As television taught us in the 1970s, God gave America two icons that we are to honor and protect at all costs: the U.S. flag and Woodsy Owl.

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But as the Iraq War teaches us even today, sometimes you have to kill something and incinerate the corpse to make it truly "alive."

Luckily, the U.S. Forest Service has provided incredibly detailed instructions for the Washington-approved procedure for Woodsy Owl burning, and it's after the jump.

We'll paste the whole thing right here, because as soon as Bill Frist learns about this he's going to introduce a constitutional amendment to ban both Woodsy Incineration andweb pages about the procedure:

Destroying Old Woodsy Owl Costumes - Guidelines

1. Incinerate the complete costume with the oversight of an official USDA Forest Service law enforcement officer*.

2. The entire Woodsy Owl costume including each of the separate pieces is to be destroyed beyond recognition.

* If you do not have access to an official USDA Forest Service law enforcement representative, arrangements will be made for dealing with your costume by contacting the USDA-FS Washington Office at:

Woodsy Owl

C/o National Symbols Program

Jesus, what do they think people are going to do with an old Woodsy Owl costume, use it in a porn video? (Actually, that would be awesome ....)

And it's great to find out Washington has an entire bureaucracy dealing with "national symbols" of the Forest Service! Because if any "national symbol" needed a team of lawyers and bureaucrats to protect its image, it's that lying sack of shit Smokey Bear.

"Only you can prevent forest fires," my ass. Unless the you in question is God, who spends most of his time striking His worshippers and torching His forests with savage bolts of lightning.

And the whole idea of a criminal organization like the Forest Service operating behind the guise of a semi-retarded friendly bear is outrageous. Which is why so many hippie environmentalist groups have used a bummed-out Smokey Bear in their anti-Forest Service print ads.

Take a look at the Symbols.gov home page. The slogan is actually "Advertising Builds Character."

Destroying Old Woodsy Owl Costumes - Guidelines [Symbols.gov]

There is actually protocol for this [Symposia]

-- KEN LAYNE