Welcome to "Exploring the Political Spectrum"

This will be a political blog. But I don’t intend it to be an opinion blog. There are many excellent opinion blogs in the blogosphere, and I don’t plan to compete with them. I will instead write about the political process and political history (mainly U.S. but also other countries). For example, later on this year I might blog about how the electoral college works and the history of how it came into being and developed into its present form. However, I will not say anything about which side I took in the dispute over Florida’s electoral votes in 2000, or what side I might take if, God forbid, something similar happens in 2008.

In the interest of full disclosure, I will describe my political leanings. I’m sure they will seep out into my writing, despite my desire for this blog to be nonpartisan. I am registered Republican. I lean toward a libertarian point of view, but am nowhere near as extreme as members of the party that bears that name. Most would probably describe me as a social-liberal economic-conservative (although I plan at some point to write about how the words “liberal” and “conservative” have lost their original meanings).

I’m an amateur, although not totally lacking in credentials. I have a B.A. in Political Science from a pretty good college. I dabbled in campaigning early in life, and did a Capitol Hill internship as a college junior. But I have not been politically active in those ways for almost a quarter of a century.

Please add comments to this blog. I hope to stimulate a discussion of ideas, not of people. I hope commenters will dispute and develop ideas that have been put forward by other commenters and by me. But please refrain from personal attacks on any of us.

I will delete in their entirety any comments that:

1. Contain profanity.

2. Include personal attacks on anyone who has published their ideas in this blog.

3. Constitute spam (as determined by me).

4. Are completely off-topic (but I’ll be lenient on this one).

I plan to publish one article-length post every Sunday. I hope to add shorter posts during the week as events dictate, and my muse inspires me.