Dear Editor,

The Winter Olympics validates the things I was taught about our country since I was a young child. We are a melting pot and a country of immigrants or descendants of immigrants.

In a poem inscribed on a tablet in the pedestal of “Lady Liberty” there is a passage which expresses these sentiments best: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

The diversity of ethnicity represented by our Olympic athletes makes me very proud.

Rene Payne

Stanford