In Perspective: 2007

'Tis New Year's eve. I did not prepare anything special to celebrate and recognize the new year of 2007 and this past year of 2006. Tomorrow will be the first day of the first month of the 2007th year following the birth of Christ: 1 January 2007 AD. Wow.

Too many things have happened in 2006; and too many things are going to happen in 2007 — for me to prepare what would have to be a massive outline of the year and upcoming year's events, issues, etc.

2006 has also been the maiden year for this blog. In Perspective officially started on 13 September 2006, after I decided I did not want to hold in all my thoughts and opinions anymore — especially after the five-year anniversary of 9/11 just days before — and wanted to let them be known to the world. Thanks for sticking with me as we enter a new year, of, to push the cliche envelope, new beginnings, new opportunities. A fresh 365 days.

More has been found out than ever before about the incompetence and events unfolding in Iraq, with books like Fiasco (which I own), State of Denial (which I also own), Hubris, Looming Tower, The One Percent Doctrine, and many others revealing American policy at home and abroad (namely in Iraq).

This has also been a significant year for me, personally, though I won't elabourate for fear of becoming like many of the touchy-feely ultra-personal blogs I despise. If you want all the content over the past few months, plus more, you can download the In Perspective 2006 ebook (COMING SOON).

More postings of blog post series/ebook "How to talk to a closed-minded person" will begin this new year, though I have not set a target date for the final product because I do not even know how long it will end up being. Oh, one more thing: apparently I won the Time magazine Person of the Year award for 2006. Of course, so did everyone else. The winner: "you", largely because of user-generated content out of the mainstream from things like blogs and YouTube and Digg.

As far as current conflicts go as we prepare to set our mental clocks one year ahead... I introduce the new Conflict Meter:

Somalia is up in both news coverage and strife intensity;

Iraq is up in news coverage and up in strife intensity;

Israel-Palestine is up or level in news coverage, down in strife intensity;

Afghanistan is down in news coverage and level in strife intensity;

India-Pakistan is up in news coverage and level in strife intensity.

Shifting focus to American civil liberties — which are corroding — Slate has an article that lists the top 10 civil liberty violations [in the US] of 2006. Also, the very cool legal blog Balkinization has listed a compilation of its posts on "civil liberties, the War on Terror, and presidential power". It is great to have a blog that not only talks about important issues, but does so in an educated and in-depth fashion.

The buzz wrapping up this year is sure to be about Saddam Hussein, recently executed and still a hot topic. Not bad considering his PR guy probably got knocked down along with the Baathist government following the US-led 2003 invasion. He is still A1, front page material, and is the topic of enough tags and searches on the Web to make even Britney Spears or Tom Cruise (or their publicists) blush.

My New Year's resolutions are:

To continue to blog ( );

to blog better and more frequently with more targeted posts;

continue writing "How to talk to a closed minded person (if you must)" ebook/blog post series — which I lost the draft too;

to be more productive with my spare time; be better at time management;

introduce bog features like My Zeitgeist and develop In Perspective further;

and whatever else...

What are your New Year's resolutions?

Feel free to share by commenting or emailing me.