(Disclaimer: I am not putting down US, just sharing personal views, IMHO, US is a great country just with a less then great president)

Random thought, read at your own risk of losing 3 minutes of your life.

So recently, I spent a couple of days south of 49 parallel and the most striking difference between Canada and US are the number of flags and bumper stickers I’ve seen. Never in my life have I seen so many flags of any one country, or as many ‘Support Our Troop’ signs and stickers as I have in US. I realize this varies state to state, last time I went to California; I never saw anything of that sort. But it made me wonder, does flag waving make you patriotic, or is it just following the crowd in proving that you care about your country?

While driving to my destination, I saw this huge pick-up with four American flags (which essentially reduces fuel efficiency by 10% a flag) cut of this other fellow with large God Bless America and Support Our Troops bumper stickers. The person cut of then proceeded to honk for a long time, tail-gating the pick-up that cut him of, and flashing his lights as if it were shooting bullets each time he did so. It seemed quite contrary to the message that they were trying to display of I’m American, and we shall unite against the bad guy terrorists. With that, and my impression of American politicians I’ve seen on TV, I started to assume that patriotism was perhaps a word just thrown around for some Orwellian reasons.

Later, after checking in to my hotel, before exploring the city for a while, I spent some time watching the news on NBC or CNN, where there was coverage about a small group of volunteers who took injured Iraq war veterans for canoeing (I think that’s a proper word). And the joy I saw on these soldiers faces was priceless. These were men who after losing a limb in a foreign country for a purpose they may or may not support came back to a country where its citizens truly cared about them. That in my opinion showed true patriotism of that group.

Not everyone has the skill set to do what those volunteers did and I don’t have anything against all the flag-waving and red-white-and-blue confetti or stickers, I’m pretty sure some ofthose people are helping out in some way or the other, I just figure that to be a true citizen, who cares sincerely about their country, it requires some effort. Effort to be a good driver and allow people way, effort to get of your seat if an elderly person is standing, effort to say please and thank you whenever and wherever possible, and more if possible. And of course, this applies not only in America, but all countries of the world.