At 10:54 p.m. last Sunday night, one of my best friends from home sent me a short text message telling me that Osama bin Laden had been killed. A little taken aback, and admittedly a bit credulous, I quickly sent him a reply and began searching the Internet for any news I could find. As I browsed through story after story, my friend sent me another message: He wrote, "I'm tearing up over here."I have no idea if he was exaggerating or if he really was overcome with patriotic emotion. But when I read those words, I realized that I was feeling a surprising lack of feeling about the incredible news I had just received. I consider myself a thoroughly patriotic, America-first, conservative Republican. Yet the news of the mastermind of 9/11's death left me without much of an emotional reaction. On Monday morning, as I watched the footage of the jubilant celebrations across New York City and Washington, D.C., I was still unable to share the elation of the celebrants waving American flags and chanting "U.S.A., U.S.A.!"

I simply feel that it's a bit shallow to celebrate the death of this arch-terrorist. Not because I'm any sort of pacifist or object to feeling happiness at even the death of those who are evil, but because I can't help but dwell on the cynical yet fundamentally true fact that Osama bin Laden's death hardly changes a thing. It is surely symbolic; however, the West's war with fundamentalist Islam and global terrorism remains just as difficult as it was before. Al-Qaida still exists on the Afghan-Pakistani border. Iran continues to grow in strength and regional clout. Hamas and Hezbollah remain strong and well-armed.

So I think it's worth wondering whether or not bin Laden's death really warrants celebration at all. What, then, should we be celebrating? I believe that some sort of celebration is called for, but not a celebration over Osama bin Laden's destruction. Rather, we ought to all be celebrating what Osama bin Laden and those of his ilk tried, and have failed, to destroy.

What bin Laden failed to destroy were the ideals of America. For unlike many of the other nations of the world, America was not founded on the basis of its inhabitants' shared ethnicity or religious identity. It was founded upon a set of ideas, upon a conviction that human beings have a set of natural rights that their governments and their fellow citizens are bound to protect.

In that regard, the American experiment has been a phenomenal success. Though it has very often come up short, for well over 200 years our country has, by and large, protected the fundamental human rights of its citizens.

This is a fact, I believe, that is far too often taken for granted and overlooked, especially in places like college campuses. After all, we college students live in a bubble of sorts. We live in an activist environment where we are so used to being able to speak our minds, speak out against our government and vote for our representatives that, in the heat of all our protests, we forget that the very fact that we are allowed to protest is a blessing that billions of people across the world don't enjoy.

So let's take this historic moment, here at Brandeis and hopefully in the entire country, not to simply celebrate the death of on arch-terrorist, but to appreciate and celebrate the rights and freedoms we enjoy here in the United States. Let's celebrate that in the United States, each of us can worship God as we choose or not worship at all, because we believe that both faith and the state will be stronger if they are kept separate. Let's appreciate that in the United States we protect the speech of all our citizens, even those whose speech is vile and offensive, because in this country, we don't fear the free exchange of ideas. Let's be infinitely grateful that in the United States we can burn our own country's flag in protest, because the freedoms our flag represents are far more important that the flag itself.

In the United States, the police cannot search your home without a warrant; you have an absolute right to the counsel of lawyer when you stand trial; and you will always be presumed innocent when charged with a criminal offense.

These rights are in short supply in the world. These are rights that thousands of activists across the Middle East, North Africa and China continue to risk their lives to gain. And these are rights that each and everyone one of us enjoy in this magnificent country of ours. Osama bin Laden could not destroy our thriving liberal democracy; he could not destroy our robust notion of individual rights, nor he could he destroy the spirit of freedom in our country or across the world.

I think that is something worth celebrating.