As we come to another Thanksgiving here in the United States, let us reflect upon some of the news of the year so far.

– Three months after his top General in Afghanistan has asked for more troops, President Obama has still not decided what to do about this “war of necessity”. We used to see bumper stickers proclaiming “Bush Lied – Kids Died!” but we are not seeing ones now that say “Obama Dithered – Troops Withered!”

– We now hear about a joint Obama/Oprah Christmas special coming up on ABC. Does this explain the delays in the above issue? I wonder if the President is planning on singing a duet with someone – or perhaps he is working on a dance number?

– As promised, the President is bestowing rights on terrorists by pretending that they are U.S. citizens who were simply arrested for some crime and that they are somehow protected by the Constitution despite earlier Supreme Court decisions finding otherwise. While giving the terrorists the opportunity to proclaim their hatred of the United States and of the Bush Administration that captured them, prosecuting them in U.S. Criminal court requires disclosure of the top secret intelligence-gathering techniques that have kept our country safe for years. Despite promising a “fair trial”, the Obama Administration reassures its critics by saying that “there is no way that they won’t be found guilty.”

– A Muslim U.S. Military officer kills numerous American soldiers on a U.S. base after sharing his plans to do so. The Obama Administration tells us essentially that “this is not an act of terrorism because we do not even use that term anymore.” When it surfaced that this officer had tried to contact terrorist organizations in the past, we were told that essentially, “you mean those organizations whose existence Bush lied about?”

– President Obama, like a kid in a candy store spending someone else’s money, shatters the spending record of any President in history while at the same time blames it on the irresponsibility of the former President.

– Politicians continue to argue about the wrong issues involving the Health Care Bill debacle. “We can save money!” No you can’t!” “We can run the system better!” “No the private sector is better!” Although the question is dismissed by all who are asked it – what specific part of the U.S. Constitution are you invoking when you intend to force me to pay for my health insurance or that of my neighbor?

– After a renowned climate research lab has its private emails exposed to the public that suggest that results of certain experiments may have been falsified to fit into the political “global warming” frenzy, there is barely a word about it in the media.

– Bills proposed by both the House and the Senate are almost 2,000 pages long. Many admit to not reading them before voting for them and some who have read them admit to not understanding them before voting for them too. When asked specifics, the authors of the Bill call people names.

– A U.S. Senator openly admits to accepting a bribe of $100,000,000 of somebody else’s money (Taxpayers) to vote for the health care bill which she had initially been opposed to. Rather than try to deny it, she volunteered that it was actually $300,000,000. Her defense was that this is just the way things have always been done in politics. Hope and change. 

The themes of the day this Thanksgiving seem to be “Have someone else pay, it is somebody else’s fault, so what – everybody does it and where is mine?”

Hope and Change indeed.

Please let us all reflect today on what we can actually be thankful for – and what we strive to keep – our freedom; Freedom to try and be the best that we can be and be what we want to be and who we want to be. Freedom has no guarantees that we will be as successful as someone else, it just allows us to try.

Happy Thanksgiving.