American Values

This post isn't intended to become a spoof, you can read what started it all in my comment to Ligit's post. The question is what are American Values? Some take the optimistic view and say that America is about freedom. That the bill of rights paired with our preamble make out the groundwork for the US. The trouble is that when those things were written, all people meant men who were white. Granted the years have changed that some, but I'm interested to hear what people believe are American values. Theirs or others. Is it freedom of religion? Well in that case if you believe in a religion that's sole belief is that every that doesn't agree is wrong and deserves killin' is it your right as a free American to kill or at the least torture disenters? If you believe that our freedom should be reserved and allow for insults like the Partiot act, here's your chance to defend that belief. Personally, I think things were just fine prior to that document and that we need to adjust policy to minimize terrorism, but some people look at that as letting the terrorists win. Well, here's a shout out to my American values. If someone else in the world proves that we were wrong in invading a country that was ruled by it's own people or worse that we support a nation that kills innocents and stifles freedoms, then we should be making amends to that situation, not calling all the terrorist "evil people that don't have any respect for life" that assumption is the reason why Iraq gets worse day by day, ideology. So, I know it's broad, but what are American Values?