Patriotism

Over the Holiday weekend Anna and I were talking about how it seems that America is less patriotic then when we were younger. There just is not the same type of patriotism. Perhaps it is because the world is more global than it used to be, or maybe because the US is going through hard times financially and does not seem to be as great as it once was. Speaking as a person who lived two years outside of the country, I can tell you that there is a difference that you notice when you return to your home land. Now granted there was a surge of patriotism after 9-11 however it died off pretty fast. Both Anna and I reflected on when we felt America was at its highest in patriotism during our lives. We both agreed that when we think of patriotism we think of post WWII and during the fifties (ala Sandlot or Wonder Years). However in my lifetime I think America was at its most patriotic in 1991-92. American had not been at war for quite some time and when Operation Desert Shield turned into Operation Desert Storm, America united. Yellow ribbons were everywhere; people were glued to news coverage of the war. One of the greatest moments came at Superbowl XXV when Whitney Houston sang the national anthem and everyone in the stadium was waving American flags, it was a powerful moment. I remember vividly (almost as vivid as my memory of 9-11) the day the war ended on the 28^th of February 1991. We had gone out to dinner to Tia's Tex-Mex restaurant and there was someone there who had their personal television (that is how much attention was given to the coverage) and they stood up and announced the war was over. The whole restaurant cheered. That next year the Olympics were in Barcelona and many may remember that was the Olympiad of the Dream Team. We sent our best basketball players to take back the gold medal in basketball. There just seemed to be much more pride in being an American then. I loved watching the original Dream Team beating teams by 40 and 50 points on their way to showing the USA's dominance. The difference now is in 2004 I was cheering for our basketball team to lose when they played Argentina. Perhaps we became so prideful in how great America was that we just expected to be the best and didn't put forth the effort to keep ourselves at the top (pride comes before the fall). I hope America can regain that patriotism again.