Full disclosure

There's been a lot of discussion about the extent to which bloggers are considered members of the press. I took some journalism classes last year, and if my fellow students in those classes are indicative of the greater population of journalistic professionals, then I'm not entirely sure that I want to be considered a member of that fraternity. Besides, I live in a part of the world where things rarely explode and have no intention of traveling to one where they do. I'm not much of a reporter. Although having the protections of one would be nice.

What I do is read way too much news and way too many history books. So, for reasons of narcissistic self-gratification, I intend to regurgitate some of the better bits of reporting with selected bits from the better history books. And if anything interesting happens in New England, well, I just might happen to be in the area.

If you're looking for wishy-washy, feel-good, lets-hold-hands-and-sing-"kumbaya" liberal perspective, you won't find it. You also won't find the arrogant, anti-intellectual, god-chose-me neo-conservative perspective. I don't trust the government any more than I trust mob rule or the corporatocracy. I just think there's better ways to do everything, and we as Americans have always been good at improvising and improving. Hence our position on the precipice. If we hadn't done so well to get here, we wouldn't have so far to fall if we screw up now.