies that are supposed to help the poor, but who put up barrier after barrier under the guise of "encouraging them to be self-sufficient".  It flies from the businesses who refuse to pay a decent wage and overcharge and screw the poor.  It flies from the houses of the rich who made their fortunes through exploiting poor people.  I've SEEN that.

I see the flag and I feel nothing positive.  I've seen too much evil in this country under that flag to feel any friendliness towards it.  It lost any claim to representing the promise by being waved in the face of America's victims.

The Dominionists (and others of like ilk) fuss about God punishing America if they don't "Bring America back to Jesus!".  The fact is, America is long past due for punishment - by over a couple of hundred years.  Slavery, theft of land so that a tiny handful can get filthy rich, the taking of resources and abuse AND GENOCIDE of the original inhabitants, all of these things are the reality.  Giving women control over their bodies and lives is not the same as murdering men, women, and children because they occupied land that greedy people wanted.  Allowing poor women (poor people in general, actually) the ability to limit the sizes of their families so that they have a chance of being able to afford to take care of their family is nowhere near the enslavement of people from a continent, because their skin was much darker.  I could go on and on... the "sins" and so on that they rant about are NOTHING to what they themselves do to the people the one they claimed to follow said to HELP!

Trump's threat to strip people of their citizenship is just an extension of the America I've seen - and it ties right in with the hate I read or hear on a frequent basis - the "If you don't love America, then leave!" or "My way or the Highway".  What they're saying is "If you won't express gratitude for your third-class existence and take our abuse and thievery with a smile, you can leave or die!"  Trump is just opening the door of ways to reduce innocent-but-honest people to slavery or to being made nationless as well as homeless.  IT CAN HAPPEN.

People talk about patriotism, well, I would ask them who is more patriotic - a person who demands that this country live up to its promise and denounces corporate evildoing (such as the murder of black people by the police or forcing oil pipelines through reservation spaces while destroying burial grounds and other sites), or the person who demands that people support it right or wrong - and helps it live down to the reality.

Then when people start telling me to leave, I'll tell them that my ancestors MET their ancestors at the shore, when they first arrived.  My ancestors showed kindness and helped their ancestors to survive and even prosper - and were repaid with theft and knives in their backs.  IT is the HATERS who should leave - the spiritual descendants of the people who stole the land and murdered, imprisoned, and put the survivors they could catch on the trail of tears who should leave - or they should learn what is really meant by "I desire mercy and not sacrifice!"