As former labor secretary and frequent commentator Robert Reich is fond of remarking: “Rubbish!“

The above concern reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the way our monetary system works. Because the term “debt” appears in each context, people (even leaders who should know better) automatically liken debt at the national level to household or commercial debt — loans that must be repaid. However, our country uses a debt-based currency system (1). National debt is a different phenomenon — it’s simply our current money supply. In the double-entry accounting system, a $40T debt to the federal government is balanced by a $40T surplus in the general economy. Accordingly, federal debt is never supposed to be “paid back” in the conventional sense or there would be no circulating money. Instead it is intended to be recycled in annual budgetary cycles.

So why does this myth pop up so regularly? There are conservatives (in both parties) who believe the government exists primarily to help the rich get still richer, while keeping everyone else under control. When the government is portrayed as reckless, incompetent and insolvent, people are intimidated into lowering expectations of what the government can do for them. Government expenditures can then be directed primarily toward projects that help millionaires become billionaires and billionaires become trillionaires.

At the national level, we never need to be at a loss for money. We are simply at a loss for leadership with the moral integrity to spend the budget on things that the country, its people, and the world at large actually need.

If you find the above difficult to believe (admittedly, it took me 10 years to fully accept it), I highly recommend the short and entertaining documentary “Finding the Money” by Stoney Brook economist and Modern Monetary theorist Stephanie Kelton. It is now available without charge on YouTube at:

Don’t fear, get clear - knowledge is power.

-Bill Miller

(1) For individuals and businesses, the process is typically to amass funding and then spend it. However, in a debt-based system, the issuer of a currency can reverse the process: spend money into existence, then recover it at the end of a budgetary cycle through taxation and loan repayment. On first sight, this may seem reckless, but there is a reason for doing it this way in that it allows the money supply to be more readily adjusted to match current economic conditions.

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A recent post on Robert Reich’s Substack blog focused on the matter of Artificial Intelligence and the potential threat of job-loss for workers. Such discussions usually center around some sort of governmental regulation plus various proposed means to compensate displaced workers.

Yet there is a more fundamental philosophical issue here that we are largely avoiding: What do we as living beings actually exist for? Is it to spend the bulk of our time as worker bees in some corporate hive? If one’s job can be done by a machine, that suggests one is being used like a machine. Is that the ultimate goal of human evolution? Do we institute a raft of new government regulations to ensure that people can retain their status as drones?

The “machine” we are all serving at the moment is the financial system. Roughly half of all jobs don’t really need to be done, but exist primarily as a means to churn dollars so that most can keep playing the game, and the crafty few can skim off more than their fair share in order to become needlessly rich. Why?

From the above vantage point, the opposite pole is commonly thought to be infinite leisure time. Yet that too becomes a curse. We likely evolved to *do* something — something beyond staring at clouds, strumming a guitar, and wanking off.

Futurist Buckminster Fuller suggested the impropriety of the notion that people need to earn their right to exist. Especially in view of current knowledge and technology, there is sufficient abundance for all to have a life of reasonable comfort, security, and opportunity.

Yet, opportunity for what? Humans have spent so many millennia struggling for existence that it seems outside our skillset to imagine a meaningful life without some degree of existential threat and struggle. A new ultimate purpose may have to be an emergent process.

Yet perhaps a first-step forward would be to take resources currently devoted to producing needless variations of needless goods and services in order to hoard up needless levels of wealth — and instead apply them to programs like the former USAID. Ensure that every planetary citizen, and beyond that, every living system, has access to the resources needed to flourish and fulfill their evolutionary potential.

Who knows what then might be possible?

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Why would we then create something completely artificial that, at the moment, is about to ensure our demise?

No, I’m not talking about artificial intelligence, nuclear weapons, or other technologies. I’m also not referring to traditional religions or political philosophies.

It is something even less substantial — essentially a board game, played with valueless tokens, yet with apocalyptic consequences. The game works because we all agree to pretend that the said tokens have value — practically speaking, more value than anything else in the world, sometimes even life itself.

Without consciously intending it to be so, these tokens have become a virtual entity - a “being”(1),(2) with more power than any leader, king, dictator, or pope. All of the latter must bend the knee, and their continued position depends upon their service to the former. For the rest of us, virtually every aspect of life in the modern world — housing, health, status, education, quality of life, security, opportunity, social network — is now regulated by and must seek permission from this entity. Yet in and of itself, this entity does nothing.

By now, you’ve probably figured out that I’m speaking of money.

Need housing, healthcare, education, and opportunity for all Americans? Sorry, Lord Money says “No“. Need sufficient weaponry to destroy the planet several times over? Lord Money says “Proceed with my blessing!“ Need to subjugate living beings to the needs of dead technology? Money says “I’m all in!“ Need a healthy, life-supporting environment? Sorry, Money must consume, grow, and self-replicate, no matter what the cost.

Originally created to be a tool, a servant to facilitate commerce, money has now become master of all. There is virtually no move one can make in contemporary society that is not touched upon, regulated, or controlled by monetary considerations.

At this point in the post, I would hope to have practical suggestions as to how to restore a proper hierarchy — one where the well being of we living creatures and the ecosystem we depend upon would take precedence over abstract concepts and artificial, non-living creations. Yet cultural deference to — sometimes even worship of — money has become so embedded in our systems and psyches, for so many centuries, that it seems impossible to turn around.

Perhaps the best we can hope for is merely to limit the its potential for harm. That would actually be simple, though also an uphill struggle. We might simply limit the amount of idle wealth that any person or corporation can hoard and control. (As a reference, I continually refer to an article in an October 2025 issue of Time Magazine: “I’m a Millionaire. No One Needs More Than $30 Million”.)

Obviously, one means to limit wealth hoarding is taxation. That’s always an incendiary issue, yet it is do-able. Another intriguing route, rarely discussed, is the notion of expiring money (sometimes known as demurrage). When monetary instruments lose value over time, there is incentive to use it now, since its value will worth less later. This solves the problem of money’s two opposing functions: medium-of-exchange versus store-of-value. When too much value is “stored”, insufficient supply is left for its intended purpose as a medium of exchange, resulting in inflation and recession.

An expiring local currency system was attempted during a recession in the town of Worgl, Austria in 1932 (3). It was so successful that the Central Bank had it shut down a year later.

Now that money is becoming digital, perhaps each dollar might be tagged with an incrementally approaching expiration date, such that it loses a percentage of its value each month.

Yet whether or not tax solutions, demurrage currency, or other hoarding disincentives are practical to implement in the modern world, the overarching point is to return money to its status as simply a tool for commerce.

If we are to continue to advance and flourish as a society and species, money must be dethroned from its current status as divine arbiter and final goal of human enterprise. The real world of living systems must ultimately take precedence over dead abstractions and symbols.

-Bill Miller

(1) Some cultural mythologies contain the notion of a mythic entity — Hebrew Golem, Afro-Haitian Zombie, Hindu Tulpa — a being that takes on effective reality when enough people believe in it.

(2) “Money is a living entity” … from “Nine Steps to Financial Freedom” by Suze Orman

(3) The Wörgl Experiment: Austria (1932-1933)

I suspect that whatever is their effort, it is largely driven by a need to defend against foreign aggression (largely from US and Israel). Recall that Iran suffered a regime change operation in the 1950s. Since then there have been similar actions in half a dozen other Middle Eastern countries (none of whom had nuclear capability). Additionally, “regime change” is one of the current bullet points cited during Netanyahu’s meetings with the Trump administration. Alongside this, Trump threatens the entire civilization with obliteration.

Is it really surprising then, that Iran might feel the need for an ultimate deterrent?

It is long past time to do this differently. Stop the adolescent posturing over who’s got the biggest-dick military capability and let the adults find a compromise solution that respects all parties’ needs and rights. Granted, the Zionist wing is not likely to be satisfied with anything less than total neutralization or depopulation of the region. Yet if human values and aspiration for a better world are to mean anything at all, we simply cannot keep going this route.

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Amidst all the reporting, it was noted that other countries, notably China and India, are also running missions with the intent to establish permanent bases on the Moon. It was also noted that the Moon is likely to contain minerals like lithium and helium that are in somewhat short supply on Earth.

So is this what it comes down to? Establishing territorial claims on the Moon with the intent to strip-mine it for raw materials?

For millennia the Moon has been a mysterious source of beauty, wonder, and inspiration for music, arts, literature, and religion. Yet these sacred things have little measurable cash value in the modern world. Accordingly, they are often treated as dispensable.

The Moon represents a once in a multi-billion year event - a gift. Are we really going to fight over who gets to grind it up into feedstock for commercial interests?

This is the central crossroads for the modern world: what do we value most — the living, breathing cosmos and the life it contains, or an abstract, fictional entity that we have entirely created known as monetary wealth?

Our ultimate fate hangs in the balance.

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Over the years, that remark struck me as increasingly profound. What is the emotional state of an outcast? Feelings of inferiority. Loneliness, anger, and resentment at feeling judged and rejected. A need to prove oneself as equal to if not better than those doing the judging. Moreover, the latter often comes with a darker side: a need to split off one’s own fears of inferiority and project them onto another. Then, the tendency to measure one’s own superiority by the ruthlessness with which one can treat the other (hence classism, racism, sexism, Naziism, Zionism, MAGA-tism, elitism, and the like.)

Accordingly, people are inclined to feel like lone agents - self-made men and women, in competition with others. Security is largely correlated with one’s position in the social rank, generally as measured by one’s personal wealth (i.e. money). Commonly, one’s gain comes at some cost to others. In such case, it is difficult to develop a sense of collective identity, of community. Instead, others may serve as temporary teammates who can further one’s quest to “get ahead” of or defeat the rest who are opponents.

In the 20th century, when resources and opportunity were abundant, this view helped build the powerhouse known as the USA. Yet now that we are running out of the same, even the teammates are becoming competitors – and those who are most ruthless and least principled are those who rise to the top positions of wealth, power, and control.

The mounting chaos in today’s world makes it clear that this dynamic is coming to an end. The central question is whether human society will end along with it – or can we find a new path forward -- one in which we see our personal fate as intimately tied together with the fate of the rest of humanity as well as the greater ecosystem in which we all reside.

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Since most citizens likely have a basic sense of decency and fair-play, and would not like to see those around them suffer, one wonders how a small cadre of death-loving sociopaths could gain enough control to destroy vital institutions and threaten the stability of the country and world at large. Could this happen without the rest of us being complicit in some way? And if so, why does it persist?

Trent’s post echos a growing suggestion that Trumpism is not the cause of our current plight but rather an end result of an under-acknowledged process at work throughout our history. A shadow-side has accompanied the 20th Century American success story of the “shining city on a hill”.

Some are obvious: slavery, treatment of indigenous populations, exploitation of workers, union-busting, hostile takeovers, bribery and pay-to-play legislation, insider trading, widening inequality, pardons and bailouts for the rich alongside prosecution and austerity for everyone else. Abroad, there have been wars with questionable rationales, and dozens of covert regime-change operations to further US pubic and private interests. All of this helps fuel the capital appreciation that our economy demands — even if just to hold even.

Although the average person might see the impropriety of the above, even the best of us might wonder what happens to our jobs, our lives, our retirement security if the above should change? That uncertainty is likely a factor in the paralysis that seems to infect otherwise progressive, democratic forces. Yes, we can sign our petitions, march and wave our signs, issue “sternly-worded” letters, whine and rant on various media outlets — yet we live in fear of what may happen if anything fundamentally changes.

I can do no better than finish with Mr. Trent’s closing remarks:

“Trump didn’t create this. He just stopped pretending.

And now we face the choice that was always coming. Do we accept our role as predators? Or do we rebuild as a nation worth believing in?

I know which America I want. I know which America my kids need.

Hope isn’t going to get this done. We will need effort and discipline. We will need to refuse these bastard’s attempts to dictate the terms of what America is and what we can be. We earn our future by building it from the wreckage of past and our present.

Like every journey it starts with a first step. This one starts with looking in the mirror and admitting we have a problem.

We have a problem.

And now, thanks to a president who can’t be bothered to hide it, we can’t pretend it isn’t there.

Let’s choose well,”

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America's Undoing

Is America on Step 1? 11 To Go?

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8 months ago · 182 likes · 73 comments · Corbin Trent and America's Undoing

Certainly, increasingly powerful technologies come with the increasing potential for damage should they run awry. Since A.I. will likely become utilized in more of the vital services we depend upon, there is some basis for such concern. However, the fear that A.I. poses an existential threat to human existence is overblown. It is premised on a misguided belief that A.I. will eventually attain (or exceed) human-level consciousness, and then might “decide” to act with malign intent. This is simply a projection of human fear and other dark impulses onto an ambiguous target. Yes, A.I. can be a powerful tool, but it is lacking one critical feature possessed by living consciousness.

First, some necessary context: The field of Semiotics centers around the way signs and symbols are used to embody and convey meaning. Language itself is a symbolic system by which we conceptualize, categorize, and communicate about the phenomena of experience. One of the early founders, Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, identified three main components of the process: the signifier, the signified, and the referent.

The “referent” refers to any phenomenon of experience that is external to one’s conscious awareness — be it in the external world, one’s own body, or even the knowledge and memory of the brain. The “signified” is the mental construction that represents that external experience. Finally, the “signifier” is the label or symbol we use to store and communicate about that experience.

For example, one might visit the zoo and have the experience of encountering a large four-footed creature with grey skin and a long prehensile snout (real-world referent). One then might mentally run through similar signified images in the brain and come up with the signifier “elephant” — thus enabling the viewer to communicate the message “Hey, I just saw an elephant!”. The listener hears the signifier, then runs through his or her own mental images that are signified by the word. If there is sufficient overlap of experiences, the two reach understanding.

So where does A.I. fall in this process?

Quite simply, A.I. can follow search-and-select algorithms and perform statistical calculations but it cannot have “experiences”. In Saussure’s terminology, an A.I. system can survey a data-pool to glean signifiers that are a statistical best match for real-world referents, but it possesses no signified idea, experienced in a digital “mind” (unless one counts mere measurement data as an “experience”).

As a simple illustration, machines do not need to be anesthetized before being repaired, modified, or decomissioned because they are incapable of pain, fear, disappointment or other experiences that a living system would undergo. Similarly, they cannot plan or act from desire, intention, jealousy, vindictiveness, or other human emotion. Yes, A.I. systems might mimic these, but only by surveying data reported by living beings, and then selecting a best-fit verbal response. That can be quite convincing, as indicated by the number people who use A.I. for companionship or psychotherapy.

And yes, human mental processing often functions in a manner similar to the Large Language Model of A.I. by forming thought, opinion, and choice based on past habit. Yet with people, there is always the potential for novelty and creativity, whereas in A.I. systems, one is simply interacting with a selection algorithm.

Life in the modern world does tend to make us more distracted, lonely, and separated from our collective purpose. When true community seems unavailable, it might be natural to search for alternatives. Yet ultimately, our fate as a species will not depend upon imagined or self-created entities, be they spiritual or digital. Whether we thrive or perish as a species, it is up to we the living.

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I began coming to the Silicon Valley for business in the 1990s and, viewing the tech-frenzy at the time, I had a vague sense of approaching doom that I could not identify — a sense that some day there would be a reckoning. It felt as though in some way, we were fundamentally on the wrong track as a society and species. In recent weeks, the factors that underlie this have now become clear.

I’ve been watching a set of interviews with Scottish neuroscientist Iain McGilchrist, who has done a lot of work with brain imaging — especially as affected by various diseases, injuries, and psychiatric conditions. Along the way, he has come to a new understanding of brain structure and function — especially as regards the two hemispheres, commonly referred to as right-brain/left-brain. (Thoroughly explored in his book “The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World”)

In the popular understanding, the two brain halves serve separate functions — the left being practical, logical, and efficient whereas the right is more emotional, artistic, and spiritual in a somewhat “airy-fairy” way.

Yet McGilchrist notes that asymmetrical structure extends far back as the primitive neural network in a 700-million-year old sea creature — suggesting that there is some larger purpose to this asymmetry. He concludes that each half attends to the world in a fundamentally different way, and survival depends upon a creature paying attention to the world in both ways at the same time.

The left-brain simplifies the world into smaller parts and focuses upon formulas for manipulating the parts to achieve some immediate goal - like getting food to eat. In contrast, the right maintains awareness of the larger context - for example, am I safe in this environment or will I become food for someone else?

Briefly, the left brain apprehends (How should I do it?) whereas the right-brain comprehends (Why should I do it?).

The problem however, is that at a societal level, over time, the immediate technical benefits of the left brain come to predominate. They provide a sense of achievement, security, comfort, and control over the world — and that eventually becomes the primary focus of societal activity. The larger context and purpose of existence – the sacred purpose for which we are doing it at all — becomes lost. Then, the only path forward seems to exert ever more power and control over the world. McGilchrist likens this to the parable of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice — one who has gained access to powerful technique, yet without understanding the full context in which that power resides, its naive use can lead to disaster.

Moreover, because the meaning and purpose are missing, exercising technical prowess never feels like enough — millionaires must become billionaires who then must become trillionaires. We are working from a stunted, partial picture of the world. (As an interesting aside, McGilchrist notes that unlike classical art, modern art often resembles that produced by people with damage to the right-brain.)

Without the right-brain awareness of the richness and complexity of the larger context in which we exist — its meaning and purpose — the natural world and cosmos simply become lifeless resources to be used — and used up — in pursuit of short-term practicality. “Eat, drink, and be merry today, for tomorrow … well, we’ll worry about that later.”

Heartening as it is to finally understand the reasons for my sense of lostness and purposelessness, it is also sobering to realize that our major modern institutions all seem to be premised on this left brain-centric principle, seeking ever more power and control over the world. In result, we are increasingly at war with nature as well as at war with others, personal to international.

As a society, can we recapture enough of the larger, holistic perspective of existence to change course and avoid calamity? I want to be hopeful, but at the moment I’m also doubtful.

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Patriotic Millionaires is a consortium of the wealthy who promote an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy. Their efforts currently center around four practical proposals related to tax policy that directly benefit the lower and middle income sectors — those who have been falling behind pretty much ever since the Reagan years, regardless of which party is in power.

Of course any reasonable, moral person is appalled by the lies, corruption, and devastation being wrought by the current Trump regime. (Likely a deliberate strategy to keep us confused, divided, and conquered.) Yet simply whining and pointing fingers doesn’t seem a sufficient strategy to inspire and win over a critical mass of new support. Instead, from the Patriotic Millionaires website:

“We won’t have a rich, stable, and free country until working people work together—setting aside their social differences—on the one issue that matters most in a capitalist democracy: MONEY. The strength of the GEP program lies in its steadfast focus on economics.”

Accordingly, the Patriotic Millionaires starting proposal:

“The federal government shouldn’t tax people into poverty. Until you can support yourself, you shouldn’t have to contribute to the federal government. That seems like an idea republicans and democrats and independents can agree on. Now let’s see what the politicians— and their donors—have to say.

“The median cost of living in America for a single adult with no children is $45,700 (this estimate provides less than $10 per day for food. Flood the Red Zone: Save America will start with a demand for a “cost of living” exemption on federal taxes up to the cost of living for a single adult with no children. This tax cut for working people will be paid for by millionaires.

“Three years ago, we invited the entire town of Whiteville, North Carolina to join us for a free dinner (complete with childcare!), games, prizes…and a presentation about exactly how over decades politicians from both parties have worked together to rig the economy in favor of the rich and against working people. We gave them $50 for their valuable time. Sixty people came to that first dinner. More people came to the one after that, and even more people came to the one after that.”

At a time when money is the gatekeeper for virtually everything that happens in society, at a time when an ever-widening wealth gap puts the promise of America out of reach for ever more of its people, would it not make sense to focus directly on practical policies that remedy this?

Watch the following 14-minute video of the Whiteville experiment and be inspired, hopeful, and motivated!

Patriotic Millionaires Go To Whiteville (work sample screener):

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After watching an interview with former Labor Secretary (and frequent blogger) Robert Reich, I had an epiphany regarding the limp Democratic response to the seeming daily efforts of the Trump regime to destroy institutions we’ve built over 250 years. Reich acknowledged the discouragement and depression that many of us feel, yet he could only conclude: “We have no choice but to keep on fighting.”

I suddenly realized why the forces for good seem so scattered and helpless in the face the onslaught. We are being suckered — “rope-a-doped”(1) into playing a game that is not natural to those of us who primarily hold values like equity, unity, progress, compassion, and enlightenment. We seek to be creators and builders rather than conquerers and dominators.

“Fighting” necessitates posing an enemy — one who must be opposed and defeated. It divides the culture into “us” versus “them”— and eventual “winners” and “losers”. Without a positive, unified, ideological path forward, it is easy to be drawn into prehistoric instincts: kill-or-be-killed, eat-or-be-eaten. In such context, liberals/progressives will always be at a disadvantage.

Yes, our current system offers a range of options in many domains, and some are more successful or popular than others. It might be natural to view them as in “competition” — especially when money is involved. Yet can we not test, compare, and choose without resorting to battle language? Would our motivations not be better framed as vigorously pursuing a positive result — one that benefits everyone?

At this stage in our evolution as a species and culture, we would do well to keep our primary focus on our collective path forward. We now pretty much have the knowledge and resources to make a world that works for all. Let us lead with inspiration rather than seek to control with fear.

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(1) “Rope-a-Dope” — a boxing technique associated with Muhammad Ali, in which an opponent is drawn into landing a series of aggressive but ineffective blows, thereby becoming exhausted and less able to defend himself thereafter.

I’ve been pondering a question for years. The majority in our society likely have a basic sense of rightness, fairness, and morality. Moreover, we’ve been aware of existential problems like corruption, inequality, racism, environmental loss, climate issues, and war for decades. And the solutions are largely known.

So why have we made so little enduring progress?

I’ve come to believe the originating First Cause is the loss of a sense of our shared humanity and shared destiny. Instead, we live in a social-economic-political system that is designed to keep us separated — lone actors, “self-made men/women”, living in our mini-fortresses separated by fences and walls, mistrustful of others, viewing them as competitors who we must keep up with or get ahead of, endlessly consuming and accumulating in an effort to reach the ever-receding mirage of “security”.

So of course, under such circumstances, over time, it is the most ruthless, sociopathic, necrophilic people who will eventually rise to the top. Just look at the news today — do we really need any more proof?

It’s not going to be easy to change course. Even the best of us are locked into a system that demands constant “growth”, and we depend upon investments that must “go up”. That extra value has to be extracted from somewhere — the environment, the lower classes, the Third World. Most of those have been substantially depleted, so now what?

The shift, which at this point may be difficult to achieve without significant collapse of the current paradigm, is a move away from dehumanizing megalopolis cities and institutions toward a network of smaller scale communities, where people have more ongoing connection, involvement, and concern for each other.

Sociologists suggest that historically, a functional community size is that of a tribal village about 150 people. In this day and age, with all of the technology available, perhaps that could be expanded to several hundred or thousand.

As major cities become more costly, unlivable, and difficult to manage, perhaps a deliberate effort by public or private agencies to create model, holistically planned communities would help us return to a more functional lifestyle. (We’d just need to keep the sociopaths out of the planning process.)

To that point, I note that virtually EVERY Trump-related policy is fundamentally based on hatred. Hatred of individuals, ethnic classes, social groups, political and educational institutions and policies, free debate and expression - the list goes on.

Even the tax cuts for billionaires — it’s not so much about love for billionaires but rather hatred of any institution that might impose restraint, limits, or consequence on the unlimited over-hoarding of the nation’s wealth.

Hatred may feel gratifying in the short term - especially to those who for decades have felt marginalized and disregarded by the current system .

Yet hatred does not create. It does not build things. It only destroys.

That’s an odd stance for those who claim to love the country (or to love God for that matter). Further, it’s a challenge for those in the progressive, pro-democracy camp. It is seductive to let emotional dismay at the current state of affairs devolve into hatred of the “other”. Yet if that is where we get stuck, then we are lost.

Now that the antisocial, antidemocratic dynamics are pretty much in plain sight, let us return our main focus to the society, country, and world that we could and should have. It is entirely possible. We simply need to apply our energy and resources toward creating the world we want rather than the one we fear.

Let’s get busy!

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I hope to god I’m wrong, but I have a sinking feeling that Trump will order a nuclear strike on Iran in the coming weeks.

In view of his sinking poll numbers, rifts within the MAGA movement, failure to bring down prices, chaotic deportation efforts, failure to cut trillions in alleged government waste, foreign countries turning away from the US rather than begging for favor, failure to end wars in Ukraine and Palestine, pathetic military/birthday parade, and an obvious failure to justify tax cuts for the rich while cutting vital programs for the rest of the country (… and whatever else I’m missing), Trump HAS to be becoming increasingly desperate to maintain his crafted image as a strong, competent, large-and-in-charge leader. (“Only *I* can fix it.”)

That, plus his apparent utter lack of regard for the wellbeing of anyone other than himself (unless they are useful).

Accordingly, what is the one thing he can do to divert attention from his failures and establish himself as one of the most powerful, significant people in history? (“Only *I* had the ‘balls’ to do it.”)? Order the tactical use of a thermonuclear weapon.

I would hope there are still enough people of integrity in our various military and other institutions who would be willing to countermand and refuse to comply with such an order. But do any of you really doubt for a minute that Trump would resort to this, were he seriously backed into a corner?

Please God, prove me wrong.

-Bill

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There is a widespread misperception about the way today’s money system works, and it holds us back from becoming the society we could and should be. Moreover, it provides superficial cover for the malevolent actions of malevolent actors like the “DOGE” boys.

Although there is substantial critique and consternation around the DOGE commission (and related Conservative efforts to “shrink” the government), no one seems to make clear that “saving money” is NOT the central issue for the federal government - not in the way that it might be for private citizens, business, and local governments.

Why? Because the federal government is ultimately the SOURCE of money. Federal spending is the way money gets into the economy in the first place. “Save” on federal spending and you’re reducing the money supply. Inflation-recession-depression is the result.

The critical issue is not the sheer level of federal spending, but rather what the funds are being spent ON. Are they creating value and meeting the true needs of the country and its citizens? Or are they being spent largely, uselessly, to further enrich the corporations and private citizens who already hold far too much of the nation’s wealth?

I think you know the answer.

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Similarly disturbing was Alex Garland’s 2024 film “Civil War”, yet that one at least might be justified on the basis of depicting a possible future that we could work to avoid. Yet much of the fare in theaters and streaming media today seems to offer extreme violence simply for its entertainment value. What does that say about us as a species and culture?

Ancient Rome held creative forms of bloody spectacle in the Colosseum before its eventual demise as an empire. Yet they were limited by physical constraints and crude technology. Today, thanks to our “advances”, we can depict any dark, twisted thing a dark, twisted mind can imagine — with the agony being delivered in Ultra High Definition and THX surround sound.

How does this gradual shift toward hellishness embed itself in the culture, and how does it accelerate us toward a future we no longer want to live in?

In many religious contexts, “Hell” is conceived as a preexisting destination of torment and punishment, to which people might consigned for offending some deity or natural order. In the secular world, hell generally refers to conditions of suffering, hopelessness, and despair. Both cases however, share a common view of the human sufferer as a passive agent, a victim, a recipient of conditions imposed by some external force or entity.

Yet whether religious or secular, for reasons divine or natural, my contention is that we, by existence, are the beneficiaries of a universe of vast potential — and it is left to us to create it as a “heaven” or “hell”. That is not merely a poetic sentiment — there is a literal aspect to it. We have more agency in creating the world we experience than is commonly realized.

Yet at the moment, we are like a driverless vehicle that eventually runs off course to calamity. We often fail to recognize our proactive role in creating the collective — even metaphysical — conditions within which we exist.

For the most part, our misapplied creative power is not done by deliberate choice or action — that is why it is not apparent. Rather, these collective states of being accrue and emerge over time, based on a myriad of small choices and actions, many of which may seem inconsequential.

So how might this work — what are the subtle factors behind the world as we experience it?

If you are a believer in metaphysics, you may already be comfortable with the notion of forces and influences beyond the individual human mind. Even if not, most of us are familiar with the notion of a “spirit” that affects the collective — “team spirit”, “holiday spirit”, “troop morale”, “national psyche”, “mood of the market”, and the like. These may sometimes be more than poetic metaphors.

Whether metaphysical or cultural, there does seem to be a body of knowledge, values, and tradition that transcends the individual and is passed on to the collective. In either case this does not come pre-formed but rather is created and modified over the decades, centuries, and millennia by our attention, choices, and actions. (Even the contemporary science of Quantum Physics suggests that attention and observation are implicated in the way reality shows up in experience.)

Such a “field” of knowledge, tradition, and habit then serves subsequently as a guide — a predisposition — for interpreting and responding to future events. Stated differently, we recognize (“re-cognize”) and respond to things based upon personal and collective memory. And events with an emotional charge tend to be the first to come to the fore (especially those with a negative charge, since those were evolutionarily prioritized for survival).

The unfortunate upshot is that we tend to be far more attentive to and fascinated by negative events than the positive. (“Positive News” newspapers never seem to flourish for long.) This increases the probability that our response to negative events will be similarly negative — adding fuel to the fire.

The end result is that we are unwittingly creating a world that looks and feels more hellish year by year. Can we wake up and turn this around? So far, it doesn’t look promising, but I hope to be surprised.

Consider together a collection of individual events:

Trump’s unfulfilled campaign promises (particularly the ensuing economic chaos)

• The assault on democracy, vital government institutions, and rule of law

• The shuttering of vital federal agencies

• The growing suppression of civil rights and freedoms

• The elimination of economic and environmental guardrails

• The destruction of relationships with international friends and allies

• The cratering economy, with inflation and recession looming

• The “black ops” abduction and deportation of legitimate residents to foreign prisons without due process

• Trump’s July 2024 statement at Turnout PAC that if elected, “you won’t need to vote anymore. We’ll have it fixed so good, you won’t need to vote”

• Observations by Columbia University professor and long-time advisor to the U.N. Jeffery Sachs that the Israeli lobby has for decades largely run US foreign policy, engaging the US in a series of wars (Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen) intended to make Israel the sole hegemonic power in the Middle East

• … in view of the latter, Trump’s meetings with Prime Minister Netanyahu

It should be clear that all of the above would be detrimental to the political ambitions of someone hoping for a favorable outcome in the 2026 interim election. Yet the Trumpists do not seem to be at all concerned. Dems, Libs, Progressives are gearing up for a business-as-usual campaign hoping for a “Blue wave” in the 2026 elections. This naively assumes that institutions and processes will proceed as usual. Yet it could hardly be more clear that the events of today are the polar opposite of “usual”.

Here is my dire prediction (forewarned is forearmed):

• Late Summer or early Fall 2026, there will be an horrific October 7th-level event with the blame pinned on Iran

• The intent is to shock, horrify, and outrage the world to the extent that there will be mass support for war (or at least paralysis for the opponents of war)

• The 2026 US election will be “postponed” (i.e. cancelled) with a rationale that in wartime, “we can’t change horses in the middle of the stream!”

I know it’s an awful vision. Are we truly being led by necrophilic monsters who would condemn thousands to millions to suffering and death in order to retain power and control?

Consider the events to date and judge for yourself.

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Each day, the “forces of darkness” give us a new opportunity to be outraged over this, that, or the other thing. It is difficult to avoid a perpetual state of anger, even hatred. We often don’t realize that we are falling into a trap — perhaps a deliberate strategy to keep our attention and resources divided, unfocused, and spread too thin to be effective.

In simplest terms,, conservatives are AGAINST things whereas progressives are supposed to be FOR things. Yet we are being seduced into expending the majority of our energies following the conservative dynamic — and we are guaranteed to continue losing since they are the experts on negativity

It’s been widely acknowledged that the Democratic Party has lost touch with the base of the American people – especially the workforce. To cut through all the noise and distraction and to demonstrate true support for ordinary Americans, perhaps winning back a majority of voters, I suggest one simple, discrete policy to focus upon and promote: phase out the income tax and replace it with a progressive tax on wealth.

The income tax is essentially a monetary fine for working. (The harder you work, the greater your fine.) In contrast, a wealth tax, progressively applied, would be a a monetary fine for hoarding — especially to civilization-destroying proportions.

Even a child can understand that people ought to contribute back to a system in proportion to the benefits received. Yet at this point, the oligarchs own and control so many of our institutions that it’s not clear how we make such a major change. Yet the choice seems either to work for that or to succumb to a life of serfdom in a neo-feudal society.

You know, we could spend the next four years or (cringe) longer running around with our hair on fire over this, that, or the other outrage being performed by the Trumpists, or we could go to the heart of the problem — the font from which all of this springs.

The 20th Century model — individualism, competition, exploitation, growth, consumption, wealth-hoarding beyond all need or reason — has clearly peaked a few decades ago and is now accelerating us toward collapse. The one symbol, the “one ring the binds them all” is money. Over the decades, money began losing its function as a medium of exchange, instead increasingly becoming a mechanism of power, domination, and control.

At this point, virtually all aspects of daily life are touched, regulated, and limited by our access to money. Yet it is not the fault of money per se, it is our social contract as listed above. Yes, competition, growth, consumption, etc. may be necessary in the initial construction phase of any endeavor, be it a career, company, or county. But when an organism (or society) reaches maturity, it is suppose to stop growing and shift to a mature, steady state mode existence. If it does not, it becomes a medical anomaly or circus sideshow attraction (… and how better to describe the current Administration).

The desire to "get rich" is so wired into our cultural DNA at this point that it may be difficult to change to a social model that values other things (people, planet) over money. But a similar effect might be achieved simply by disincentivizing the vast hoarding of wealth through progressive taxation, thus restoring money to its intended function as a medium of exchange.

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