[Gunslingr3]

[Leatherneck_MT]

I would have to agree with the Author on this one. I don't pledge allegiance to anything other than My God. My allegiance is to him, not a land filled with people governed by an elite few. I have however swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of these United States. I see no disparity between my allegiance to God and my Oath to defend.

Good piece, more people should think on this before they start slinging the "Your not a patriot" mudballs.

[smith288]

My own allegiance - by smith288

I pledge allegiance,
to God Almighty
For what He does and what He has done for me.

I pledge allegiance,
to my family and those I hold dear
For I owe them safety, nurishment, housing and love.

I pledge allegiance,
to my country
For as long as it stands for God and family.

[LiteKeeper]

INTREP

[Lazamataz]

I don't care where the pledge came from. It has grown larger than any one author. It is a pledge of devotion to a country that -- until fairly recently -- embodied the only example of citizen freedom on our planet.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

The phrase "one nation under God" was added during the national paranoia of the McCarthy era, when in1954 the Knights of Columbus lobbied Congress to add the words.

I think the book of the same name, by Rabbi Seymour Lapin, attributes the change to the support of President Eisenhower. Ike was convinced, properly, that respect for an Authority higher than the state was sine qua non for freedom--and thus the actual distinctive between the U.S. and Soviet systems.

For what it was worth, the Sovet Constitution sounded wonderful. The trouble was that in Soviet principle the Soviet constitution was toilet paper. The true "paranoia" of "the McCarthy era" was the fear whipped up by journalists and Communists and fellow-travelers that a Senator in a party which was not then and was not about to be dominant in Congress was about to eat the Constitution for breakfast.