Truth be told, the quality of my life is pretty good. In respect of possessions, comforts, good friends and beloved relations.

But I am not so short-sighted as to think that my own comfort is the measure of my nation. And in that regard, the quality of my life is declining. I once took intense pride in the core precepts of individual freedom, of checks and balances under a rule of law, and in the fundamental decency of Americans all over the country.

Bush's imperialism has revealed a nation where the law is a mere convenience, the Constitution a piece of paper, where ditto-headism is the highest virtue, and where freedom to speak and assemble is curtailed. The openness of citizens to dialogue has given way in many places to rabid partisanship, name-calling, and blind lashings of the sort which Old Guy has posted in the past. Most important, we have become a nation that is willing to start wars and invade other countries. I don't think we have ever had so pusillanimous a Congress nor so aggressive and fascistic an executive branch before.

So although I am doing okay, my optimism is a bit less sunny than Martin's; I think there is some writing on the wall that we need to pay attention to.

A