The New Year has almost arrived. Later this week, many of us will be watching the clock and singing Auld Lang Syne when 2008 gives way to 2009. Clasping hands, hugging loved ones (and pretty much anyone else in the immediate vicinity), and giving thanks for all that has been bestowed upon us over this last 365 days.

Champagne and streamers aside, let's review what the last 365 days have brought:

* A 40% drop in the stock market

* Massive layoffs and rising unemployment

* A foreign war that seems to just keep going and going

* Cataclysmic corporate failures in the banking, auto, and mortgage industries

* A complete failure in the free market system that has led to the biggest financial meltdown in our country's history

At the national level, it's been a pretty rough year that has impacted families across America. The economic climate, in particular, has all of us worried and concerned about how we can ensure that our children grow up with the same or better opportunities than we've had.

Stress levels are through the roof as we struggle to adapt to the new realities that this recession has uncovered. This includes the debt burden that we will leave to future generations after the billions that will be spent bailing out the companies whose survival seems to be required to hold our damaged economic system together.

If I start a business and make bad decisions, I go under. Apparently some businesses get to have their bad decisions subsidized by the American tax payer.

We call ourselves a free market economy. We're not.

I look at my son and wonder what kind of world he will grow up in. I think America's days as the world's preeminent superpower are done for now, and maybe that's not a bad thing. Like the typical neighborhood bully, we have tended to throw our weight around lately. And I'm a big believer in that what goes around comes around.

I pray for leadership in Washington. I pray that saner minds than the ones I see on C-SPAN will recognize that partisan politics, regardless of which party is in the majority, will only perpetuate the stagnant and bloated body of government that runs this country.

I look at my son and I see tomorrow. I look at the evening news and I wonder what that tomorrow will be like.

I do know I want to be around to help him through it.