(no subject)

Listening (don't ask why) to a radio program from the ACLJ (American Center for Law & Justice) while watching a pair of butterflies dancing past the tree outside my window. Someone called into the show to ask the hosts if they were going to fight in civil liberties cases involving the USA PATRIOT Act, which the caller denounced in no uncertain terms as a threat to liberty. I laughed. One of the hosts said he helped draft the Act; both launched into an impassioned defense of it, going on about how it was a necessary act, had helped protect us from terrorism, was an update of old laws and not such a big deal anyway, had been declared constitutional by the courts, and didn't deserve the scorn of the ACLU and their cohorts.

I remember for a few years when Clinton was president, reading in some Christian periodical my father subscribed to about ways in which the Democrats were trying to invade our privacy. If Clinton had been able to get similar legislation passed, he would have, and these people would have howled in anguish at the loss--or at least potential loss--of their constitutionally protected freedoms. Somehow it's so much better with Dubya as president. We're all much safer with him in charge.

The tree and the butterflies are beautiful. It is good to see the sunshine for a change. This paragraph is not sarcastic.

(no subject)

Why is it so often the case that losing something we value hurts less than losing the dream of something better?