A changing world

I haven't posted for a few days; not because I don't have things to comment on, but rather because the world is getting a bit overwhelming. So much is happening, and none of it seems to be good. Here and there I see a glimmering of goodness, but for the most part the news is grim, both personally and in the world.

It's a bit less tense around my house on a personal level because my daughter's girlfriend is gone. I hope for good, but I doubt it. As a result my daughter is home more and is drinking less. These are both good things. She has even started cleaning house again and invited me to go with her for a pedicure on Saturday.

Politically the U.S. is a mess as we plunge toward the midterm elections. Scandal follows scandal with no letup and crisis follows crisis. The Foley scandal continues to roar on unabated. New things arise every day.

On the world stage the U.S. is proving itself to be ineffectual and no longer a power with whom to be reckoned. A paper tiger. Bush draws lines in the sand and other countries step across them with impunity, knowing we have neither the will or the resources to enforce our saber rattling and bluster. Iraq is getting to be a bigger mess by the day and now, rather than beginning to draw down troops by early next year as we were told, we're not told that it will be 2010 or later. Afghanistan is sliding away because there are insufficient troops there to stop the reinsurgency of the Taliban across the Pakistani border, and the Pakistanis have given them a free pass.

Yesterday it hit me how much the world has really changed. A small plane flew into a high rise in NY city. The first thing the news was broadcasting is that it probably wasn't a terrorist attack. I can remember when such a thought wouldn't have occurred to any of us.

I guess I am just feeling overwhelmed by all of the possibilities and all of the news. The one bright spot in all of this chaos is the reaction of the Amish community to the terrible massacre of its children by a nutjob with a gun. Members of that community actually attended the killer's funeral and have set up a fund for his children's schooling. That is such a fine example of living your faith and your beliefs rather than just talking about them. Members of the American religious right could do well to emulate these fine, caring people of faith.