TADA!  It finally happened.  After months of trying to decide how to approach this blogging thing I think I've finally found my hook.  Anyone who knows me in person knows...well, I can be a bit grumpy.  Downright angry at times, but generally a bit brusque and sorely irritated by stupidity and ignorance.  I tend to get into discussions easily, as I enjoy interacting and sharing ideas, but quickly get a bit heated when disagreement occurs and the opposite party won't admit to even seeing my point.  For my part, I'm not innocent of being stubborn, repetitive and argumentative, but I've tried to adopt a "agree to disagree" policy when I see that happening with a modicum of success.

So, why the blog?  Well, I've discovered that folks don't like it when you clog up their Facebook posts or other social media outlets with your opinion.  Perhaps it's a leftover from my days on LiveJournal, but I always assume that when you post something up for all your followers to see, that you don't mind folks interacting and discussing the subject.  After all, if you didn't want discussion why would you scrawl your thoughts out there for everyone to see and leave commenting open?  I am wrong about this is all but a few cases.  Most folks seem to want only positive reinforcement for what they are saying, and I can see why they feel that way.  Facebook isn't a journal or blog in the traditional sense.  It's a place to jot down thoughts, share your disappointments or triumphs, share silly memes or interesting links and generally interact on the web's equivalent of cocktail party chat.  Some folks post up political stories, but they do so when they feel the folks who are friends with them will agree on the position of the writer.  Some few, very dear friends of mine appreciate a polite dissenting opinion or observation, but they are few and far between and their network of friends and contacts often do not.  Long story short (too late), Facebook is a slightly vain exercise and really not a good forum for folks to explore complex issues from many points of view.

What makes this blog work?  I want there to be a free discussion of every point of view.  I *know* I'm not always right about many subjects.  I love hearing positions that differ from mine and make me reconsider my opinions.  When I rant about something, I surely enjoy the support of folks who are in agreement, but I'd like a forum where a dissenting opinion has a chance to be heard and considered.  I like it when folks of differing sides can come together and find the boundaries of where they disagree.  Perhaps somebody has a point that makes those boundaries move.  Maybe it can be found that those boundaries don't actually exist in any meaningful way.  Compromise, ever the boogeyman of modern politics, can be discovered. 

Ideas, people, are worthless unless they are tested.  Unless you actually consider you might be wrong and check the assumptions and facts you have based them upon.  Curse my high school math teachers, but you need to do the proofs and check your work and the only way to do that is to hear the other side.  So...here's the forum for just that.