Three great things happened on this day:

#1) George Washington was born

#2) In 1980 a rag tag group of Americans trounced the Russians in Olympic Hockey in what is now known as the “Miracle on Ice”

#3) I was born (on the exact date as #2)…

OK, I know, one of those things is slightly the lesser of the others. I will let you decide which one.

Birthdays are a wonderful time for reflection and ones thirtieth is a time like no other. While I am and will always be the person I was born in my core, a lot of things have changed me over my life. Some of the more profound have occurred in just the last few years. Life has dealt me some wonderful blows and some very humbling experiences.

While they have been difficult I am so very glad for the moments of tribulation. They have made me who I am. My coming to conservatism and to be the person I am was not an easy journey. It is rewarding though in ways I never thought possible. I am happy in my skin, happy in my life and while the past few months have been especially difficult, I have relied greatly on a network of support both offline and on. People are amazing beings. I am astounded at how warm they can be even at great distance and over the bits and bytes of an Internet connection.

I want to thank you for coming to this blog, talking with me on Facebook and Twitter and for those who know me in analog life for being there. I hope in some small way I can give to others through these forums a small percentage of all I take out.

To another year, a new decade in my life, a new decade in all of our lives and to friendship!

Let me be blunt, 2009 was a terrible year. Aside from gaining an adorable new niece, just about everything else fell apart. Like millions of Americans I suffered through a layoff and was out of work for four months. While I did eventually find a job, a cavalcade of deaths, medical problems, drama from friends and family, and general malaise left me wishing this godforsaken year would just end and fast.

Speaking of terrible things, this was the year of Obama and I needn’t say more.

I could go on but I am trying to be a more optimistic… so I will end by saying I hope 2010 is not the ever burning tire fire of uselessness 2009 was.

A year ago last week I decided it was time to become part of what was then a budding conservative movement online. I chose the name Roaring Republican because, frankly, I started this journey almost equally upset with the morally bankrupt and irresponsible Republican Party as I was with the Democrat Party. No pulled punches, no limits, no apologies, I was going to share my beliefs about the world and what was happening in our nation.

I have somewhat neglected this blog, finding a great deal of support on Twitter and an amazing vehicle for expression. There were many times over the last year when I would sit down, start typing an extended blog post, and find myself overwhelmed. So much has happened in our nation in such a short period of time, much of it bad. There were many moments I did not know where to begin.

I also went through a year of major trial. Like millions of Americans, I was laid off. Like millions of Americans, I dealt with the death of loved ones. Like millions of Americans I struggled with personal, emotional and physical hardship. Like millions of Americans too, I am prevailing. Back at work for some time, working hard to build closer ties with family and friends, I have accepting struggle as the challenge of life that leads to reward. I have attempted to make myself a better person, as I push hard against the gravity of the difficulties we all seem to face in our lives, regardless of our differences.

In this time, I decided to rededicate myself to this blog and to share more with those who visit this space. It is a difficult process to expose oneself to ridicule but I have learned over the years through blogging, twittering and other online activities that the rewards can be magnificent. I knew months ago I would reach a moment when I would write in a longer form again, I also knew I would have to wait until the time was right.
I believe that time is now.

I thank all the friends I have met in the last year and I am astonished at how many likeminded people are “out there” floating around cyberspace. Conservatives are connecting in ways that seemed impossible in 2008 and before. We have found voice, vehicle and fuel, now is the fun part where we begin to drive and share.

To the year gone by, the year to come and what will hopefully be a bright and shining future.

Delivered on September 24th 2009

I know we all have memories of my grandma that will stay with us throughout our lives. For me the earliest are also the happiest. So often in pre-school and during kindergarten, my mother would pick me up from school and the three of us would go to lunch. Grandma always sat with coffee in hand, telling stories, asking questions, and filling us with the glow of her happy spirit. We ate grand slams at Denny’s and breadsticks at the Olive Garden and whether or not she cared about the subject I was speaking on, she would always listen.

My grandma was an angel. Not of the kind who sits atop clouds in the radiant light of innocence; but a coffee drinking, candy loving gambler who in all the days I knew her filled our world with boundless love and jovial happiness. She touched our lives and the lives of her children’s, children’s, children. Her existence and her memory will always be a lighthouse guiding me through the darkest hours of my life, toward the sun that was always shining bright, just beyond the horizon.

Today we grieve her passing, not for her, but for ourselves. We fear the emptiness and the tragedy of our world without her. We wonder how we will fill the emptiness and where we will find the light.

We need not worry, for the gift of her life is in the sustainability of her spirit. It lives in the warmest concaves of our hearts. We need not lament her passing because she has simply returned to the place of our foundation, an angel looking out not just for us, but now for all the world. She, like us all, is part of the ancient heavenly connection and her spirit will never be forgotten.

To her, I must say, I will miss you deeply. You meant more to me than I was ever capable of saying in words. You are and will always be that warmest place in my heart, and I love you.

There are two things I have spent a great deal of time being vocally opposed to, golf and nature but I have to admit I have changed my opinions on golf and because of that I now have a new appreciation for nature, at least in the context of golf.

To give you some background let me start by saying something that typically results in people giving me a very dirty look, I hate nature. I am more than thankful I live on a planet with lush greens and blues and not some empty rock floating in space; general though I enjoy things that are man made over that which I find growing on a rock covered with slime. I don’t like bugs, I don’t like heat, I don’t like cold, I am not a fan of the wind and excessive sunlight really bothers me as does lengthy dark. I prefer a nice hotel room or a temperature controlled house to the outdoors. Hiking or camping sound like nightmares to me. I like anything that bends atmosphere to my desire and standing outside carries with it just too many things I cannot control.

I enjoy the thought of the beach, I really do, but ten minutes in the sand bothers me, the water starts smelling and most of all the people who congregate there never actually look like they do in an episode of Baywatch. South Florida and parts of California aside most of my experience on beaches has been looking around to see enormously overweight people sunning themselves in skimpy clothing with a few nice lookers sprinkled in to mock the entire experience.

We have a few very beautiful sprawling parks here in New York and once or twice a year I like to drive through them, get out for a few minutes and say “yeap, trees, trees, waterfall, hawks, squirrels, trees, more rocks, trees I get it, let’s get an ice cream cone and go.” I much prefer a nice mall or an Apple Store.

As for golf it always seemed like a massive waste of time to me, not that I don’t enjoy wasting time because, I do. Wasting time is great. Have you ever just sat before a massive television and watched Godfather 2 for the twentieth time and order in a pizza? It is great! Largely though golf just seemed like the opposite, more outdoors and a silly game.

Not long ago I decided to put my prejudice aside and give golf a try; suddenly I realized just why so many people love it.

Golf is seriously a game invented for people like me. There is no running involved. I run on a treadmill three times a week, I don’t want to spend any more time than I have to in a hurried pace. You hit the ball, you walk or get in a cart, you hit it again. No need to get out of breath!

The challenge is in perfecting your accuracy, your distance and your swing. In many ways while you are playing “against” people you are really challenging yourself. You can play it alone if you want and there is always something new to try and account for.

As for the outdoors, the secret of golf is that it is the ultimate taming of nature for a pointless endeavor. Gold courses contain some of the most beautiful land cornered off for something that is entirely useless for the evolution of the planet or humanity. You just stand out there for hours, taking in the beauty of the day but you can always get back in a cart and drive to someplace else. You don’t have to spend much time in one spot, you just move along.

Best of all you have to pay to be there! Because of this fact you don’t really have to deal with many people you don’t want to. There are no ruffians getting in your way. Sure there are jerks out there too, but at least they paid to be there and miserable.

I foresee a very long and fulfilling relationship with golf and at the very least I will acquiesce to nature while I play.

I am an uncle once again, now to both a wonderful boy named Braden and a darling girl named Alexa. Nearly three years ago Braden entered my world and changed it dramatically; a jaded and self-centered twenty-something who was more than slightly repulsed at the thought of having children, my heart opened and it never closed.

I spent most of the weekend watching the little boy I have come to consider as one of the great lights in my life. This morning I surprised him; having gone to bed with his parents still home he awoke, I was the only presence besides the dogs in his home. He surprised me with an ear-to-ear grin, he was excited to see me and we spent all of the morning together. He helped me make coffee, laying on the floor with me so we could watch it drip into the pot. We played hockey for hours, watched television and he told me stories as we laughed over silly jokes.

I watched him hold his little sister for the first time and I saw in his eyes the same love that washed over me the first time I held him. He adored her and the sight of two children whose veins were filled with many of the same nucleotides as my own made my insides tap dance.

I held her myself more than once and I remembered how small we are; she may be tiny in size compared to me but we are all small in stature when compared to all that which exists above and below us. Young beings still waking up to a vast world.

There is so much life ahead of them, so many books to read, so many songs to hear and sing, so much love to give. There will be bad times too, but they will be part of life and remind them of the fragility in the human soul just as pregnancy reminds us of the awesome brawn inside the human spirit.
I am so happy right now, filled with love and joy and a renewed commitment to the preservation and ascension of life. Thrilled to watch them grow and explore, thrilled to have my own one day, hopefully soon.

2009 will mark the first year we spend with President Obama; an upsetting prospect for those of us who did not vote for him and of course a welcome change for those who did. As someone who did not support and who will not welcome the coming of the Obama administration, I admit that my love of country is more powerful than one Party, one leader, one administration that anything mortal could conceive or contrive.

In this new year of 2009 I resolve to temper my loath for President-Elect Obama’s ideals and ideology for the warm and sweet embrace of the perspicacity displayed by our founding fathers and our very first president. George Washington could easily have ruled as a king but upon the end of his second term he relinquished his power; willingly and peacefully he set in motion a tradition soon to be on display in Washington as George W. Bush stands upon the tall shoulders of American giants and peacefully hands control of our Executive branch to a man who has sworn himself to a worldview that is diametrically opposed to my own and many others.

Obama, like those before him, will become the latest steward of an office and the figurehead of a nation that means more to me than I could ever express in words. I believe forcefully that this nation conceived in liberty was created not just from the providence of human beings but inspired by the heavens and sowed and continually replanted by the blood and labor of heroes and heroines.

In this time of resolutions I resolve to oppose the incoming President’s agenda but to do so in a manner that is respectful and fitting of the high office the people of this nation entrusted him with. Over the last eight years liberal opposition to the Bush administration has acted shamefully, hurling slanderous insults not just upon our President’s agenda but against the office and the nation their leader of which their leader will soon take command. Over the last eight years with little evidence of wrongdoing liberals have likened our president to the terrorists he has so nobly fought and condemned our nation’s entire history and commanding stance in the global marketplace .

Worse still we have watched these same individuals fight tirelessly to undermine our nation’s military and even argue on behalf of brutal dictators around the world; they have been caught cheering for nations like Russia and Venezuela to challenge our commerce and command. The last eight years of liberal treason was born from blind party loyalty, deranged paranoia and a self loathing that has permeated the deepest roots of the Democratic Party. All of this stemmed from a hatred of one man and a political agenda they disagreed with because blind party loyalty told them it should be so.

I admit openly there was a time when I too considered myself a Democrat and was surrounded daily with such extremism. While I still question many of the decisions made by George W. Bush and other commanders and opinion leaders in our nation over its history, the love I feel for this nation cannot be deconstructed or destroyed simply because our righteousness is often clouded by temporary fits of poor judgement.

While I believe we have reached a moment of such judgement I do not hold contempt for my countrymen. I would never suggest that a political decision would lead me to withdraw from this country or denounce its justness in the world. Likewise I cannot and will not treat the Obama administration with the same blind contempt that I have watched liberals hold for President Bush. When the incoming president acts righteously and justly for the safety and prosperity of our nation I will applaud him. When he acts with such righteousness but walks in the wrong direction, I will question his judgement but not assault his motives.

In 2009 I will be vocal and carry with me a skeptical mind but I will not denounce this nation or those who serve it from the simplicity and sacrosanct of blind allegiance to Party or Partisanship. If evidence can be found that anyone Representing our government has attempted to usurp or destroy our Constitution or betray the oath of office to which they are sworn, I will fight them with the same force leveled upon the British tyrants who once held thirteen colonies captive; I will not simply subscribe to hate or extremism because I disagree with a political decision or the direction our new President would take us in.

There is not just room for dissension in our nation, such dissent is a vital part of our Democracy and a sacred component of our Republic. It is blind hatred that is never justified and is counterproductive to our development. I know many will disagree with this assessment and some will spent the next four years attempting to exact revenge for the last eight. I resolve to do better, be better, for the sake of not just myself but our nation and in the spirit of those who gave birth to our wonderful common dream.

Hello all. I know the blog is brand new and I am going to work hard in the coming months to get as much content up as possible. One of the things I am quickly trying to do is get this site connected into Web 2.0 world. So with that said, you can follow me on Twitter (hope to have that integrated with the site by the end of the weekend) and you can become a fan of this blog on Facebook.

“… because I don’t care anymore. I am a communist, I think people are too stupid to vote and if you don’t like it go to the Dean because I have tenure and there is nothing they can say to stop me.”

With absolutely no hyperbole that was an actual statement made by a professor of Philosophy during my early college years. Earning an Associates, Bachelors & Masters I’ve spent a lot of time in classrooms listening to garbage like that.

In many classes I always knew the right answers, not because I was better prepared or more enlightened than other students but because I knew the political arguments that drove research. I read Chomsky & Zinn, devoured journal articles and left-wing media, and was raised on liberalism; it wasn’t hard for me to see the direction professors were taking and then write an essay or adapt an argument that would please them rather than challenge anyones beliefs.

I was fortunate enough to work in research under a very large Federal grant exploring education not long after receiving my last degree. The purpose of the research was conservative; get kids interested in Math, Science & Technology, an important national priority in this age of innovation and growing overseas competition. The means to achieving that objective, though well meaning as they were, never seemed quite right. They were wasteful, often unproductive and without millions of dollars to guide them sustainability or the ability to replicate any results across the nation seem impossible.

I was given a window into the wasteful and mismanaged government system; I spent my life believing that government could be a solution to our problems, but everywhere I turned I began to see how government can often get in the way.

Continue Reading →