During the month of August, comfortably ensconced in my “cone of silence,” I spent most of the time reading a variety of books. While all of them speak to various ethical values, many of the authors were simply good storytellers. After listening to an interview of former Navy SEAL Robert O’Neill, I became interested in reading his account of how...

In one twenty-one day period, we witnessed the worst and the best this country can demonstrate. August 11, 2017 began as a quiet day in the suburban town of Charlottesville, Virginia, and ended as a violent clash between several hundred Neo-Nazis, White Nationalists, Ku Klux Klan and counter-protestors. During the violence, self-proclaimed white-nationalist James Alex Fields, Jr., drove his car...

In a vigorous and powerful speech to the Senate yesterday (July 25), Arizona Senator John McCain wasn’t a Republican or Democrat; he spoke as an American and political figure fitted with the responsibility to do something for “the public good.” He spoke less about the health care debate that brought the Senate to a vote, and more about their lack...

“I call upon the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace: to give us the means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.” – Ronald Reagan “For the first time in the seven-decade effort to avert a nuclear war,” The New...

Political heroes are rare. The last genuine political hero, Senator Philip S. Hart, is remembered on the front of an office building in Washington, D.C. as: “A man of incorruptible integrity and personal courage strengthened by inner grace and outer gentleness…. His humility and ethics earned him his place as the conscience of the Senate.” Last Friday (June 30), another...

True story, every morning, I make the bed. (I also wash my own laundry but that’s another story.) Over the years, my wife has occasionally mentioned this to others at social functions, as if performing such tasks was due to some anomalous male genetic mutation. (The shocking truth is, most men routinely have made their beds and other chores before...

Here Rests, In Honored Glory, An American Soldier, Known But To God – inscription on the tomb of the unknown soldiers, Arlington National Cemetery Palm Desert, California eighth-grader John Diaz, along with fifty other students, will be visiting Washington D.C. in June for their first time. Two students will be given the rare opportunity to place a wreath at the...

We are standing on a precipice of an Alt-Reality where self-serving falsehoods are driving out truth and objectivity. Goodbye Walter Cronkite; hello Alt-Deceivers. Fake news stories have quickly taken on a life of their own. Part of this is due to the hyperpartisanship of the recent election cycle. Another part is due to Donald Trump shamelessly pushing false information at...

Last August, the world was shocked and outraged at the tragedy that has become Alepo, Syria. However, it was the image of a dust and blood-covered Syrian boy, Omran Daqneesh, that crystallized the true cost of war. Although Omran’s older brother Ali died of his injuries, the rest of his immediate family survived an airstrike that turned their home and...

“Democracy is the only system capable of reflecting the humanist premise of equilibrium or balance. The key to its secret is the involvement of the citizen.”         – John Ralston Saul “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” – Ronald Reagan “Nuclear weapons have posed an existential threat to humanity for decades. They undermine democracy by putting...