For a while now, I have been observing politics and our government from a distance. The people I once saw in charge of the levers of power in Washington DC were always intelligent, collaborative, and there to do what was the best for America. As the past 10 years of American history have unfolded, I have begun to wonder what has happened to our elected officials. Why have they gone to such extremes in rhetoric and policy, sometimes to the point of destroying or fundamentally altering key American institutions? These, and any number of theories and policies are why I am starting this writing project.
My name is Jeremiah McBride. Really, I am no one important. I am a regular American citizen like almost any other person you might walk by on the streets. I come from two working class families who started in Pennsylvania and Tennessee and made their way to the Florida Gulf Coast. I was born and raised in a tiny coastal beach town outside Tampa, FL, and I spent my youth like any other kid: going to school, playing sports, running around town with friends. I left Florida after high school and headed to Auburn University in Alabama on a US Air Force ROTC scholarship. The plan was to become a mechanical engineer and then make a career serving my country. As is normal in life, plans change. I switched majors 2 years into college and took up aviation management. I learned to fly as part of my major and began chasing a passion I have had since I was a kid. After graduation, I was commissioned an officer in the Air Force and began a 7-year military career leading and managing aircraft maintenance for various units. During this time, I was deployed once in support of expeditionary and Global War on Terror operations, including ENDURING FREEDOM and SOUTHERN WATCH.
After separating from the Air Force to pursue the flying career I could not have in the military, my family and I moved back to the Tampa Bay area to begin life as a civilian. I have held various jobs throughout my aviation career, but the Great Recession of 2008 really made me rethink what I had to do to provide for my family and still quench my thirst to fly. Shortly afterwards, we packed up and left Florida for the mountains of East Tennessee. Here, I decided to apply for the airlines and the rest is history.
It’s amazing how much time you have on your hands as an airline pilot: waiting around airports, resting in hotels, and riding on airplanes when you aren’t flying them yourself. Over the past 10 years, I have been doing a lot of searching and thinking, reading and studying, and I have come to the conclusion, early on I might add, that our government may be hopelessly broken, and I am unsure we can fix the mess that has been created over the past 20 years. But I don’t give up that easily when the nation I sacrificed for is going down in flames. Our best hope is to fight. To bring to the table new blood, new ideas, and new solutions to our nation’s problems. This will be one of my forums for unleashing the thoughts and ideas I have been, and will be, formulating to solve the problems we face. Hopefully, you will join me on this journey, help me to craft better policies and smart ideas, and move forward to help this country heal, harness its potential, and move back to leading the world.
I don’t want this to be done inside the vacuum of my own mind. I am but one person and I like to hear others talk about their ideas. When we come together as a collective and work together to move forward instead of fighting one another, we have the potential to do so much good for ourselves as individuals, as well as our fellow citizens. A hand up for each of us should be a hand up for everyone. We really have the potential to solve our problems moving forward. But I ask, with all of my soul, to please be respectful in our discourse. If you engage me or anyone else on this forum, please keep it based on the ideas, and not target us personally. Fear and intimidation are tactics of the weak. Knowledge and wisdom are the weapons of the strong.
Reality Politics 