I couldn't agree with you more about the "under god" in the Pledge of Allegiance. I find it very insulting and I didn't recite the pledge by the time I got to high school either. I would stand, if the first period teacher made us (I had some first period classes were the teacher just ignored the pledge and we did our own things), but I wouldn't place my hand over my heard to recite the words.

I really wish we were a more religiously tolerant nation. It's very frustrating to me to hear all the horrible things people say about other people.

In my opinion, being "patriotic" is recognizing when your country has done wrong and working to correct those mistakes. Being blindly patriotic and supporting everything that's done no matter what is what gets us in trouble, but people seem to confuse these two things.