New Year Resolutions...

I'm not making any.

The year 2006 ends with former U. S. ally, Saddam Hussien, hung by his arch enemies, the great "decider" Bush keeping the former dictator's pistol as a trophy of his personal triumph, and former un-elected president Ford being buried in a state funeral overseen by one of the constants through all of these years - Dick Cheney.

You can't write stranger or darker fiction.

I just re-read Henry David Thoreau's essay "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience." I believe that I last read it in high school - it's probably banned now. Certainly, he would be arrested under the Patriot Act and since the last Congress abolished Habeus Corpus, he wouldn't just spend a night in jail, he'd be shipped to Guantanamo or worse for "extraordinary rendition." I can't help but wonder what Bush would keep as a trophy of his triumph over Thoreau? Maybe an ear, a finger, or a tongue? Probably more than one part, so he could share with Mommy, and because unlike most of us Thoreau had the fortitude not only to speak, but also to act.

I leave you with a small bit of Thoreau - the strange reality is that at most only three words would need to be changed to make this an accurate description of the times as we move into 2007!

"...There are thousands who are in opinion opposed to slavery and to the war, who yet in effect do nothing to put an end to them; who, esteeming themselves children of Washigton and Franklin, sit down with their hands in their pockets, and say that they know not what to do, and do nothing; who even postpone the question of freedom to the question of free trade, and quietly read the prices-current along with the latest advices from Mexico, after dinner, and, it may be fall asleep over them both. What is the price-current of an honest man and patriot today?

...They will wait, well-disposed, for others to remedy the evil, that they may no longer have it to regret. At most, they give only a cheap vote, and a feeble countenance and Godspeed, to the right, as it goes by them. There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons of virtue to one virtuous man;..."

What resolutions does this challenge us to make? Maybe we cowards better stick to diet and exercise? It's too late to dick Cheney before he dicks us!