Wow!! Hey Karl. How’ve you been? Hope Jen and the kids are doing great.

Nah, I’m not bitter… I like how Jason put it, ‘engaged and critical’ is more like it.

Even since we were all together, I have been on a journey of deconstruction. Deconstructing the church particularly and now that journey has extended beyond into culture, our country and our government. What do I mean by deconstruction? Tearing away all the junk and getting back to the core principles. Thinking of things in a cleaner purer more thoughtful way. Whether its looking at the church machine and peeling away the layers that cause hurt, confusion and distraction from Gods message or pulling away the curtain of an incredibly broken political system which is based on greed and superficiality.

I hope you stick around. Even if you disagree, you’ll be treated well. I always welcome new perspectives. Please read some of the archives. Even the previous post about the Terror Texts. There’s lots of great thought provoking, uplifting and hopeful conversation to be found. Hopefully it will become clear that I’m not bitter and certainly not hopeless… with regards to the next administration, I definitely am concerned.

just wants to raise a few hackles and get others riled up

Probably a reasonable statement, but for different reasons. I’m not sure I would say ‘riled’ up, but activated or engaged.

For at least the past 16 years we’ve had leadership that has blown with the wind of public opinion and it looks now as if we have 4 more years of the same. With that being the case that means the public holds a lot of power. Therefore, we need to make the wheel squeak. The media is widely becoming passe and useless, the internet and bloggers are becoming the new voice.

Karl, I do hope you join in. I find that engaging with those who may see things differently provides much more growth and substance than cloistering oneself with people who agree… (just ask Chris )

I see political parties a lot like Christian denominations. Basically outdated, divisive, ineffective and piled high with garbage that obscures the core message.

My core principles don’t really align well in totality with either of the major political parties. Rather than try to appease perceived public opinion, conservatives need to strip everything away and return to core principles.

In this election while one party relied on fear, the other relied on division and pitting one group against another. What we need is adherence to the fundamentals of the Constitution, freedom and equality… most of which (if he does what he promised) will be eroded in an Obama administration [BTW some of that erosion started with Clinton and continued with Bush].