I'm no longer oppressed by my president.

I don't know about y'all, but this midterm election was like a breath of fresh air. I felt like I was living in a monarchy without the ability to control our government. In the past six years, I've been made to feel as though I was wrong for criticizing the government, for speaking out against our president (remeber the Dixie Chicks) and for not just "going along" and "trusting our president" because he has access to more information than I do. I was so tired of hearing that speaking against the war is "un-American" and I could not STAND the fact that the former House and Senate gave Bush and Rumsfield all of our money to waste. What I hate most is how the adminstration hid what they were doing by making generalized statements about "spreading democracy throughout the world" and the gross and abusive use of the word "freedom".

In these past six years, I have never felt more helpless and unpatriotic in my short life. And on tuesday, I received a present that was long overdue. I heard the president come to heel when he announced the resignation of Donald Rumsfield. He made nice with the Democrats and was held accountable for statements that he made during the campaign. On election day, the American people (or a little over half) snatched the carte blanche that he so carelessly abused. And it couldn't have come sooner. Unfortunately, most people became angry at the wrong time. I wish the anger over the war and the administration was timed for the 2004 Bush's re-election campaign. But beggars can't be choosers. We can finally put the brakes on Bush and I feel a little more safer (he often used fear to sway voters) and a lot more patriotic. Thank God for our democracy!

Note--if the election went for the Republicans, I really don't know what I would've done. Probably seethe quietly in the corner until 2008. But I honestly was ecstatic on Tuesday because the people spoke and we were heard and we pretty much said, "Your carte blanche is revoked! Heel Bush Heel!"