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Same can be said for Filipinos (see their courageous service in WWII under MacArthur}

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Apples and peaches. The Filipinos in WW2 were fighting to free their own country. Filipinos can't be drafted (how many died in Korea 1950-53 or VN 1963-73?). Filipinos are not dying in US uniforms in Iraq. How many Filipinos are currently at WRAMC learning how to walk again?

My point was prior to independence, Filipinos SERVED in the U.S. Army, both in WWI and WWII.

Let us ALWAYS honor those brave men and women who served in the past and the present. My point is that even though Filipinos, Samoans, Puerto Ricans, and Chamorro (aka Guamanians) have taken bullets for Uncle Sam, and should be thanked, they are not culturally American.

The problem is that the Statehood movement has always tried to sell Americans on the idea that Puerto Rico is "no different from Ohio as Ohio is different from California." Anyone who has spent time on the island or has dealt directly with folks on the island (as you have and I, to a lesser extent have), knows that this is far from the case.

The bravery of the Puerto Rican soldier, sailor, airman, or Marine cannot be questioned. Nevertheless, they are only Americans in a political sense, not a cultural sense.