AMERICANS RETURN TO WORK TODAY after a bittersweet weekend. Yesterday we celebrated our Declaration of Independence from Britain with fireworks, parades, unfurled flags, and the consumption of 150 million hotdogs, a statistic that warms the hearts at the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council, but probably curls the hair of the health police.

But we also worried about mounting casualties in the war in Iraq, and were disturbed by recollections of internet and television images of beheadings and random explosions triggered by young suicide bombers who prefer death to life in the emerging Iraqi democracy. Polls show that about half of the country is wondering if it was worth carrying the war on terror to Iraq.