My First Entry Into Blogging

Hello, America. This is my first, probably my only, venture into the wonderful world of blogging. I am 54 years old, 55 in December, and I have never done anything like this before so, if you decide to follow this blog, just be advised that you do so at your own risk. I have started this blog, in part, because of a new friend, Kristin, who writes a blog called Candysandwich.net. I met Kristin at a 24 Walk-a-thon for September 11 commemoration. She is a very interesting person and, in talking, she told me about her blog. I started reading it on a regular basis and I found it interesting to see the variety of subjects and thoughts she put forth in her blog. I want to try to put forth my thoughts, feelings and ideas in this blog, if for no other reason than to simply say some things that I have wanted to say for a long time. So, HERE I GO!

My name is Brian. I am 54 years old, a die hard Penn State Nittany Lions football fan (they are currently ranked #3 in the nation) and married for the past thirty years to my beautiful wife, Vicki. We have four adult children, ranging in ages from 20 to 28 and were recently blessed with our first grandchild, DJ, who is the son of my oldest son, Charles. More about my family and personal life in future posts.

I am a political moderate, although I guess most people would consider me right of center, politically speaking. I try to keep an open mind about most issues, live and let live, but I also feel that America, as a country, has turned too much away from many of the basic beliefs and core values which have made the United States of America the greatest country on Earth. And make no mistake about it, I believe that we, as Americans, are privileged to live in the greatest country that has ever existed on the face of God's green earth.

Because I believe this as a fact, it makes me very sad to see our country coming apart at the seams sometimes. We are split in so many areas, such as religion vs. secularism, gender divisions, racial divisions, political divisions...the list goes on and on. One of the greatest of our presidents, Abraham Lincoln, once said, "a house divided against itself cannot stand." These words need to be heeded now if we are to realize the true greatness that our country has yet to achieve. We have become a nation of "me first" and "it's not my fault." We lie, cheat and steal from each other in the quest of acquiring wealth, power and control. Many, perhaps most, of our "public servants" in our Congress and in state legistlatures have ceased to be the servants of the people, but rather, they are the servants of the special interest groups whom they try to cater to simply to aid their re-election bids and keep them in their positions of power. This is not just a Democratic Party problem or a Republican Party problem, this is a problem for all of us.

As citizens of the USA, we annually preside over the wasteful spending of billions of OUR dollars, for all sorts of projects of doubtful value. Our recent financial bailout is just the latest example of this. We started out with a bailout bill which was three pages long, and it was voted down. Then the Congressional Piggies got their collective noses up to the public trough and created a bill of some 450+ pages of pork barrel projects that had to be passed because of the need for the bailout legislation. It is discouraging, disheartening and downright maddening to watch our legislators work.

In the coming days, weeks and months to come, I am going to try to use this blog to expose what I see as the larger problems in this country. But, unlike many people I know who whine and complain about things as they are, but never do anything to try and fix the problem, I am going to try to offer some simple ideas for trying to make life in America better for all of us. I hope you will join me.

GOD BLESS AMERICA!