Feeling better about things. I haven�t been sleeping well at all this week- averaging about 4 hours a night- until last night. Last night I slept like a baby. Last night was the first night Emily and I have shared a bed since last week. It was the first night things have felt somewhat normal again. I started reading �Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus� on Monday. As hokey as some of that book is, I think it�s wonderful.
Paula also sent me a letter this week- I guess in response to the one I sent her. While I wasn�t initially all that happy to hear what she had to say, my sister reminded me that these are things that Paula probably felt like she just needed to say- in her own words, directly to me. So I guess in some respects, progress has been made on that front.

I�ve been thinking a lot lately about people who support the war in Iraq- more specifically, about how the number of people who support the war in Iraq is dwindling. I for one never supported it, but I know a vast majority of the country did, and some people still do. So in my opinion, there are three kinds of people: Those who, like myself, never bought into the idea of WMD�s and felt the invasion was a terrible mistake. Then there are those who believed our President when he told us we were in danger and supported his decision, but who have since changed their minds as it has become more evident he was lying the entire time. Then there are those who still support the war. I was trying to figure out how they can still think this was a good idea. In a lot of ways, I came to the conclusion that there are people who have such a fanatic belief in our inherent �goodness� that nothing will shake them from that feeling of certainty. I hate to use the word juvenile or na�ve because they are loaded terms, but I can�t think of any more suitable adjectives. For these people, we�re the good guys, and �they� are the bad guys. To them, the idea of our soldiers overseas is almost romantic. It fills them with pride to think of brave young men and women fighting for the just causes of this world. We�re spreading the light of Democracy to the dark corners of the globe, and the men and women putting their lives on the line to do so are heroic and noble. In some ways, I admire the resolute and unwavering patriotism of these people, but in other ways I pity them. Patriotism and love of country is a good thing, but without temperance, the line between patriot and zealot is easily blurred, and too often crossed. I still cringe when thinking of our President, our supposed leader and compass, uttering things like, �If you�re not with us, you�re with the terrorists.� That sort of bigotry, openly and proudly displayed by the leader of our country, should be frightening to anyone who truly wants to see this country live up to the expectations we hold ourselves to. How quickly did we see the overwhelming global sympathy and support after 9/11 decay into overwhelming disgust and contempt? We as a country banded together after that day in September, and I was truly proud to call myself an American. While everyone was shocked and distraught over what happened, I�ve never in my lifetime seen such cooperation and sacrifice in response to those events. As I�m sure it did with everyone else, it genuinely filled my heart with pride to witness the indomitable collective spirit of this country. And it equally fills my heart with sadness to have watched that pride and patriotism molded into ravenous bigotry by those in whom we have entrusted the responsibility of steering our country toward the goals and ideals the rest of the world had once admired. No longer the shining example of freedom we profess ourselves to be, we have become the poster children for pompous hegemony- completely devoid of the humility and self-restraint essential for the leadership we claim responsibility for.

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