I must say that anytime I worked with our American military colleagues, it was a distinct pleasure. I spent three weeks down in Colorado Springs in '94 in training, and I'll never forget the great time we had and the generous hospitality extended by our American hosts.

Which brings me to my other thought: I've always had a great time on all my visits to the US, either on business or vacation. I have met so many friendly people in the States.

Unfortunately, there seems to be a lot of American-bashing going on in the world today, which I find to be quite annoying. All Americans out there, just ignore the bashing. Remember the massive, selfless effort the US put into bailing Europe out of two World Wars. I wonder how many people would have still been under the yoke of some fanatical dictator if it weren't for the US.