Important Note:
Opinions are fun. My friends tell me I am someone with lots of opinions and that's fine since I don't get mad at others when they disagree with me. In this same spirit I am interested in hearing yours views as long as you are able to share your views without boiling over. I look forward to hearing from you. I tend to write in the form of short essays most of the time, but contributions do not need to be in this same format or size. Some of the content here will date itself pretty quickly, other content may be virtually timeless, this is for the reader to judge.
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Connecting the past to the present
Posted at: Oct/20/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: My philosophy,
I know, some of this will mean nothing to you if you are under the age of 25. I am going to share a few events both big and small and then try to pull them all together for you. It was the year 1861, the American Civil War had only just started and the Union Army held control of Fort Monroe in Hampton Virginia at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. In May of that year, Union Major Gen.....read more…
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Comparing American Generations
Posted at: Oct/15/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Society,
America is a country awash in diversity. Yes, we have a broad range of ethnic, cultural, and religious diversity. We also have a significant amount of diversity from generation to generation. This diversity fosters change, conflict and cultural metamorphosis. If there is ever an opportunity to become overwhelmed with data, that would be upon visiting a government website. The data here is vir.....read more…
A Nobel Prize for IVF
Posted at: Oct/14/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Perspectives,
This month (October 2010), professor emeritus Robert Edwards of the University of Cambridge and Dr. Patrick Steptoe (who died in 1988) won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for developing in vitro fertilization. In vitro fertilization (IVF) is a process where eggs removed from the female are fertilized by sperm outside the body, “in vitro.” IVF has proven to be a highly successful treatme.....read more…
The burden of Free Speech
Posted at: Oct/05/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: The Law,
I know; Free Speech seems like an obvious and totally understood subject. It is the fall of 2010 and the Supreme Court is getting ready to hear the case of Snyder vs Westboro Baptist Church. The Westboro Baptist Church has made a name for itself going around the country picketing at military funerals with the message that the soldiers’ deaths are divine punishment for America’s tolerance of homos.....read more…
World War I is finally over
Posted at: Oct/04/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Historical Insights,
Does the title surprise you, on October 03, 2010 a unified Germany will make the last in a series of war reparation payments to other European countries that has spanned nearly ninety years. Based on the terms and intent of the reparation payments, I guess Germany and the Allies can call it even and “all square." The final payment as reported by the London's Telegraph newspaper is about $93.8 .....read more…
Should Marijuana be legalized?
Posted at: Sep/22/2010 : Posted by: mel
What good is a debate if you don’t pick a subject that heats up the audience? The debate over Marijuana and its potential legalization has been going on for a long time. Nothing that gets said here is likely to change public perceptions, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have the discussion. Contrary to the beliefs of those who advocate the legalization of marijuana, my research of crime stati.....read more…
Comparing Lee & Grant
Posted at: Sep/17/2010 : Posted by: mel
Some time ago I read another article in which an author was comparing Generals Grant and Lee during the American Civil war. Of specific interest this author focused on the Overland Campaign of 1864. It seems that everyone who writes about U.S. history eventually takes their shot at this comparison. I am not a professor of history, so my insights may be considered sophomoric, but I repeatedly see .....read more…
When disasters aren’t really disasters!
Posted at: Aug/22/2010 : Posted by: mel
We hear a lot about disasters. In recent history we have had monsoonal flooding in Pakistan, an earthquake in Haiti, fires in Russia, another earthquake in Chili, and the environmental disaster of the Deepwater Horizon rig and oil spill. Despite all these real disasters we continue to go to the movies and watch disasters as entertainment; honestly it can be confusing and misleading. I.....read more…
A Mosque near the WTC site?
Posted at: Aug/19/2010 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Watching America,
It’s the summer of 2010 and there is another debate raging in America. Actually, when isn’t there a debate boiling about something. I guess part of the beauty of this country is that we can publically debate so many things without risk of going to jail. This time the subject is a proposed Islamic center including a mosque near the ground zero site of the destroyed World Trade Center (WTC) tower.....read more…
Do we need to go to space?
Posted at: Aug/16/2010 : Posted by: mel
Space travel is cool stuff. I was born in the late 1950’s. This meant that during those young and impressionable years I was totally transfixed as I followed every detail of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo space programs. Other than a brief period during elementary school when I read Hardy Boy Mysteries, my genre of choice has always been science fiction. Of course the border between current s.....read more…
