Nobody who knows me would accuse me of being patriotic to the point of believing that everything that this nation does immediately becomes right.
I've never been on the winning side of a presidential election.
I've opposed every American war that started since I was old enough to grasp what was going on.
The land of the free has a suspiciously high prison population, and persistent problems of passing laws that imprison people who have harmed nobody.
We've got problems. I don't deny it. I still think that the best path for human flourishing, and the only morally sensible process by which to allow the world to organize, is without rulers of any kind.
So, why celebrate it?
I love this country because I know I can burn her flag, and that's why I'd never burn it.
This is a nation, for all of her flaws, was built upon a moral bedrock.
As the late, great Christopher Hitchens often said upon immigrating to these United States, "The First Amendment isn't just my livelihood. The First Amendment is my life."
For all of her flaws, and for every time she's strayed from this fundamental principle, she's always eventually come back.
Her beauty is that your act of burning her symbol out of anger only strengthens her. She's a living illustration of anti-fragility. She's the greatest leap forward that we've had.
To not revere this country is to expect the impossible -- perfection. You don't need something or someone to be perfect to love it.
For all of her flaws, I love this land.