The end of the Empire...

I didn't watch The State of the Union Address last night, but have read excerpts and summaries here and there on various news websites. Whatever Bush's intelligence is, it really perplexes me as to how the political discourse has become so volatile when the U.S. so needs to find some common ground to rally around. I don't know if this is just a reaction to getting news 24/7 from television and the Internet, or me getting older and paying more attention to what's going on. Regardless, I get the feeling that the State of our Union is really in some dire straits.

I don't know what to think about 20,000 extra troops going into Iraq. I want to feel like it would make a difference, like the U.S. can accomplish what it set out to do in the first place. But it's hard to argue when over half of our political leaders think it can't be done. And who can blame them? The Iraqi governement doesn't even seem to care anymore.

NPR aired a story yesterday about how foreign opinion about the United States is continuing to deteriorate. It seems only a few countries in Africa such as Nigeria and Kenya have any positive thoughts about America.

Anywho, my random thoughts for the day. I'll end with this. Wander wrote a post about Randy Newman, so I thought this op-ed piece in The New York Times by the perennial Oscar-nominated composer would be worth a read. Unfortunately, it seemed to ring too true, and made me quite sad:

The end of an empire is messy at best
And this empire is ending
Like all the rest
Like the Spanish Armada adrift on the sea
We’re adrift in the land of the brave
And the home of the free
Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.