by admin | Apr 27, 2019 | Adoption, Child Welfare, Christianity, Disaster, National security, Personal history, Public safety, Religion, Terrorism
This week, it seemed as if the world was determined to break my heart. I am sure I am not the only one who felt that way, but I may be the one who puts two seemingly unrelated events together and wonders how we come to such a pass. I often write about how we can...
by admin | Mar 17, 2019 | Activism, Blogging, Identity, National security, Personal history, Public safety, Racism, Religion, Writing
New Zealand is a nation that counts its annual totals of gun homicides in single digits, as a friend of mine who just returned from a visit Down Under accurately notes. It is, by comparison to most of the world, an incredibly peaceful, peace-loving country. Yet two...
by admin | Aug 25, 2018 | Activism, Blogging, Books, Careers, Government, History, National security, Politics, Public policy, Writing
Like John McCain’s assuredly final book, The Restless Wave, I read Facts and Fears: Hard Truths from a Life in Intelligence, by James R. Clapper, in large part because my wife bought it for me. The usual pathway to my desk for books I discuss in this blog is that they...
by admin | Jul 18, 2018 | Activism, Books, Crime, Government, History, Journalism, National security, Politics
It is a dramatic and evocative scene. In The Two Towers, the second novel of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, Grima Wormtongue, a spy at the service of the evil wizard Saruman, has gained control of the mind of Théoden, the king of Rohan, which is on the...
by admin | Jan 13, 2018 | Activism, Books, Chicago, Civil rights, Government, History, Immigration, Literature, National security, Racism
Greetings from the U.S. city founded by a Haitian immigrant. Sometime in the 1780s, Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, reportedly born of a French father and an African slave mother, who had gained some education in France and made his way from New Orleans to the Midwest,...
by admin | Jun 27, 2017 | Government, Healthcare, Journalism, National security, Politics
This is not going to be a polite blog post. It is going to be blunt and brief. Politeness serves a purpose in life, but mostly when engaging with other people of honest intentions but different perspectives, in an effort to keep discussion civil and respectful. It is...