In some ways the last 24 hours or so has been pretty interesting as far as national affairs goes. I mean, this whole business of an investigation into the "tawdry" tactics of the Bush administration outing Ambassador Wilson's wife as a CIA operative is rather interesting. Of course, the Democrats, seeing a political opportunity (and let's face it, that's what this is) are calling for a "special prosecutor" - a la Ken Starr, I suppose. Ha...we should be so lucky. Seems John Ashcroft has bigger balls than Janet Reno ever did and I have a strong feeling he won't bow to that pressure. At least not without a major fight. The Dems have a point, though. I mean, when the Justice Department calls the White House counsel's office and tells him to send a memo to the staff that they will be required to cooperate fully with the investigation, and the White House Counsel asks if he can wait a few hours before sending the memo out, and the Justice Department says okay...well, you see, that's a problem. Whether that is standard operating procedure or not is irrelevant. It seems wrong and that is enough to make the whole thing suspect. But even if a special prosecutor was appointed, the chances of getting one that is as rabidly opposed to this adminstration as Starr was to Clinton's are slim to none. I am interested to watch the whole thing as it unfolds. Though, knowing Karl Rove and his band of dirty operators, they will create some other kind of news (perhaps find another (fake) mobile weapons lab?) to get this stuff out of the headlines.

In other news, seems the Texas Republicans are now fighting with each other over their illegal, racist and downright dirty power grab aka redistricting! Ha...wouldn't it be ironic if it ended up not happening because the Republicans, after steamrolling the Democrats, couldn't quite bring themselves to fall lokstep behind the wishes of their fearless jackal Tom DeLay? I would laugh my ass off if the redistricting fell through.

And Arianna is out of the race. As if her two percent will help anyone at this point.

According to Jewish teaching, you cannot ask God to forgive you for a transgression against another person, people must work that out on their own. I like that teaching because it keeps us on the hook for our behavior. Of course, just because I like it does not mean that it's easy to do.

I remember last year I asked R___ to forgive me. It was hard to do...we were standing by a tree at the Pacific Grove triathlon and I somehow managed to get it out. He was quite gracious about it and, in keeping with his good character, did forgive me. So he said. I chose/choose to trust him. Of course, I was desperate for his forgiveness, having harbored both guilt and regret for several months at that point.

In my current scenario, there is neither guilt, regret or romance involved..it's like, I have forsaken a friendship, which was the right thing to do...I just don't like how I went about doing it...and it is for that I am seeking forgiveness. The Days of Awe last for about 8 more days...I am hoping to figure it out before this period ends.