I am scratching my head over why this message seemed like a good idea to post publicly. I’m all for the extend kindness part, but “ask permission first” is a little creepy, especially lately. It left me picturing John Michael Karr (warning: creepy guy image ahead).

I have unwittingly developed a fascination with church marquees over the past few years. The occasional unintended humor of a public message makes me laugh, and I suppose these marquees are also limited social commentaries on where we are as a society lately. I’ll keep looking for more.

I’ve been anticipating attending this Refugee Camp exhibit ever since hearing about it early last month.

There’s a lot more I could do to help people in need, and I think this exhibit is a great reminder of that. It’s remarkable to me just how much we turn a blind eye as a society to poverty at home and especially around the world.

I guess it is human nature that we focus primarily on the familiar–what we know and little else. Geographically, we tend to think about where we are and stay immersed in the happenings around us. The saying “all politics are local” rings true, I think, because we tend to behave like we’re in a tunnel: We only see what is immediately in front of us. By design or by default, most of us don’t spend much time thinking about inner-city neighborhoods or distant third-world countries where clean water is a luxury.

I’d like to change this habit when it comes to my own life. I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with seeing what is in front of you all the time, but I do believe that it is a noble thing to look “where you normally wouldn’t” to see things you wouldn’t otherwise see. The view may not ultimately be very pretty, but it is reality. It is wrong to assume that everyone lives in the comfort that we do, in my opinion, and to think that it is OK that others don’t. I’m not suggesting a car in every driveway and a 3,000 square-foot home for every person–goodness knows we can’t sustain that for six billion people–but I’m learning that for me, there has to be something more than just making sure I have “enough,” as though that were a level I could actually reach and feel satisfied about.

I don’t agree with President Bush about much, but I support the remarks he made today about alternative energy sources.

“The problem is we get oil from some parts of the world and they simply don’t like us,” Mr. Bush said, speaking of Middle East suppliers, but naming no countries. “And so the more dependent we are on that type of energy, the less likely it will be that we are able to compete, and so people have good, high-paying jobs.”

While these words are, in my opinion, typical of Bush’s very poor public speaking ability, I think he’s right. Right or wrong, our country has developed a need for enormous amounts of energy, and we are extremely dependent on other nations to get it. Our need to ensure that we have petroleum in large quantities effectively dictates our foreign policy far too much.

I would like to see us change two things about how we spend money as a nation: (1) Dedicate far more of our resources, private and public, to developing more abundant, less polluting energy sources and (2) Dedicate much more of our resources toward direct help for third world nations, particularly Africa.

I firmly believe that alleviating our dependence on hostile and/or unstable countries for energy and helping resolve humanitarian crises in other nations will make our country less of a target and our world a safer and more compassionate place to live.

I am a big fan of Google, but I think this recent news about their research for audio eavesdropping software is going too far.

Google is an innovative company that has developed a lot of the great tools on the Web these days (Blogger, of course; also Google Reader, Google Earth and their original search engine, too). They generally seem to be devoted to making information more accessible for the benefit of everyone, but this latest step raises at least one eyebrow for me.

Introducing this technology without, at the minimum, allowing anyone to opt out of it would be a major violation of privacy, in my opinion. I get that Google, and other companies like it, needs to continue to develop revenue streams and alternatives to conventional advertising. I fully accept that reality in return for the use of their technology, but there is a limit to what is acceptable. Even developing this technology and opening the door for another company or even individuals to use it for ill purposes is a concern for me.

Let’s hear an explanation, Google, because I think one is in order.