Title from Bricoleur's comments. She also has a big upside-down American Flag with the logo:

We are all terrorists now.


And if you don't know what I'm talking about, read this or better yet, read Ohioan and SF writer John Scalzi's post on Moral Cowardice.

Because being American abroad was so easy before this. (that's sarcasm) I may be particularly sensitive to the "having to defend your country abroad".

Let me share with you what it was like doing a homestay in a small mountain town in Nicaragua. My group's homestay families, unimaginably, nothing-on-the-shelves-of-the-local-store poor, graciously welcomed us, took care of us, fed us, and enthusiastically spoke with us.

Each one of those families had a brother, uncle, father, or son dead or missing because of U.S. trained and armed contras. EVERY ONE.

It sucked. There's nothing to be said. There's no excuse.

And from there I went to Japan. You remember, the only country in the world that's been Atom-bombed? Yep, by America. I wish everyone in the US could go through the Hiroshima museum.

Again, no words to apologize.

But my only scrap of self-respect remaining in both those cases was our constitution and the US's outward stance on freedom and liberty.

Not torture. Not endless detention without cause.

If you aren't a member of Moveon.org or TrueMajority.org, please go sign up now. It's an easy way to make your opinion heard. They just send you an email and all you have to do is push "reply" to communicate with your representatives.