We have just passed the second anniversary of our nation's invasion of Iraq. I remember the relief I felt when it looked as if my fears about the carnage that might result were not going to be realized, as out troops raced toward Baghdad. Since then the chaos and blooshed have exceeded those fears. The election which we tout as proof that we succeeded in replacing a deadly dictator with a working democracy, have yet to produce either a constitution or a government. Not even the relatively benign symbolic appointment of President.

I read on some posts that things are better than we read and see on TV. I pray that may be so. But it still looks to me as if we are nearly alone in our determination to impose on the middle east with force what only the people of that region can finally choose for themselves.

In the meantime has anyone remembered Osama bi Laden's last communication in which he said his strategy was to defeat the US by bankrupting us? Has anyone stopped to calculate the imapct of our Iraq adventure, not to mention the spending on domestic security, on middle class America?

We are showing ourselves to be a reactionary nation. We have adopted, almost without debate, the fight against terrorism as if it were akin to WWII. Is it? No other nation has done that. And the nations of Europe and Asia have faced more terrorism longer than we.