Columns

Just like many of you, I sat down this past Thanksgiving to a delicious dinner relishing the extra time with family and friends. Each year around the holiday time, amid hectic work schedules and party events, I make it a point to take time out and think about all of the things that I am thankful for. However, this year my thoughts were redirected toward issues surrounding me in my home state and across the country. I reflected on the ways in which families were handling the second holiday season following September 11, the many individuals struggling to survive in the Middle East, and about major policy decisions being implemented by President Bush.

This year, I wonder how former Governor Christine Todd Whitman spent her Thanksgiving, considering how she spent the week before–preparing to announce the Bush Administration’s decision to allow old, coal-powered plants in midwestern and southern states to continue to emit harmful airborne pollution over New Jersey and the Northeast. Did the former governor even consider her home state and the public health problems this decision will ultimately cause?

With today’s hectic lifestyles, the home often becomes a retreat, a place where one has control of one’s life in an often uncontrollable world. The home is a sanctuary where one can rest from the fast pace of modern society. To be offered an invitation into someone’s home, to be allowed to share a piece of that sanctuary, is a privilege, not a right, and who is and is not allowed in should be at the sole discretion of the homeowner.

Telemarketers believe otherwise.