 Those of us who are over 35 or so years of age grew up in a different America. We were taught very directly what it means to be an American, and we absorbed almost in the air a love of country and an appreciation of its institutions. If you didn't get these things from your family, you got them from the neighborhood, from the father down the street who fought in Korea, or the family who lost someone at Anzio, or you can get a sense of patriotism from school,