I don't think I've mentioned how many business associates, both in-company and outside (principal vendors such as ad agencies I'm currently working with, internet consultants, and meeting planners) have day by day since the election offered me condolences. By yesterday, when the CEO of our commercial construction division popped into my office to crack a stale joke about my political affiliation (he's a sweet, innocent kind of guy who would never deliberately cause pain or even discomfort), I was beginning to feel the strain of good sportsmanship. I have never for one moment tried to pretend that the results of the election didn't matter. I remarked at one point that it seemed for some people that this was something like the day after the NCAA football national championship bowl(as a well-known FSU alum, I have some experience with this).

Like other Democratic voters over the past two weeks, I've gone through at least some of the stages of grief. Unlike some, I honestly regret our lost opportunity to get ourselves out of this GWBush-created mess by electing the efficient, effective John Kerry. As a natural and historical rebel, I early advocated Howard Dean as our party's nominee. But as I researched the candiates' histories and platforms, I came to not only respect and support Kerry, but to believe that he was the right man to lead the nation at this precarious time.

Okay, I'm a "person of faith" so I'll be praying that we'll survive and overcome the next four years under still another Bush administration. I know, as one of those evangelical Christians who actually read the Bible and vote progressive, that the Lord's timetable tends to be more eternal and not so contemporary. But after all, He did create us in His image, so I imagine He expects us to exert a little effort on behalf of the good ourselves, right?

It's not a sin to resist governmental error, despite what John Asscroft says.