[david914]

"Antiquated courtesy"? It's just plain courtesy. Something that many people these days don't seem to know much about. Our society has become so "me-oriented" that the big picture is lost. The condemning of the United States by it's own citizens is indicative of this. Once upon a time, a person could get hung from the nearest tree for making such statements. Now, they get by with nary a slap on the wrist.

We could all take a good lesson from our grandparents generation. They fought and sacrificed during WWII to keep our country together, and it worked. The only glimpse of that kind of teamwork that I see today is largely in our miltary families.

If a person is that unhappy living here in the United States because they don't like President Bush, or the fact that our military is in Iraq, or they don't like God mentioned in public, I say get the hell out. The majority of United States citizens love our country, support our leaders, and believe in God.

Shortly after 9-11, I was on a local university campus and noticed many students parading around with anti-war signs. I was very tempted to walk up to one and ask how long they think they would last walking around New York City like that, but I didn't. I wished now that I had. All this "make love, not war - touchy feelie - wanna be everyone's friend" stuff doesn't work if the other side won't play by the rules. Try and talk to someone who lost a loved one on 9-11 about being nice and not fighting back. Chances are, your words will fall on deaf ears (and rightly so).