BOOM: This may be the best smackdown over the National Anthem you’ll EVER read - Allen B. West -...

America was not created perfect, but it had always striven to be better. It's Constitution established a framework for limited government so that it would not institutionalize the problems that it inherited from its Colonial past. Thus, these issues could be addressed and corrected as the culture matured. Slavery was eliminated. Women's suffrage was granted. Racial prejudice was delegitimized. The work is not done. It is far from done. It will never be done. But progress cannot be made unless we celebrate each victory. Who will want to carry the ball forward if those who brought it this far are villainized?

Perps who disrespect the flag and their country under the guise of free speech should be smacked down in the harshest terms possible. You have free speech but so do I and I hold you accountable for yr behavior and actions. Just because you have a right to burn the flag doesn't mean you will get away with it, esp if there is a vet in the area.

By showing their alienation from our nation and expressing contempt for it, the people who sit for the Anthem are failing to consider "compared to what?". We have a criminal justice system capable of and inclined to address police misconduct. We have good representative government. Not perfect, but the remedies for its imperfections do exist, and can be applied. So many other nations don't have that. Perhaps some other nations are doing better, but I'm seeing in Europe and Canada that the same issues besetting us also exist - uninvited guests who don't "get" what it means to live in a civilized nation with laws they're expected to obey.