Editor's note: The original version of this column was published March 13, 2004.

I was born in 1946, at the leading edge of the war-baby generation. My late father, who retired after a lengthy career as a U.S. Army officer, did wartime stints in both North Africa and Korea.

If it is true that we are the products of our conditioning, then I can understand why I feel as I do about this nation.

I'm more concerned than ever that we are rapidly discarding the principles and values that made us who we are and what we stood for only a few decades ago. No, this is not another "yearning for the good old days" commentary. It's more like a fire alarm ringing in a sleeping theater.

I can see hard evidence of the shameful decline everywhere I look. We have never been a democracy of perfect people. But the lofty, compassionate principles we profess in our pledge of allegiance, our Constitution and our anthems reflect a widely diverse republic bent on continually seeking the highest ethical and moral grounds.

You remember the honorable phrases we were raised reciting: "Land of the free, home of the brave," "one nation under God," "liberty and justice for all," "nation of, by and for the people." Their messages formed solid bedrock upon........

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