"No Heils in America!"

I started school in the early 1950s. My Dad and my Uncles were all veterans of WWII. My Grandmother and my great uncles were all naturalized citizens. My great uncle Louie was a veteran of WWI; I have one of his medals hanging in my house. I never heard anything negative about living in America from any of those folks. Every morning from 1st grade to high school, I remember reciting the Pledge of Allegiance at the start of each school day. All of our assemblies started with the "Pledge", and all of our athletic events started with the National Anthem; I remember no controversy in regards to those practices. As a veteran, I feel this is a good practice for our children. No matter what others may think, the United States of America is the best and freest country on the earth. This nation offers the best chance for success to its citizens; more than any other nation, be it socialist, communist or monarchy, our republic is the crown jewel of all nations. If we didn't believe this, why did so many of our young men and women give up their lives for its existence? I take great pride in being an American. When the hippies were holding up pictures of Ho Chi Min while our soldiers and marines were dying in Viet Nam, I could feel my stomach turn at their lack of respect for our nation.

A group in Brookline, Massachusetts wants the Pledge of Allegiance pulled out of the town schools; they feel it is reflective of a totalitarian regime! When I heard this I was flabbergasted! To equate America with a totalitarian state is ludicrous and insane. I would like to know any other country that gives more freedom to express than America. I would like to know of any other country whose citizens willingly serve in a military without conscription and field the finest military in the world. These people must be left-over hippies who believe America is a bad place; although none of them seem to be in too big of a HURRY TO GO SOMEWHERE ELSE! These people say they are patriotic, yet they diminish America at every turn.

Loyalty to America isn't a "seig heil"; it is a pledge to stand behind our nation and the principles our founding fathers believed in and tried to pass on to us. Groups like this are trying to draw our children away from the ideals those great men of the past stated in our constitution. We have had over forty presidents; each voted in, and out, by the citizens of the United States of America; these are hardly the acts of a totalitarian nation. My fellow Americans, we must ask ourselves what is to be gained by the elimination of a pledge of loyalty to this great nation? If you are a socialist or a communist, perhaps you have your reasons; "eliminate loyalty and you eliminate the nation". I don't think five minutes a day in a pledge of loyalty to America will damage any children; it might even be a benefit. Try to remember George Washington and Abraham Lincoln never had salutes that included their names; no "heils" in America!