Why I Love America

Today saw the inauguration of Barak Obama as a second term President of the United States, a peaceful re-affirmation of his leadership of this country for the next four years. I was happy to see him sworn in, but I would have been happy to have seen Mitt Romney sworn in as well.

Why?

Because every time there in an inauguration I am reminded of how lucky we are in this country to have peaceful elections and transitions of power without bloodshed (literally, if not figuratively).

The swearing in ceremony and all of the celebration that goes along with it, is not celebrating any one person, but, to me, is a celebration of the greatness of our system of government as flawed as it might be at times.

That’s all I have to say tonight. I am so very grateful to be American. I am grateful to be able to vote. I am grateful to be able to express my opinion in public, on Facebook or in this blog.

Mostly I am grateful that I don’t have to fear for my life or the lives of my loved ones with every change in power in my country.

A Word of Thanks for a Great 2012

2012 has come to an end and it has been a year of change for me. In the midst of what may have been my mid-life crisis, I decided to go to graduate school and start this little blog as a way to voice the opinions I don’t always feel I can voice in my everyday life. Thank you to all who have visited, commented and followed….I am grateful you found me.

WordPress sends its bloggers a year end report and I’m sharing it with you. In a nutshell, The Passionate Moderate received 10,000 views in 101 countries. I’m pretty excited about that and I hope to continue to write posts worth reading in 2013.

Here’s an excerpt:

600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 10,000 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 17 years to get that many views.

Click here to see the complete report.