I think I have some sort of disease: I can’t stop starting new books! I’m reading 9 books right now. Yes, reading multiple books at the same time means I finish them all at a slower rate, but that doesn’t really matter. It’s so much fun! Here’s my currently reading list:

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne The Art of War by Tzu Sun The Alchemist by Ben Jonson The Time Machine by H. G. Wells Gandhi An Autobiography by Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Little Women by Louisa May Alcott Positive Imaging: The Powerful Way to Change Your Life by Norman Vincent Peale A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

I started reading the first 4 on that list just yesterday. I’ve been reading A Tale of Two Cities and Positive Imaging for a very long time now, but I’m still plugging away. I have a feeling Gandhi’s autobiography is going to take me a really long time. It’s a big book.

Anyway, the main reason for this post is because of something I read today in The Art of War:

6. There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare. - Sun-Tzu, The Art of War, Chapter II. Waging War

No benefit from prolonged warfare? Sounds like the United States’ current situation in the middle east. Perhaps President Bush could learn a thing or two from this book. Then again, I think trying to win a war that can’t be won isn’t a very bright idea. We should be getting out of there instead. Too bad nobody really wants to do that.

Oh wait, except this one guy, I hear he’s running from President or something?

Both Jefferson and Washington warned us about entangling ourselves in the affairs of other nations. Today, we have troops in 130 countries. We are spread so thin that we have too few troops defending America. - Ron Paul