Over the Fourth of July weekend a widely publicized poll revealed that only 36 per cent of the youngest demographic cohort polled, ages 18 to 24, were either very or extremely proud to be American. In all other groups, including blacks and Hispanics, the number who were proud to be American was over 50 percent. Far be it from me to gainsay those who see these figures as portending ruin for our country only a few years down the road, but I would just mention that we can hardly be surprised by them. For one thing, polls have shown for years that the young are less patriotic than their seniors. It’s been part of what it means to be young at least since the emergence of the youth culture of the 1960s. For another thing, the wave of emotional publicity ensuing upon the death of George Floyd last year at …