Are you aware that the Pledge of Allegiance was written by a socialist? Does it matter? I am proud to be an American, too, but my pride does not rest on a few paragraphs written by a man to promote his cousin's socialist ideas. Nor does my pride rest on a cloth ensign waving in the wind.

It rests on the ideals on which our country was founded--equal justice for all, the rights of the common man, freedom of speech and religion, etc. My ancestors help found this country in the 17th century, and I am proud of them, too. They risked everything--life, liberty, family--to come to this country and defy the British and their political and religious ideas.

I do think we have strayed from our ideals and I'd like to see a resurgence of them, but jingoistic defence of flag and the pledge isn't going to take us there. Just ask the people who lived through the rise and fall of the Third Reich.