Wednesday nights after work are always hectic, chaotic, and busy in the extreme for me.  From the moment I depart work until I lay my head on the pillow it s a hustle and hurry evening against the relentless clock.  I have to my children from the after school program, get home, scrounge up a meal, and get out the door by six fifteen.  It is as challenging as it difficult.

Invariably, something always gets in the way.  Either the work day does not run as smoothly as I would like, and I can't leave on time, or traffic is a toxic morass of accidents and slow drivers.  And as a result I become stressed which wears through my otherwise cherub-like demeanor, (sarcasm intended).  Stress for is always an unwelcome guest.  I do not like the person it makes me.  My mood, which is not good under the best of circumstances becomes foul.  I become irritated, short tempered, and otherwise a person even I don't like.

And on a recent Wednesday evening it was no different.  Traffic was running slow.  True to form for a typical Wednesday.  I was irritated behind the wheel watching the enemy steal precious minutes from me.  I was doing the math  in my head as to the impact on my schedule and it was not good.

And then the sea of traffic parted, and I maneuvered into the fast lane.  I could finally make up for lost time.  I put the hammer down, and was able to breathe a sigh of relief.  My schedule had been saved or salvaged at least.  Little did I know what fate had in store for me next.

As I was passing Easton on I-270 South, I noticed the car was fighting me and had a strong right pull.  As I started to investigate the problem, I felt a thump and no less than three dash board lights came on.  My initial guess was that I had lost a tire somehow.  From the strength of the pull and sluggish handling response, I figured it was the right front tire.

Now I know what is possible at these speeds.  And when dense traffic gets factored into it, I knew a deadly pinball game was one likely outcome.  I was at least five lanes from a good shoulder.  I knew the odds were not on my side.  I just had to try and hope for the best.

I switched on my hazard blinker, and began to slow down.  I expected the worst.  It did not happen.  A path between me and shoulder materialized out of nowhere.  I was able to carefully navigate my stricken Impala through the traffic without incident.  No one honked their displeasure.  No one gave me the finger for their trouble.

I was able to reach the shoulder and bring my car to a stop without further incident.  And as I sat there, I knew a few things for an absolute certainty.  I was alive and unharmed.  Things could have gone badly.  A million things could have gone wrong, but for reasons I don't know God's mercy, grace, provision, and protection appeared.

In such moments, I was thankful.  Sure my evening was wrecked.  My plans were shot for sure.  However that did not bother me.  I was around to have shot plans and a wrecked evening.  Even though I never feel worthy of the grace and mercy extended to me in such moments, I was thankful nonetheless.

I experienced a closeness with the divine in the confines of my car that overwhelmed with thankfulness and gratitude.  Even though that was a beginning of a difficult evening, I knew the worst of it was over.  There were insult to injury moments, disappointments along the way.  In the midst of it, I knew I was not alone.  I knew I had been and continued to be protected.  Learning that lesson was worth it.

I am and have been a student of foreign policy over the course of my life.  Each generation has had its own view of, take on, and distillation of this subject.  It has seen each generation leave its own stamp on the subject, sometime for the better, and sometimes not.  Almost every derivation of the subject has seen some version of implementation, all with vary degrees of success.

I will say that American policy is at its best when it is based upon our guiding principles.  And by that I do not mean the 'foreign policy that yields lower prices for Americans' formula.  This formula leads Americans to believe they are the center of the world, and what is good for us, is also good for the rest of the world, which is patently false.  I mean a foreign policy that is based upon the ideas and ideals upon which our nation was founded.  Anything less than that is not leading with the values that drive American exceptionalism.

A foreign policy driven by the views that wrote "We hold these truths to be self-evident..." is what we need.  We need to make clear that we as a nation are for human rights the world over.  We need to make clear that we support all efforts for people suffering under tyranny to breathe free. We need to make clear our desire that all people have a chance to seek to redress their grievances fairly before their government, without fear for life and limb reprisals from said government.  We need to establish firmly a foreign policy based solely on our desire to see despotic regimes to fade into history, and be cast upon the ask heap of failed government systems.  


Our policy should be for freedom everywhere.  We should be for freedom of speech everywhere. We should be for freedom of assembly everywhere.  We should be for freedom of worship (or not) everywhere.  We should be for participatory democratic forms the world over.  We should insist that all governments be composed entirely of the will of the people across the globe, and that those governments be subject to that will at regular intervals.


This is likely to be a hazardous policy fraught with bumpy transitions and unforeseen challenges. However, in doing so we redeem the values that generation before us fought to establish.  Only in doing so do we uphold the values that we claim to cling to.  Only in doing so do we redeem the primal purpose for our founding.  Only in doing so do we show ourselves to be a firmly committed country to the cause of liberty of all.  Anything less is a waste of effort.  Anything less is not worth being spoken, much less written down, enacted into law, and enforced.

The American power grid is an outgrowth of a competitive war of titanic proportions between two vastly different visions for delivering electrical power.  The war was initially between two men of genius caliber intellect.  It quickly grew beyond them to those that supported them, and beyond.  The visionary wunderkinds were Thomas Edison and Nickola Tesla.

The war between these two men was the stuff of legend.  Their competing visions for electrical power boiled down the DC model promoted by Edison and the AC model promoted by Tesla.  Both models were radically different from each other.  The struggle for supremacy of the electrical distribution hegemony brought out the best and the worst in both men and their corporate backers.

Much has been said and written about this period of strife.  The purpose of this piece is however not to chronicle in detail this period.  Rather it is my purpose to ask a simple question.  In the decades since this struggle was concluded and Tesla's AC model won, we have seen the task as building a grid of electrical distribution and making that grid as efficient as possible.  All the effort has been place on managing the grid.  And we have settled into a world of balkanized oligarch's ruling regionalized monopolies that have a stranglehold on the consumer.

My question is this, What's next?  Where is the effort for innovation in the world of power generation?  The battle for creation of new methods and new processes seems to have ended when the battle between Edison and Tesla concluded.  Sure we have experimented new technologies and we have created more efficient methods of delivering power.  The revolutionary time of Edison and Tesla seems to be gone.

There don't appear to be any great thinkers working on the question of what's next.  There don't appear to be men and women on the stature of their progenitors of the grid efforting this issue.  A dearth of fundamental basic research is where we find ourselves.  Researchers don't seem to be interested in revolutionizing the situation.  They seem be content to put their efforts into innovating the status quo.  Essentially making the mouse trap a more effective, not in reviewing if the mouse trap is needed at all is where we reside.

The status quo is untenable.  Our civilization is struggling under an archaic model that is verging close to a century in age.  And while the grid's impressive size and scope in the first world, it is a staggering problem for the developing world.  As nations attempt to make the herculean leaps that first world nations made a century ago, their population sizes and the grids and power plant necessary to support them are becoming environmentally challenging.

Take the athletes that competed in the Beijing Olympiad for example.  Across the glod they spent a minimal amount of time there, because of poor air quality.  As pollution goes, China's environmental situation is bad verging worse.  Even with the efforts to clean things up for the Olympics, it was a difficult situation.  As other nations of China's size attempt to make their leaps the global impact is likely to be disastrous.

I am not a doom and gloom let's all return to the 17th century agrarian life, sort of person.  Nor am I suggesting radical change for the overall individual electrical consumer.  what I am saying is that our civilization needs the next gargantuan innovation that fundamentally alters the electrical model.  Our world is waiting with baited breath for that which comes next.

The world needs a cheap, clean, and low impact, user friendly invention that shifts away from the grid delivery model, that while necessary in the past, can no longer be relied upon.  Some suggest solar and wind are the way forward and there are benefits to this suggestion.  It does however fail the test I laid out for what is needed and are both useless in poor weather conditions or times of zero wind.

Some suggest that nuclear power offers the best way forward.  It also fails the test I laid out.  Furthermore the recent earthquake in Japan demonstrates that even when the best and brightest build these plants to the highest standards, they are still horrendously risky endeavors.  These plants are also among the most costly ways to produce energy.  Also even with more than half a century of experience with this power type, we do not have a functional solution for how to handle the waste they produce.

Each other method currently deployed carries with it risk.  They all have ecological costs and human health risks attached to them.  None have zero environmental impact.  No have zero risks to human health.  All are products of the last race for innovation and power production.

What we need is something that is fundamentally new.  We need something sets the consumer free from their corporate masters, that attempts to enslave them.  We need something that renders obsolete the old model and ushers in the next age of human development and progress.  Anything less is not what's next, and it is by extension that which already is.  And as such is an effort to arrange the Titanic's deck chairs for the best viewing angle of the eventual calamity that will claim us all.

We need a revolution, not to change which company bills the consumer.  Rather a revolution that sets us all and our world free.  We owe the next generation nothing less.

There are as many outlooks on life as there are people to have them.  In many cases, they are about as useful as an opinion and a warm glass of spit.  The single biggest problem with a life outlook is that they define the world as perceived or it doesn’t define anything at all. Outlooks on
life when effectively constructed and laboriously installed define the visual field and its contents for the viewer.  They also give the viewer emotional preset feedback.  They can also act to narrow the field of vision and color it to whatever preset the outlook was built to output.

When it is done properly, this works to aid the viewer. It can assist the viewer in advancing agenda and attaining life goals.  It can spur the person on in making the most of their time in the world and redeeming the opportunities granted him or her.  It can be a positive spur.  It can be a substantial aid in times good and bad.

If the framework is done improperly, it will act as the exact opposite.  When its constructed from fear, bias, and negativity it is anything but helpful. It acts to keep the viewing from risking advancing on a potential opportunity seeing as a trap.  It limits potential for growth and with that success. It becomes a chain that binds the viewer to a world of agony and disappointment.

The outlook that defines nothing is just as problematic. It is in essence no outlook at all. It can be and often is an outlook in name only.  Typically it goes completely unused by the potential viewer.  This outlook causes the viewer to drift through life with no sense of urgency or little ability to recognize opportunity when it is staring the wearer in the face.  The viewer is for all intents and
purposes in this case leaves the viewer functionally blind.

Life outlooks require substantive effort to create. The demand constant adjustment to function as intended.  The viewer must still be vigilant to guard against bias and general animus that can bleed
into outlook.  They are certainly not build, install, and forget appliances.  Outlooks to function effectively require constant attention.

The best life outlooks proceed from overtly simple concepts.  Some are little more than expressions of personal values.  A friend of mine shared his with me recently it is, ‘life is an exploration’, and it has guided him well over the years.  Another profound one I ran across was ‘life is about giving all that you are in the moment’.

My own outlook is based upon such a simple notion. It is ‘always value the power of that which is possible’.  This is not some ode drawn from pop psychology.  It is not some weak assent to the power of positive thinking.  It is drawn from personal experience coupled with Biblical enlightenment.  In Matthew 19:26 it says…  “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are
possible.”  In my opinion that means in any situation the divine is capable of delivering infinitely more than I can comprehend or accept as possible.  It means that three loaves and two fish in the master’s hands can feed a multitude.  It means that seas can part, a universe can come into being, the sick can be healed, and a valley of the dead can be raised to life in service to the creator.

For me, it means, in my own life, that the facts as I see them aren’t the whole picture.  It means one plus one only equals two as long as there aren’t other factors in the equation to change the outcome.  It means a young man of little means can somehow, mystically survive college without the obvious resources to do so.  It means an undisciplined and rebellious youth can see the world in a Navy uniform.  It means a man who had given up on life and love can have his world radically altered by the simple act of a desperate prayer spoken in the wee hours of the dark. It means that the tattered remnants in our lives can be transliterated into something wholly different.

When we value what is possible at the core of our being, the world becomes a different place.  When that is our outlook on the world, we can accept the current state while understanding it doesn’t always have to be that way.  The broken and battered can become the repaired and reforged. The so called bungled and botched can become the renewed and the avant guarde.  That which is can become that which should be.

There are historical examples of this.  Gandhi embraced the idea of Indian independence through non-violent means.  At the time he embraced this idea there was no evidence it was possible to do this. There was no road map for walking this path.  The consistent witness of history to that point was that independence was only achieved through force of arms.  And yet in the face of mountains of evidence to the contrary, he persisted to believe this was possible.  It became the mission of his life.  It was a success.  That success reshaped the South Asian continent and I daresay the entire world for the better.

Winston Churchill in the dark days of World War Two is another example.  He believed not only that the United Kingdom would survive but that the Axis powers and Germany in particular would be vanquished.  He had no evidence for this belief.  Western Europe had been crushed under a swastika banner.  The Axis armies were better equipped, better led, and had superior tactics.  At the low point, the Allied Command hadn’t won a single battle in the field.  Their cities were being pummeled daily and German submarines were sinking every cargo ship in sight.

And yet he persisted in believing in eventual triumph as more than just a distant possibility.  His outlook on it defined him.  It radically altered all his actions.  Many though him to be insane for his beliefs.  The testament of history proved his belief to be correct.  His faith in the possibility of eventual victory was vindicated only a scant few years later.

And so let me conclude by saying this…  It is not too late to adjust your outlook.  It is not too late to start valuing the possible. In doing both you can radically alter your own circumstances. 
I can’t promise results or that the preferred outcomes we ache for will
happen.  I can promise that your
life will be significantly different, and the ensuing adventure will have been
worth the ride. And being consumed
along the way by a peace and joy not defined by circumstance as I have will have
been worth the risk.

Many people have been jumping and down of late about Fox News.  They argue vehemently about bias, half-truths, and distortions.  On some level, they do have a point.  And there was a time in my life when this sort of thing would have gotten me worked up.  For good or for ill, that time in my life has passed.  I suppose its what happens when you live enough life to have seen these cycles run their course numerous times.

The truth, as I see it, boils down like this...  There is not a single media outlet that does not exercise some degree of editorial discretion.  And there is not one that doesn't allow the outside views of the editors, producers, and ownership from finding its way into print copy, or onto air transmission.  The news media is not innocent on this issue, and never has been.  And rarely back in the day, when Walter Cronkite signed off with, "And that's that way it was..." was it ever totally true.

Bias is just a simple fact of the 24hour news cycle that's been created, and every owner of these outlets from Ted Turner, to Les Monves, to Rupert Murdoch, and beyond are all guilty of engaging in it.  Its a fact of life in our post-modern world, and we should get used to it.  We should become more informed, and more saavy consumers of news from the outlets we chose to consume news from.  We should spend time weighing the opinions we hear against those from other sources.  Anything less is just wanton stupidity.

We live in a free society that allows anyone to say just about anything.  Its the beauty of the republic we reside in.  Its the wonder of our democracy.  Its the freedom that multitudes of people fight and die to get here to partake in every day.  The United States does not have an official state news media like say Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, or North Korea.  We don't have to accept the version of events, or the spin on the truth being presented to us.  Its our virtuous right, its our glorious priviledge, its downright American in every sense of the word.