Another Reason We're Different

For some strange reason, I've been finding articles on the web the last few days that highlight American traits that make us different from everyone else. The latest is the announcement that we have buried Uday and Qusay Hussein in their father's hometown.

From the descriptions of the event, they were given proper, even respectful, burials. Their coffins were wrapped in Iraqi flags. Even in spite of their patently evil nature, we were still respectful in death.

We could have held the bodies until next of kin came to claim them (not real likely). We could have ignored Muslim tradition and stored them in a freezer until Judgment Day. We could have dumped them in a pauper's grave. We could have dumped the bodies at sea. We could have done pretty much anything we wanted.

Yet we showed them respect. Not because they had earned it - they most certainly had not - but because it was the right thing to do.

Would they have showed the same respect if they had gotten Tommy Franks? I don't think so.

Very few other nations on Earth would have handled this the way we did. Most would have taken the unmarked grave route because it was expedient. A few probably would have gone in for mutilation and desecration.

But we handled it right. Why?

Because that's the way we Americans do things.