What does America mean to you and more...?

Question

I'm going to give a speech in about a week in my english class on the topic of Aemerica and how people view it today.. questions below:
1. What do YOU think America is?
2.What do the colors of the American flag mean( without looking up the answer, do you know off the top of your head)?
2.What are your thoughts on the song "The Star Spangled Banner"?
3.Do you have any good quotes on the topic of America?
4. What is the worst/best thing about being an American/living in America?

( A lot of answers would help)!!! Thanks so much!

Answer 1

1. I think America is a place where equality is first and foremost. Starting in school, students who work hard, do all their homework and hand it in on time and get high grades on their tests, gladly take a "C" grade so their classmates who goof off, don't do any work, and fail everything also get a "C".

2. The colors of the flag are red, for republican states, blue, for democratic states, and white, for the men who are allowed to be president.

3. A good quote for America: "The best government money can buy."

4. The worst and best thing about being an American - we're so rich we can afford to be stupid.

Answer 2

Question 1) America is, very simply, the whole of it's people- legal and criminals- and their individual histories, customs, and heritages combining into a collective consciousness.
Question 2) When the National Colors were first adopted, there were no special significance. It wasn't until after the Revolutionary War that the colors (red-hardiness and valor; blue- vigilence and justice; white- purity and innocense) came to mean things.
Question 3) The Star Spangled Banner was a poem written by someone who NEVER saw the flag still standing. F.S.Key was some 20 or so miles away during the battle. My personal thoughts are that the words to the first stanza are a good beginning to what his personal thoughts were at the time he write them. My favorite stanza is the last, with my favorite lines being the last couple.
Question 4) My favorite quote is from a movie, The America President. "America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it."
Question 5) The best thing about living in America? In my opinion, it isthe fact that regardless of all of the hassles that we have, and all of the negativity that we are enduring, both in the press and in personal statements by people who live here, We are able to speak those thoughts in a civil and non-threatening manner (or you will if you want anyone to care what you are saying), and that this country is obviously not as screwed up, nor as ill thought of as many here would have you believe. If it were, why are so many people breaking the law trying to get here, and why are so many others trying to get here legally? You don't see anyone immigrating to Ecuador, do you?