To Honor Troops, Stop Playing the National Anthem

If you don't know anyone in the military, it can be shockingly easy to forget that the US has been at war for almost an entire decade. A good remedy would be making the cost, particularly in human terms, more visible, writes John Baldoni. He suggests that the national anthem not be played at major televised sporting events. Instead, read the names of soldiers killed that week.

Borrowing an idea from Hockey Night in Canada host Don Cherry, Baldoni suggests sports announcers take the time to talk about the fallen soldiers and their lives "as a way to focus our attention." It would take up time, but "we need to 'give up' some of our time to remember their sacrifice with their names and stories," he writes for the Washington Post. "A few moments of remembrance might make it that much harder to forget we are at war."

(More Iraq war stories.)