Long Time Coming

I had just finished watching a Law & Order SVU episode Sunday evening when I laid down on the couch to watch the news.

Flipping to one of the local stations, I saw the national news was on.

It reminded me of waking up Sept. 11, 2001. On that fateful day, I woke up knowing my television was on ESPN from the evening before.

However, when I turned on the tube, Peter Jennings' voice was on and he was not a sports anchor.

Something was up.

While watching Brian Williams talk about the upcoming press conference President Obama was to deliver, I noticed the ticker at the bottom of the screen:

"Breaking News: Osama bin Laden dead."

What?

Nearly 10 years later?

It finally happened?

I tried as hard as I could to stay up to watch the press conference, but I missed it.

Still, I thought, this is good news.

The next morning, I saw what was going on later in the evening in several different cities across our country.

I don't think this was in good taste, seeing so many people jumping up and down all across city streets yelling and screaming. Seeing several college students jumping into fountains, yelling and screaming.

It reminded me of something I don't like to see when I watch the evening news: Citizens in other countries practically doing the same thing. Burning our flag. Burning presidents in effigy.

It seemed rather ironic to me.

As Americans, I believe we are better than this.

Personally, I don't think we need to take to the streets and celebrate something like this. No matter how justified we believe it to be.

We are better than this.