For most of my career in politics, I was the ultimate Republican team player, always falling in line to support the team's candidate. In 2012, I was the most prominent openly gay advocate for Mitt Romney. Then in 2014, I left the Republican Party and declared my political independence. Like most Americans these days, I don't feel that either party represents me, but that doesn't mean that I'm not engaged or that I don't care about our country.

Ever since Marco Polo made the first 'modern' trading route to the Orient, there have been those who wanted faster, safer, and cheaper ways to get goods to and from Asian markets.

When the Suez Canal opened in 1869, this created the first enormous leap forward, shortening the trip from Asia to Europe by over 4,000 miles.

The United States follows a very familiar formula when it comes to gun violence: mass shooting, outrage, do nothing, repeat. This cycle has a few root causes that contribute to the status quo.

"This is not a day care. This is a university!"

This was the reaction from the president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University, Dr. Everett Piper, in response to a student's complaint about a sermon he had delivered on the topic of love. The student, Dr. Piper wrote, said he felt "victimized" by the sermon because he was made to feel guilty about not showing enough love toward others.

California’s glorious history is fueled by our tradition of “direct democracy,” most notably our initiative and referendum process which allows people to shape state policy via the ballot. That passion was historically accompanied by a similar interest and participation in the workings of our local governments.

But this great California tradition of public engagement is at risk. Voter turnout at the November 2014 general election hit a record low and Californians are decreasingly engaged in their communities as confidence in elected officials and government remains low.

The United States terrorist watchlist includes the names of 72 employees at the Department of Homeland Security, according to one Democratic lawmaker.

Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.), who was one of 47 Democrats in the House of Representatives to support a GOP bill that would increase the screening of refugees from Iraq and Syria, claimed that DHS has major problems within its own system.

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla and San Diego Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez recently took a trip to Colorado to take notes on ways to increase election turnout.

In the 2014 general election, Colorado’s voter turnout was more than 54 percent, the third highest in the nation. In that same year California had a record low voter turnout, just 42 percent.

In Ronald Reagan's first year in office (1981), he faced the enormous task of handling two of the greatest refugee crises our government has ever faced.

The 1980 Mariel boatlift brought almost 125,000 Cuban refugees to the United States, while continued pressures of the Indochina refugee crisis were continuing from America's departure from Vietnam and the fall of Saigon in 1975 -- as well as the Khmer Rouge genocides in Cambodia.

Climate change is real and is caused by humans.

To many, this statement will seem partisan -- a liberal viewpoint. It does not have to be nor should it be, however.

Environmental issues as of late have become some of the most bitter, partisan contests of the day. Yet there was a time when this was not so, when environmental policy enjoyed widespread support from both parties.

Following the suspected terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, two senators have introduced a bill that privacy advocates could see as a means of enhancing surveillance powers that were reformed earlier this year.