DEAR EDITOR:

Am I proud to be an American citizen? Not now, because we have let our country down.

We no longer say the Pledge of Allegiance, we no longer say Merry Christmas, and we have allowed Spanish to become our language. What happened to those entering through Ellis Island to become citizens? They wanted to come to our country, they learned our language, and they were willing to work. The people coming here now want to speak their own language, don’t want to work and expect everything we receive for them as well, even though many are in our country illegally.

If you do not want to live in this country with our beliefs, please return to your country. You came here for some reason, but obviously it wasn’t because you believed in our principles.

I am also discouraged by our two-party system. We cannot work together, and within either the Republican or Democratic party, we are not willing to fight for what is best for our country. We are money-hungry individuals who only want what is a benefit to us, regardless of what it is doing to our country. Those that have made politics their career are not doing any of us a favor. There should be term limits, but what politicians are going to vote for term limits when they will have to give up all the freebies they are receiving?

Our educational system has gone awry. Our colleges are liberal, and our elementary schools and our high schools are not teaching the history of our country. My grandchildren do not know about WWI and WWII, let alone the Holocaust. Why isn’t spelling important? Oh, I guess I know, because we have spell check on the computers. When my grandson had to sign for his driver’s license, he did not know how to write in cursive, and my daughter had to show him. At least cursive is coming back.

We are going downhill fast. I am very concerned for my children and my grandchildren.

What has happened to our country? We better put God back into our lives or we will fail.

NANCY EPSTEIN

Boardman