This is Who We Are?

Rod, at Proof Through the Night, has written one of the best posts I've read lately; bar none. He has synthesized much of the bad news we've had lately about the actions of the BushCo. regime and what they mean in terms of "who we are" as a nation. Titled "The Fall of the American Republic," his post is a damning indictment of the lawlessness, secrecy and hubris of Bush and his handlers.

It is impossible to argue with his penultimate paragraph:

I have said many times that, while I do not believe that September 11 "changed everything" (for example, it certainly did not change what is right and what is wrong), it clearly changed one thing: It changed a strong, confident, imperfect but essentially just nation into a small, frightened, cowardly one. Again: This is who we are.

His final paragraph, which I won't reveal here, took my breath away. Rod's conclusion is - well, I haven't quite come to grips with it yet. I hope that he's wrong, and fear that he's right. I hope that our democratic institutions and habits are so ingrained that we can recover from this administration with all of them intact. I fear that they have been so subverted that it may not be possible.

Hyperbole? Perhaps; maybe it's just the thoughtful mood his post has put me in. Maybe.