The Future

There is a reason the U.S. has such a large defense budget. Our theory of statehood resolves around the premise that a safe America means a safe world. Moreover, we're convinced that geopolitical instability means further destabilization elsewhere, so we have to contain or eliminate threats before they spread.

The problem is this policy only works if its all-or-nothing. When our judgement on whether to act overseas becomes clouded, it is because we are allowing other parties, whether 'allies' or 'adversaries' to influence our discourse and therefore impact our decisions.

We must choose either isolationism/competition or globalism/cooperation. The current administration is taking a hard isolationist 'recorrection' after what they saw as misstep in Obama's globalist agenda.

In my opinion isolationism is not the answer, and should be left to the history books. The future is progress, cooperation, global trade and peace, and open communication.

The first course of action is to take back

1. Our media (where we get our information and news)

2. Our means of communication (towards publicly operated, encrypted, and unsurveilled and away from private and unsecure) and

3. Our methods (halting the dismantling of welfare state, the funding of prisons, the withdrawal from global trade and ecological treaties, and the gerrymandering political districts resulting in inaccurate representation at both the state and federal levels of government)

I'm sharing this on Facebook because this is my modern day soapbox, and my hope is that my words are read. But I am putting in Facebook's hands the responsibility of sharing it far and wide. I don't want Facebook to have that power over me. I don't want to submit my thoughts into FB's algorithm where it selectively feeds my post to a few Newsfeeds to judge it's reaction and opt to share it wider or not.

For that reason, and to work toward the first two steps, I wish to start a web forum that is owned and operated by it's users, not a for-profit company that profits off my usage of it's services.

If anyone has any forum-building experience would like to help or consult on this effort please comment or send me a message. I'm not suggesting this will even begin to replace Facebook as a source of utility for many purposes, but it will be an alternative if you so desire it.

Happy thanksgiving.