Michael Lopez goes yard on the Toni Smith question (where a woman basketball player turns her back on the US flag during the national anthem to protest inequality in America and the "upcoming war"):

The reason for this, the operative principle behind this action, is that college students desperately need to prove that they matter. You see, if you acquiesce with the power structure, you are simply another one of the faceless, passive masses. But if you rebel - no matter how symbolic or futile the gesture - you are an actor.

"The inequalities" that are "embedded in the American system" are clearly important to this young lady. In time, I hope, she will understand that it is precisely because we are all a part of the American system that we are free to work to remedy those inequalities. We may never succeed, but we have the freedom to try. And for that reason, we should put our hands over our hearts when saying the pledge, and we should look at the flag when the national anthem is being played.

Yes.