The past 8 years have altered my personal world and the world at large in ways indescribeable. Who can forget the optimism of the millennial celebrations? It seems like yesterday I watched as ajrose93 followed the global welcome of the year 2000 from the temple bell sounding in Japan to the fireworks erupting over Hawaii. We all believed anything was possible.

And now here it is 2009 and my life and the world are irrevocably darker. The Bush election theft (parts I and II); 9/11; the Boxing Day Tsunami; the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and now Gaza; Hurricane Katrina; the dismantling of the Constitution, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and environmental protection, my own personal loss and sorrow. How are we going to explain this time to generations hence? "You had to be there"? Really, it's quite inexplicable. For all the self-congratulation of the Obamabots, why did it take 8 years to finally toss that bum out? We just sat and watched our world melt before our eyes and did practically nothing to fight back. We think a magic wand will now pass over our heads and everything will be better, but it will take many years to right the wrongs, to bury the dead, to get back to where we were. We are emerging from a mini-Dark Age and it will take a lot of hard work to recover.

I want to go back to 2000 and have a do-over.