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If there is to be a change

I read recently a tweet that said that we are now in a time where one third of americans are willing to kill another third while the last third stands idly by. While I dont necessarily see that extremism as accurate, I do however see the emotion that drives it. And while I do not buy into the idea that a third of americans want to kill another third, I do believe that never before, at least not in my memory or in my lifetime has this country been so deeply divided. To think that there are people who will put the welfare and well being of their own political party above and beyond the welfare and well being of not only their fellow citizens but the welfare and well being of the rule of law, the basic freedoms guaranteed by our constitution, and the very founding tenants of our nation is beyond disgusting. To say that the political parties in this country have been corrupted by power beyond their own intrinsic ability to reform is more real than we should like to admit. It i...
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When outrage isn’t enough

On a phone no thicker than my pinky, I have instant access to the entirety of human knowledge.  I can watch, ad infinitum, every television show, every movie, every idea, at any time, at any place.  I can access news from around the world, in any language I want.  I can read the works of Plato, Aristotle, Marcus Aurelius, St. Augustine, Chaucer, and Dr. Hunter S. Thompson.  One could spend a lifetime in this black hole and gain nothing from it.  Today, I watched the FCC end the Rules of Net Neutrality, with full grasp of the irony.  But this post is not about that fight. I believe, in the interest of full disclosure, that we, as a society, are experiencing seismic changes, growing pains, if you will.  It is becoming increasingly difficult for our ancient laws and institutions to keep pace with these changes.  The very presence of the President of the United States on Twitter has proven itself to be an incredible agent of chaos both in the Unite...
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America Lost the first Battle of the Information Age

This past weekend we marked ninety nine years since the end of the war to end all wars, an act, which in hind sight seems presumptuous at best. If the past century has taught us any lesson about war it is that the we, as a species have a gritted determination to overcome any peace and seek out new weapons of conflict; using our incredible ability to improvise and adapt to create new ways of destroying each other, a fact of conflict that was thrust into the modern consciousness in the violence of the First World War.  It was there that centuries old tactics met the modern genius of the industrial revolution. With the addition of massive artillery, poison gas, machine driven firepower, tanks, airplanes, the world saw first hand the true horror of which we as a civilization are capable. The suffering we inflicted on each other and ourselves was immense and even today, those muddy, blood soaked and gas covered fields still evoke from us, a generation far removed from the violenc...
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Existential Revolution

We are on the very precipice of the greatest technological revolution in the history of our species.  To understate this would be to do disservice.  Within most of our lifetimes, the paradigms by which we understand the world will evaporate, the mechanisms that drive our economy, our culture, our governments with be fundamentally and permanently altered.  Our understanding of what it means to be human itself will be challenged, and with it our understanding of faith, religion, and how we behave towards each other.  There are three massive upheavals coming, each related, and each interdependent. Fossil fuels will  run out, and they will run out within our lifetime.  Each of them are finite resources, and not only is the amount of our consumption of them increasing, but the rate  of our consumption is increasing.  The effects of the end of oil, coal, natural gas, etc, are far reaching.  It effects not only whether or not we can drive, but it...
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Trigger

It has been twelve years, eight months, and sixteen days since I swore my first oath to defend the Constitution.  It has been eleven years, eight months, and one day, since my first firefight.  It has been nine years and nine days since the last time someone I knew died in combat.  It has been eight years, eleven months, and five days since my last firefight.  I have grown old in the midst of violence.  I have come to know the crack and snap of bullets flying, the thud and gut punch of bombs exploding, the sting of spent gunpowder in the air.  And because of this, I knew fear before I knew courage. I doubt anyone who was in Pulse that night will read this, but just in case, I want you to know that I cannot fathom the horror of that night.  That nightmare space of death and gunpowder was supposed to be between combatants.  Between willing participants.  Combat should never be thrust on the unwilling.  I know that night will haunt the v...
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Peace on Earth, Radical Freedom for All

We are born into this world and we die in this world. Our lives are remembered for a time, and then they vanish into the void of history. Each of us in our time exists, and then we do not. Our power in this world is limited to our minds and our beliefs. Individually, we can affect change in the world only to the degree that we can change the minds of others. Our freedom in this life is contained: we are free to believe as we choose. No person can force a belief which we, in our minds can choose to reject. But this freedom to believe is powerful. It has forced into being religions, governments, and values. From one generation to the next, we pass on those beliefs which we have agreed are in our own personal best interests. And while this has guided the course of our collective history, it remains the most fragile of ideas. A government would cease to exist were the people whom it governs simply to choose to cease to believe. It exists only as an idea. Likewise the gods of old died w...
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