The Political Spectrum

After several months of sending out resumes, being called in for interviews, and trying to take advantage of every single contact possible, your humble correspondent has finally landed a new full-time position. Man, finding a job in DC is a tough proposition.

Just some thoughts on the job search process. In this town, a lot of it is who you know, not what. The reason for that is there are some three million or so people living in the metro area, and approximately 2,999,000 of them have advanced degrees. I think the janitors in DC probably have Masters Degrees (there's probably some M.A. in Janitorial Services). Thus every job opening solicits hundreds of well-qualified candidates, and it can't be easy for employers to distinguish from the herd. I know my current bosses have been scrambling to fill a couple of positions, and there are just so many well-qualified people applying that it becomes almost a tossup as to who to select to bring in for an interview.

But the wait is finally over for me, and for the first time in my adult life I will not be forced to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and ramen noodle soup for lunch - I will now do so of my own free will. But what does this mean for my blogging?

Admittedly my current position, especially in the past few months has not been all that demanding. That's not to say I haven't learned a great deal from my organization or that the job's been a total bore in any way, but the project that I have been working on for close to two years has come to a close, so there really hasn't been much to do. So I have been able to do a lot more blogging - both in terms of reading and writing, and have felt reasonably free to write on this blog from work - as I am currently doing.

That will, in all likelihood, change. I will undoubtedly be busier in my new job, and probably will not have the time or the ability to blog from there. Happily for me I have a cable modem at home and can write from there in the evening. But evenings are dissertation time, so it's not as though I can easily spend hours devoted to reading and writing upon current events. As most people know, the most important aspect of writing is reading. What am I supposed to react to if I can't read the news or other blogs, and where am I supposed to acquire information?

So, long story short, you may not be hearing as much from me in the coming weeks. I am not exactly challenging Ace or the folks at Power Line in terms of daily output, but I probably will have to take on a diminished role. But I have over a week until my new job starts, so I hope my co-bloggers will indulge me as I churn out a bunch of stuff I've been sitting on or that has come up in the past few days.

Also, who knows how things will develop. It's hard to stay away, as Publius can attest, and even if I can't delve into current events as much as I would like, there are a whole lot of theortical issues that I can bore the heck out of you all with blog about. And Pat Buchanan is bound to write something that will inspire a rant from me.