I was invited to meet my friend’s friends for a glass of wine and some superficial conversation; I didn’t know one of them would bring along philosophical gasoline into which I’d throw a rhetorical match.

It was the 4th of July, a hot, sultry night in a Mexican restaurant in the heartland. I was the old friend from out of town, eager to revisit favorite haunts. This one was decorated with signed posters of local pro football stars and pulsing with music so loud nobody could understand the lyrics. Red, white and blue T-shirts and baseball caps reflected the spirit of the big American flag draped across the wall behind the bar.

I’d met my friend’s girlfriend once before, and remembered Alice as a nice, middle-aged mother of two grown kids who ran her own business. Of her husband, whom I’ll call Jack, I knew nothing except what I could see: medium height, beefy, a big gold watch, lots of hair in a buzz cut. The chip on his shoulder was invisible.

After we’d ordered our burritos and fajitas and Jack had called for a round of margaritas instead of wine, he turned to me and said: “So, what do you think about the war in Iraq?”

Uh-oh. That wasn’t a chit-chat question, this guy had an agenda.

“Well,” I said, starting off slow and soft, “I support the troops.”

And added silently to myself, Okay, buster, just leave it at that.

His wife glanced uneasily at him; my friend tried to change the subject. He bored in:

“I hear you were a reporter in Vietnam,” he said, taking a swig of his drink. “You one of those people who called us baby killers? You one of the people who lost us that war?”

I’d heard it all before, many times, but mostly from drunks. Jack was still sober; I made up my mind to bail before he got to the bottom of his glass.

But even though I knew better, I couldn’t let his slur slide by. I’d spent my professional life pursuing facts in order to write balanced, accurate journalism. I was sent to Vietnam as an accredited Associated Press correspondent charged with giving readers as much unbiased information as I could find so they could make up their own minds. That’s the only way I knew how to be a reporter. I tried the same approach with Jack.

Ignoring his cheap shot, I told him that I believed the United States should not have invaded Iraq, that the war was launched on false pretenses, that no evidence was ever found that proved Saddam Hussein harbored weapons of mass destruction, that we were in one helluva mess, and that nobody, including our president, knew how to get us out of it.

From then on, it was Katy bar the door. Jack ranted, Jack raved. He called me a traitor on the side of our enemies. He said all journalists should be censored because we undermine the security of the United States, adding “nobody believes you anyway because you make it all up.”

Jack proclaimed himself “a real American,” insisting that because he was a veteran of the United States Marine Corps he was right and I was full of poo.

I commended him for his service to his country but I don’t think he heard me; by then he was trashing me and my brethren so loudly other diners had put down their chips and salsa to listen.

But when he got to the part where he said I didn’t know what I was talking about because I was a woman, I asked him the question that always stops the bullies in their boot treads:

“So tell me, Jack,” I asked, oh so sweetly, “have you ever been in a war? Have you actually been shot at, you know, seen combat, watched American soldiers die?”

Jack paused in mid-rant and glowered.

I swear, the Devil and the arrogance of all these uber-patriots who never served their country farther west than Camp Pendleton nor east of Camp LeJeune made me do it; I delivered the coup de grace.

“Well, Jack,” I said, looking straight into his eyes, “I have.”

In the spreading silence, I got up from the table and left the restaurant.

As I write this, the American death toll in Operation Iraqi Freedom stands at 3,564, with 14,519 wounded. The price tag is at $1 trillion dollars, and increasing at $10 billion a week. The Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group appointed to advise President Bush about the war reported there is no military solution. Polls show nearly 70 percent of Americans have lost faith in the administration’s conduct of the war, though we continue to wholeheartedly support our troops wherever they serve.

Republican senators George Voinovich of Ohio and Richard Lugar of Indiana, the highest ranking minority member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, are urging the White House to begin withdrawing American forces from Iraq. Al Qaeda is more dangerous than ever, Osama bin Laden remains at large, the Taliban is aggressively counterattacking in Afghanistan, and America’s prestige in the world is at an all-time low.

A patriot is, foremost, an informed citizen. I do not allow Jacks without facts to foist lazy, misguided patriotism off on me. Wearing a red, white and blue baseball cap, flying Old Glory from the veranda, or even being a stateside veteran doesn’t qualify one American to denigrate another’s loyalty to the United States.

I believe – and stand up for – the Bill of Rights and the Constitution of the United States. I vote in every election, national or otherwise. I pay all my taxes. As the daughter, wife and sister of military veterans, I support all Americans in uniform. I respect the office of President of the United States, even if I sometimes mightily disagree with its occupant. I honor the Stars and Strips, never fly it after dark or before dawn, keep it in good repair and out of the rain, and properly dispose of it when it is too tired to wave on my porch.

I try, at all times, to defend free speech, an independent press, all religious practices. I believe I have not only a right, but a duty, to say what I think in order to protect and defend America’s freedoms.

To all the Jacks out there, be warned: Don’t tread on me. I’ve witnessed war’s tragedy, waste, pain and suffering. Opposing it makes me a better patriot.

What do you folks ELSEWHERE IN AMERICA believe?" Join the discussion in Elsewhere in America.

Photo description and credit
Soldiers from Delta Company, 4th Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division rest after searching for three of their comrades still missing after a May 12 attack that left four U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi soldier dead in Quarghuli village, near Youssifiyah, 12 miles (20 kilometers) south of Baghdad, Iraq Friday, May 18, 2007. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)