Sandman's Journal

I had trouble sleeping last night. Around 6 a.m. I turned on the television to learn that John Kerry had lost Ohio. I ate some oatmeal and drove to the mountain with my dad to put some siding on the north wall. The Killdeer Mountain is less a mountain than a series of bluffs and buttes shoved up against a river of meandering badlands. The scenery is truly astonishing from atop my parents' roof. The golden hills and gullies are hyper clear in the crisp, morning air. They make me think of African grasslands. It's hard to believe that we are the only humans for miles and miles around as we hammer and measure and cut and drill. We move slowly.

(My parents are watching West Wing now, and I can't concentrate to write more...)

Ok, I'll try. So, the Evangelicals beat the Slackers. Karl Rove says that four million more Evangelicals voted this year than last election. The Catholic Church has joined ranks, too. Heartland Republicans don't seem to relish abortions and gay marriages (or New Englanders). These aren't the core values of the Democratic Party, either, of course. Somehow, though, "tolerant" has become synonymous with "immoral."

WWWRW?! (What would Will Rogers write?)

I wish I knew. Here are a couple of his quotes from yesteryear, though:

"People talk peace. But men give their life's work to war. It won't stop 'til there is as much brains and scientific study put to aid peace as there is to promote war."

"We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others."