The Gazette Launches

I have been intending for some time to launch a blog. Like many on the Internet, I am a frustrated writer and the scourge of free access to the web is that private journal writing has now become public. The general thrust of the blog will be political obesrvations, but I am an inveterate eater and music afficionado, so I suspect those subjects will creep in as well.

By way of background, I am a businessman with a background in media and as such, I have spent considerable time on both coasts. I have been immersed in liberal politics which represents the singular perspective of the media world, though in truth, my liberal inculcation goes back much further. My paternal grandmother was a card carrying communist and my maternal grandfather fled Russia because the Czar's army forced conscripted Jews to "serve" for a minimum of 25 years. In the late 1950's, my parents moved from Brooklyn to suburban New Jersey where we moved into a co-op apartment complex which was fully integrated. They walked the walk and talked the talk, marching in civil rights actions, taking me to see Bob Dylan and Joan Baez in the early 60's, enlisting me to campaign for Joe McCarthy in '68, etc. You know the story.

My personal worldview was forever altered on September 11, 2001. Though I hadn't voted for George Bush, I was moved by his reaction to this national catastrophe, and I began to research and study Islam - particularly the politics of Islam. Though not terribly religious, I had always felt an attachment to and affinity for Israel (especially since a substantial arm of my generational family had settled there at the time of the Russian Revolution) and the events associated with 9/11 certainly made the world a more precarious place for Israel. I never for a moment felt that George Bush would ever imperil Israel and would do whatever was necessary to keep Israel safe.

That was really the start of my conversion to constitutionalism. And that's really how I prefer to label it - not Republican, not conservative - a dedication to the values espoused by that document and those responsible for creating it. Small federal government. More limited taxation. Safety net benefits for those truly in need with limits in term. Social engineering orchestrated by the states. A Supreme Court that determines constitutionality only, that doesn't recraft legislation to fit constitutional requirements. I'm sure you get my drift.

Last but not least, the name of the blog. I've used "Gazette" because of its link to Ben Franklin and "Flyover" because that's where I live now in spirit and in reality.