A patriot can see faults in what their country does, as everybody and every organization of bodies makes mistakes. A patriot seeks atonement for those mistakes, to make things right, and come back stronger, with more support from the world.
replyIt seems you're confusing patriotism with jingoism: "we're the greatest country in the world, we never make mistakes, so we don't need to learn from them, suck it victims, everyone is in a grand conspiracy against us because they're jealous, everything bad is bad because of that conspiracy", etc, that sort of thing. That's how you get the sort of "patriots" that one could find in 1939 Germany. I guess some people want that.
I agree that a patriot can be cognizant of shortcomings and Im not advocating jingoism.
replyI think there is a class of people who are less interested in constructive reform, and more interested in seeing america fail. They would rather everyone suffer then improve and thrive. Maybe they do see that as a form of atonement.