A few days ago, there was a post on this site that caused me to overreact and I freaked out and deleted the comment, and it wasn't by some crazed interloper, it was one of my best friends. To my friend, it was uncalled for and I sincerely apologize. Since then, we have had a very good dialogue on the process, the purpose for this site, and the need for guidelines. I will post the first set of guidelines in a couple of days. In advance of this, here are some thoughts.
First and foremost, this set of forums and the journals (I will be changing the link of Blogs to Journals) is directly linked to the main site of the business, the business being EXCALIBUR Research & Development, LLC. The intention was to seek projects, problems, contracts from government and industry folks, post the outline on the main site, and then allow the commentary process to take place on the Forums. In addition, similar to traditional blogs, I would post observations and commentary on the blog page (soon to be renamed Journal) and allow additional commentary. So, why did I freak out??
As an observer of American politics, I think we desperately need individuals, groups, and leaders who can work in the national security realm that don’t have a political bias, or at least, don’t allow that to become the overriding issue. My friends comment, in retrospect, was not a major political hot button but his comment referred to a scenario based on a potential outcome in the coming election. Later, he wisely told me if I thought I could separate the discussion of politics from national security, good luck! That is precisely my hope, whether or not it’s achievable is the question.
My hope is for this to be a place where we can professionally argue, discuss, comment, and disagree, but as he said, also allow the ball to move forward and improve both the dialogue as well as the security situation. In that light, the commentary will remain open and unlocked (not requiring a review prior to posting) but I can imagine in the future, there maybe some folks that seek to cause mayhem here and add snide or derogatory commentary and we’ll deal with that if it does ever emerge.
This will remain a political free zone, no mentions of candidates, pro or con, as well as trying to keep the policy discussions away from politics. It will be free of racist, sexist, profane or other hateful comments but we do seek contrarian and opposing viewpoints. As my friend pointed out, quite often it’s necessary and appropriate to take an author to task and that you are commenting on their performance as a writer, and not their overall character or qualifications, we will still seek those types of commentary, especially since we’ve had a really good discussion going on certain issues.
At the end, this is a business and we will not agree with everything posted and those thoughts remain those of the poster. But this is not an anonymous, anything goes blog. If something is considered patently offensive (which the previous comments deleted were not, they were just a shade too political) or are not in the spirit of our guidelines and intent, we will not delete the whole post, but will go back and contact the poster and request they delete the comments not in alignment with our concept here. On this subject, I really do seek your thoughts, this is all new to me and while we want to absolutely create a place for healthy dialogue, we don’t want to be ogres or overreact. Thanks for listening.