Well, let's see...I'm a Vietnam-era Army veteran and retired Department of the Army Civilian Public Affairs Officer. My 32-year career took me to 122 countries and every continent. I've been to the edge of space and just about as deep under the sea as naval technology can take people. Last year (May 2006-May 2007) I worked with a Defense contractor company in Afghanistan as the Public Affairs mentor to the Spokesman's Office of the new Afghan National Army.

Over the decades I acquired four Masters degrees and almost finished a Ph.D in international relations before accepting the 8th Army Public Affairs Officer position in Seoul, Korea; where my family -- a wife and four children -- and I spent nearly all of the 1990s. My final position with the Army was as Deputy Director of Public Affairs for the US Army Reserve, at Army Reserve Headquarters, Ft. McPherson, (Atlanta) GA.

In all, my family, or sometimes just me on 'unaccompanied assignment' spent more than 24 years living outside the US and each time I returned to the States I noticed that the country was a little meaner, a little coarser and that the laws were increasingly strict and harsh.

As a young man I was fairly liberal, sympathetic to the "Under Class" and a supporter of Federal programs to help the poor and "less fortunate." But as my tax burden rose and I saw the erosion of the liberties I was devoting my life to defending -- and I saw that the "less fortunate" were scarcely advancing but Federal power and the Federal bureaucracy were growing stronger every day I became less and less an advocate of government power and more of an advocate of Conservative Values, individualism and personal responsibility for one's life and prosperity.

Today, my wife of 40 years and I live on 55 acres of hardwood forest land in East Lower Alabama. My home is almost enery self-sufficient and will be completely off the grid by summer 2008.