What is a Patriot?

Have you ever been blogging and have an urge to comment, but then find your comment actually might make a fine post on your own blog? This happened to me this evening. I was reading Ken Grandlund's Common Sense - which really do have to slice out some time to read as his posts are very well thought out and lengthy - not your usual blog fodder....

So, I came up with in interesting angle on his recent post as I found myself thinking about how to become a better Patriot.

First off, I know that there is a difference in how people define it and what it means to each person can vary. So, my first question naturally flows:

1) What's the definition of Patriot?

Here's one: One who loves, supports, and defends one's country.

But that is a fairly broad definition, so, as we have the www at our fingertips, I thought I would google it. "What is a patriot" provided numerous hits, and at the top of the list was the USA Patriot Act.

Now, for the life of me, I scanned the thing, and couldn't find any definition of the term patriot. There was a lot of talk about terrorists, and what is terrorism, but missing was a good, clean, definition of Patriot.

Unrequited, I copy and pasted it into word and did a search, and did you know that the word "patriot" only appears three times in the whole of the 132 pages? And each time, it was to name the act.

This left me empty on what it means to be a patriot, except to turn in suspicious individuals.

Looking further, I found references to football teams, and the movie the Patriot, and finally hit on an "official" White House page where you can actually register yourself as a Patriot. Did you know you could do that? I didn't. This is something like the "do-not-call list, but better (if you take a look at the page, it really is a satirical piece, as in funny, ha ha):

Looking further, I found a self proclaimed watch dog group called the Patriot Watch.Interesting.

Slice from their page:

"As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air - however slight - lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness." Justice William O. Douglas

Before my eyes blured over, I found the Fallen Patriot Fund, perhaps the most worthy of your review and spare cash/time to volunteer - interestingly, located right next to the Rightwing e-rag, the Federalist Patriot.

Still, I have not come away from my search with a fantastic definition of Patriot. So, I thought I would pitch it to the blogiverse - What are your thoughts about being a Patriot?

Before I leave this post, let me give you the preface - I was commenting on the environmental post on Common Sense and got to thinking how one could be Patriotic - read further if you like as here's the salient portion of my comment originally posted on Common Sense:

Anyway, I think the solution has to start with the individual. If we each pledge to go as green as we can and reduce consumption, we would do well.

Keep in mind, this simple thought - the most strategic reserve of oil sits parked in the driveways and parking spaces of America. Every time you make a decision to fire up the combustionable, you burn up another chance to save and increase our reliance on OPEC oil. So, perhaps the most Patriotic thing one can do is ride a bicycle, or walk or take public transit to work....or use only clean/efficient vehicles....

That's my idea on where to start. We can all do our part, now isn't that Patriotic?