Save Some Lives

Part 1 – The idea
I’m a lucky guy. I married into a large family of truly smart and loving relatives. This week we were having a seaside lunch with two of my wife’s cousins. Cousin “E” handed me a gift. A 2026 calendar from “The Union of Concerned Scientists”.

Ironically, I recently received a large envelope from the UCS requesting money. At least 50% of our “snail mail” is of this nature. I normally just recycle all of it because we usually make our modest donation decisions once a year near the holidays. I kept the envelope for future consideration. I hadn’t read about the UCS in years. Maybe later.

But our cousin sparked my curiosity. I decided to research “The Union of Concerned Scientists”. I opened the envelope.

A little sticker fell out. It struck a chord. When you were in school, or for that matter for most of your life, did you really think that “science” would be denied by millions of Americans? Denied by the President of the United States? Holy shit. Say it ain’t so.

Part 2 -The insanity

Would you have ever believed that the Secretary of Health and Human Services would be literally insane and embrace wild ass conspiracy theories – endangering the lives of millions of people? But I digress…

Part 3 – The Pitch for a Solution

UCS: “Who we are”
“Our founders knew science and evidence-based decision making was critical to solving many of the biggest challenges facing humankind. To make progress we would need to work persistently in the face of often daunting odds. That’s just what we’ve done.

• We combat climate change and seek to alleviate harm caused by the heat, sea level rise, and other consequences of runaway emissions,

• We strive to develop sustainable ways to feed, power, and transport ourselves,

• We work to reduce the existential threat of nuclear war,

• We ensure our solutions advance racial and economic equity, and

We fight back when powerful corporations or special interests mislead the public on science.”

Please follow this link to see some of the work the UCS is doing. You will find documentation of the damage done to our scientific communities by the Fascists in just six months. You will read recommendations for action on our part.

Part 4 – Checking it out

We typically use “Charity Navigator” before donating to an organization.

Rating Information for The Union of Concerned Scientists:

“Great”

“This charity’s score is 100%, earning it a Four-Star rating. If this organization aligns with your passions and values, you can give with confidence.

This overall score is calculated from multiple beacon scores, weighted as follows: 60% Accountability & Finance, 25% Impact & Measurement, 10% Leadership & Adaptability, 5% Culture & Community. Learn more about our criteria and methodology.”

I just made a donation to UCS. We don’t have deep pockets or a lot to give, but maybe the planet itself should be our primary focus. Maybe we can all save a few lives. And we get a tote that says it quite well:

Part 5 – Opinion
We should be as worried about this….

And this:

And this:

As we would be worried about this:

An intelligent, educated and benevolent president of the richest nation to have ever existed should wake up every morning asking this question:
“What can I do today to help this Earth and all its inhabitants deal with a rapidly changing climate?”

And Congress as well. It is their constituents that are suffering the ravages of bizarre, violent and highly destructive weather driven events. Isn’t protecting them job Number One?

There is nothing more important. Nothing.
86 47.
Fund the science.

https://www.ucs.org/

https://www.charitynavigator.org/ein/042535767

Respectfully, I have some questions

Dear President Trump:
I hope things are going well in the White House. I can see you have brightened up the place. I hear that “gilding” is trending now. Not only do you lead the country but you are now a home design guru! This could be a business for you to pass on to Barron.

But today, I do have a few questions for you, sir. You have millions of devoted followers. I’m sure you would like to respond by clarifying a few issues. Thanks in advance.

First, we are curious about the “Better Health Plan” that you mentioned. I think you had some “concepts of a plan”. How are they coming along? I’m asking for my elderly neighbor who has been cared for by her son. Both are on Medicaid. He’s been told because he hasn’t worked enough hours he will lose his Medicaid. It’s been tough. The son has to do everything. Bed pans, laundry, hand feeding, bathing, monitoring the meds – you get the picture. The best he can do is work part time because Mom is a full time job.

Because they can’t afford to pay for home care services they turned to a Medicare agency. They would like to help, but their staff has shrunk. Not sure why. But I heard many of them “went home”? So Mom and son are on a long waiting list.

Can I tell my neighbor and her dear devoted son that your “concept” is taking shape?

Sir, I think I need to watch less TV. The fighting around the world seems to be increasing. So depressing. I remember that you had said you were going to stop the war on Ukraine on your first day with a phone call. There is a young woman who waits on us at a favorite restaurant. She is Ukrainian – here to study (no worries – she doesn’t talk about politics 🙂 Anyway, her mother is still in Ukraine and lives on the border with Russia. Our young friend was excited when you got elected. But her mom is having a rough time. Electricity only part of the time. The hospital she was visiting for chemo is gone. The school where she worked is gone. But she has a pretty good system for collecting rainwater off the roof and enough stray animals wander by – so she isn’t starving.

How’s that phone call coming along? Can we pass along some encouragement this week. We have every faith you will close that deal with Putin real soon, right?

Recently, I was having coffee with some friends and the subject of food prices came up. I don’t want to alarm you, but some of them are “hangry”. If you are not familiar with the term, it a merger of hungry and angry. Clever, eh? They were asking me why hamburger prices were so high. I think they said they paid $6.50 – last year it was $5.50. I said, “Well, that’s only a dollar.” Three of them screamed “We eat a lot of hamburger! Can’t afford no rib eyes!” and then “He said he was going to lower food prices on day one!” All I could say was “I think he was busy with calls to Vlad – give ‘em a break. How much can anyone really do in a day?”

Anyway, sir, you declared on last Friday that you have “already solved inflation” and that “costs are down.” What a relief! I get that it is just a generalization. But maybe you could call the meat packers and ask them to hire up? I heard a bunch of their employees “went home”. That’s tough. But I’m sure there are a lot of sturdy young Americans they could find for the work. Tell them to advertise!

One last question for today, sir. We live in a new development. Moved in last year. Love the house. Just what we wanted. Great next door neighbors. The only issue so far has been that the guy across the street keeps stealing the yard signs of the guy next to us. There’s some yelling. One of them screamed something about giving the other guy a cocktail – some Finnish concoction. Maybe they are reconciling! Hope springs eternal.

There is one other issue. There were to be 33 houses in this project. Things are looking good near us, but down by the cul de sac, there are about seven houses that seem to be incomplete. There are walls and roofs. But no siding. Some have windows. There are also a couple of empty foundations. And I don’t see or hear any workers. It’s weird. I called the developer. But his phone is disconnected. A friend of mine said he can’t find him. But he did talk to him a few weeks ago. I guess his workers “went home” and the bank stopped lending money to him. There are rumors that he is in Costa Rica.

Sir, do you know where we could find some folks who just want to work hard and help us finish building out the neighborhood? I think some “squatters” have moved into one of the half finished places. My friend said they were from DC – “campers” who were kicked out by some guys in camouflage and masks. Your ideas are welcome here, sir. I know you have a grand plan. Share when you are ready.

BTW, thanks for solving America’s drug addiction problem. You got those smugglers! I’m sure it must have been tough with that boat zig zagging around. Did they let you pull the trigger? If you missed the first time, you could consider playing some video games on your big TV. It helps build your online assassination skills. Just an idea.

Please get back to me when you can. I know you are really busy.

All the best.
Make America Great Again!

(The 1950’s were the BEST. People knew their place, right?)

Sunday Morning Feature

I am sorry to add to your exploding email inbox. But this interview is just too good not to share. Grab another coffee or save this for your wine time. You won’t be sorry.

The Borowitz Report

MAGA’s Worst Nightmare

If you guessed “the release of the Epstein Files,” you’re wrong. MAGA’s worst nightmare is a liberal comedian who’s a Bible expert: the hilarious John Fugelsang. John reveals what the Christian right gets wrong about Jesus, the man he calls “an inconvenient radical Jew.” Plus: Jesse Welles sings his tribute to the Great Caucasian God…

Listen now

2 months ago · 556 likes · 30 comments · Andy Borowitz

The view from Space

I believe that what has fueled the current state of anger in America is that too many people are suffering from economic insecurity. The “culture wars” are encouraged by the ultra rich to hide their hoarding of the national wealth. It is a clever diversion from the fact that a few people own more than all the rest of us.

Ask this question of Google: “What percentage of wealth do the top 10% have?”

Answer: “In the United States, the top 10% of households hold approximately 67-71% of total household wealth, according to recent data from the Federal Reserve and the Congressional Budget Office.”

What follows is long. Part 1 discusses the US tax system when compared to other developed nations. Part 2 is shorter. It talks about the insidiousness of recent legislation.

But if you are short of time, skim 1 and 2 – scroll right to Part 3 and explore a solution to the EXTREME unfairness of our kleptocratic system.

Part 1 – Taxes as viewed from space

Much of what you read next is taken from The Tax Policy Center. I have bolded some statements for emphasis.

TOTAL TAX REVENUE

US taxes are low relative to those in other high-income countries (figure 1). In 2021, taxes at all levels of US government represented 27 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), compared with a weighted average of 34 percent for the other 37 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Six OECD countries (Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ireland, Mexico, and Türkiye) collected less tax revenue than the United States as a percentage of GDP. Taxes exceeded 40 percent of GDP in eight European countries, including Denmark, where taxes were 47 percent of GDP. Those countries generally provide more extensive government services than the United States does.

COMPOSITION OF TAX REVENUE

Income and Profits Taxes: Taxes on personal income and business profits made up 48 percent of total US tax revenue in 2021, a higher share than in most other OECD countries, where such taxes averaged 34 percent of the total (figure 2). Australia, Denmark, and New Zealand were the only OECD countries where over half of total revenue was generated from such taxes.

In the United States, taxes on just the income and profits of individuals (not businesses) generated 42 percent of total tax revenue, compared with 27 percent for all other OECD countries combined.

We rely very heavily on income taxes from wages. But couldn’t the very rich pay a lot more?

Social Security Contributions: The United States collected less revenue from retirement, disability, and other social security programs—24 percent of total tax revenue—than the 29 percent average across the 37 other OECD countries. Some countries were well above that average: the Czech Republic, Japan, Slovak Republic, and Slovenia each collected over 40 percent of their revenue from Social Security contributions.

Compared to others, the U.S. invests much less in the “security” of their seniors. Much less for the disabled. This is an issue of human values – morality. If you think you won’t ever get old, or never have a car accident…then you might like this embarrassing statistic.

Property Taxes: Taxes on property, estates, and gifts provided 11 percent of US tax revenue, compared with 7 percent for all other OECD countries. Almost all revenue from taxes on property in the US is collected by state and local governments.

And the bulk of those property taxes are for education. I call it zip code funding. Those with fancy homes give their kids a fancy education. Which, of course, perpetuates a class society. A legacy educational system – excluding the poor from equal opportunity.

Goods and Services Taxes: The United States relies less on taxes on goods and services (including both general consumption taxes and selective sales taxes on specific goods and services) than any other OECD country, collecting 17 percent of tax revenue this way compared with 28 percent for the rest of the OECD. Chile collected the highest share of its total tax revenue from taxes on goods and services (53 percent).

The U.S. compares favorably if you agree that taxes on goods and services are regressive – unfairly and disproportionately taxing the poor and middle class. Of course, we could take a more “progressive approach” to this by levying even higher tax rates on super luxury items like jewelry, “art”, yachts, private planes and other high end toys. How about no taxes on essentials priced for the poor and a 50% tax on designer dresses?

The value-added tax (VAT)—a type of general consumption tax collected in stages—is the main source of consumption tax revenue within the OECD. The VAT is employed worldwide in 160 countries, including in all 37 OECD member countries except the United States. Most consumption tax revenue in the United States is collected by state and local governments.

I am not a fan of “VAT” taxes. Because they are sneaky. Effective but hidden. A product could be taxed at several levels – starting with the raw materials, then the means of distribution, then the more fully assembled part, then the distribution of the larger part, and then the final assembled product. The government is getting its “taste” multiple times, effectively raising the price for everyone.
Truly REGRESSIVE. Punishing most of us – especially the poorest of us.

Part 2 – The Con

The “Big Beautiful Bill” has passed. It is a travesty unless you are very rich.

My ultimate takeaway is that the “con” is in the complexity. Almost no voters or taxpayers can understand even a small fraction of this bill and our outrageously complex tax code. That is by design. And the design is to provide the rich with as many loopholes as possible to avoid paying a fair share. The rest of us carry the burden. And the pain of the debt.

From the Tax Foundation:
”The bill further complicates the tax code in several ways, sending taxpayers through a maze of new rules and compliance costs that in many cases probably outweigh any potential tax benefits.”

”The tax and spending provisions would increase the budget deficit by $1.7 trillion from 2025 through 2034 on a dynamic basis, and that higher budget deficit would require the US government to borrow more. As interest payments on the debt made to foreigners increase, American incomes decrease.”

And the burden isn’t just in our taxes. It’s in the diabolical scheme to create MORE government debt. It is deliberate. The MAGA “conservatives” use that debt as a bludgeon to claim that the poor are bankrupting the country. Pure bullshit. It is the rich (the entitled few) who are bankrupting the U.S. by hoarding their wealth. And why? Is life really better and more satisfying if somebody has $100 billion rather than $1 billion? What is enough? How many homes, boats and jewelry or art can someone need?

Of course, what those extra $billions do get is the ability to buy elections, legislation and judges. Thank you Supreme Court and “Citizens United”.

This “beautiful” bill adds trillions to the national debt and cuts $100s of billions for social services to those who need it most. Medicaid, Medicare. Hospitals, doctors, nursing homes, food assistance. Cruelty on steroids.

And the affluent can cut their taxes even more by buying more homes, boats and expensive cars They BORROW – deducting the interest costs. They don’t just purchase with their cash. They use their money get more money and pay less taxes in the process!

This is oligarchy. This is an economic con for the ages.

Part 3 – A solution

What follows is a newsletter from the “Patriotic Millionaires” – a group who is seeking Economic Justice.

Hi Friends of the Patriotic Millionaires,

Yesterday, we teased that we would be sharing a forthcoming solution to the way our tax code unfairly pits our money against your sweat. Today, we’re happy to share what we’ve been working on to reach this very important moment.

Earlier today, a number of our members joined Congresswoman Delia C. Ramirez (IL-03) on Capitol Hill to introduce the Equal Tax Act. This landmark piece of legislation makes the tax code more equitable by taxing investment income at the same rate as ordinary labor income and by closing the stepped-up basis and other common loopholes used by the wealthy to avoid paying their fair share. It’s the first of four pieces of legislation that make up our legislative platform, The MONEY Agenda: America 250, that puts working people at the center of economic policy.

Here we are with Congresswoman Ramirez at our press conference to announce the introduction of the Equal Tax Act.

You can watch a full recording of the press conference here. (Remarks begin at the 9:35 mark.) Also be sure to check out our posts on X, Bluesky, Threads, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

The Equal Tax Act would ensure that millionaires and billionaires, who earn most of their money passively through investments, pay the same tax rates as newspaper reporters, dental hygienists, and auto mechanics. Remember what we said yesterday: every dollar that we make through our investments is worth more than every dollar most Americans make at their jobs because, as it’s currently written, the federal tax code taxes ordinary labor income at a higher rate than capital income.

The legislation would also close a number of loopholes that allow the wealthy to avoid paying what they owe the country in taxes. This includes the stepped-up basis, which, if you remember, gives wealthy inheritor families the opportunity to avoid tax completely on capital income.

In full, the Equal Tax Act does the following:

• Limits the lower preferential tax rate for long-term capital gains and dividends to incomes under $1 million. The bill maintains the preferred rate for working people who may have money in a 401(k) or the like. The higher tax will only apply to the first dollar over $1 million.

• Ends the stepped-up basis loophole and disrupts the “buy, borrow, die” strategy used by the wealthy to avoid taxation by treating capital gains as realized at the time of gift or death, with exclusion allowances of up to $1 million in gains.

• Enacts a lifetime limit of $1 million on the use of like-kind exchanges on real estate gains.

• Limits the pass-through deduction to incomes under $1 million.

• Offers very generous protections for family farms and small businesses.

The preferential treatment of capital income over labor income is both intellectually indefensible and grossly unfair. Money is money is money is money—or at least it should be—regardless of how you make it. That’s why the Equal Tax Act is so important.

Here’s another reason why. Inequality in America has reached historic, democracy-destabilizing heights. And when one kind of money is taxed less than another, growing inequality is baked into our society by the math. That’s a recipe for disaster, because inequality—when it reaches a certain level—leads by definition to authoritarianism. And if the events of the last few days and weeks have told us anything, we are already there in America.

To beat back the oligarchical coup that’s currently threatening everything we hold dear in America, we must advance a new vision for the economy. We must structure the economy so that it naturally delivers more stable, more equal outcomes. That starts by treating income the same regardless of how you make it. We’re glad to have done our part by working with Congresswoman Ramirez to introduce the Equal Tax Act today to make it happen.

Warmly,
The Patriotic Millionaires

That was a lot to digest. Here’s simple summary:

• Our tax code is designed to make ultra wealthy people wealthier.

• The tax systems of many other “happier” nations support the well being of the whole population – not just the few.

• The Patriotic Millionaires have a fiscally responsible way to improve the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans without causing the rich any harm or raising the national debt. Read it here: The Money Agenda – America 250
  

Article source:
https://taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/how-do-us-taxes-compare-internationally

Economic Nerd Opportunity:
https://tradingeconomics.com/stream

Corporate Tax rates worldwide (very nerdy):
https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/global/corporate-tax-rates-by-country-2024/

Assessment of the “Big Beautiful Bill” (as passed by the U.S. House of Representatives):
https://taxfoundation.org/blog/one-big-beautiful-bill-pros-cons/

Eight Men own half the wealth on the Planet
https://thewire.in/world/half-of-worlds-wealth-in-the-pockets-of-just-eight-men

A recipe for Economic Justice
https://patrioticmillionaires.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/America-250_-The-Money-Agenda-Exec-Summary.pdf

Rich people fighting for all of us
https://patrioticmillionaires.org/

”Tax the Rich, Pay the People, Spread the Power”

America has chosen PD for Profit

My publishing schedule is generally twice a week. Which limits the amount of stuff landing in your inbox. I try to be merciful. If you are like me, your inbox is now a part time job to manage. Good Substack authors are multiplying like rabbits.

The side effect of this schedule is that I have several “draft” letters that are in a publishing queue. Today’s post was written in February but got set aside as the MAGA Mafia Administration began its attack on sanity and decency.

This essay (no paywall) by Nicholas Kristoff resurrected the following post.
(Thanks Bob H, for the heads up.)

Recently, my wife and I were discussing Parkinson’s Disease. Why are there so many people we know who are suffering from this? Then this article from Civil Eats popped up in my news feed.

“Over 1 million people suffer from Parkinson’s disease in the U.S., and each year, 90,000 new cases are diagnosed. Parkinson’s disease can develop when the nerve cells that produce the chemical dopamine die; dopamine controls critical body functions such as memory, mood, and movement.”

My wife and I echoed each other: “There is something in the water.” Of course, it is more than that.

70 countries ban the use of the pesticide Paraquat. The US does not. Civil Eats explains:

”In recent years, it’s become clear that Parkinson’s is largely caused by interactions between genetics and environmental factors, including exposure to metals, solvents, or pesticides. According to a recent study that offered free genetic testing for Parkinson’s disease to more than 10,000 participants with the disease, only 13 percent were predisposed genetically.

Said another way, 87 percent of the Parkinson’s cases analyzed had no known genetic risk factor. As a result, researchers are investigating how genes and environmental exposures interact to create hot spots of Parkinson’s disease.”

California’s Central Valley, which produces one-quarter of the nation’s food, is one such hotspot. “I call California’s Central Valley my personal lab,” says study co-author Beate Ritz, a Parkinson’s disease researcher at University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and a retained expert consultant in lawsuits against Syngenta. “The levels of Parkinson’s disease there are outrageous.”

Read more here about Parkinson’s Disease. With the information we have, why do we let industries dominate our health policies? Why do we let large corporations and the oligarchs give us such suffering?

I suspect that everyone reading this knows somebody who is suffering from or is deceased as a result of PD. One million of us have it. And millions more of us are impacted by it as we care for and watch our family members and friends suffer.

The field of medicine is scrambling to find cures and better ways to prevent PD. What if we did what other countries have done? Why don’t we stop American Big Ag from spraying this crap…this toxin…on the fields where we get our food?!

Answer: the “Profit Loop”

“Studies from researchers around the world link paraquat exposure to Parkinson’s disease in humans and laboratory animals,” says Ray Dorsey, a professor of neurology at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York and co-author of the 2020 book Ending Parkinson’s Disease: A Prescription for Action.

The financial benefits of reducing pesticide-related Parkinson’s disease are striking. Global sales of paraquat are $400 million each year, yet the economic burden of Parkinson’s disease, in terms of health care costs, is $52 billion a year, according to Dorsey. “Even if paraquat was responsible for just 1 percent of Parkinson’s disease cases, the economic value of preventing its use is $500 million per year,” says Dorsey.

That is the “Profit Loop”. Big companies make billions selling chemicals that make us sick. Then big companies make money trying to find treatments for PREVENTABLE illnesses. That’s some sick irony. Selfish cruelty by design.

It all reminds me of the scam of tobacco companies making enormous profits selling poison – simultaneously providing the pharmaceutical establishment with patients to “cure”. Profits on top of profits. The people be damned.

Here is Kristoff’s last paragraph. I think he is too kind:
”Environmental health is hard. It requires juggling trade-offs and making complex choices with insufficient knowledge. Yet because of profit incentives, we work much harder at spewing toxins into our ecosystem than at shielding ourselves from them. Unfortunately, the United States government — more so than other governments — is more inclined to keep chemical companies safe than to protect our families.”

Or put this way:
Very rich people are making themselves richer by poisoning us. And then making themselves richer by “treating” the results of the poisoning. And then, just to make it more cruel, they deny the poorest of us that treatment. Thank you stockholders and oligarch CEOs of major companies in America. The business model of creating disease to be treated is diabolical genius. American Exceptionalism on Full Display.

So yeah. There must be something in the water. Something that clouds our thinking and keeps us too docile, clueless or otherwise distracted to see the brutal awful truth and act on it.

https://civileats.com/2025/02/12/is-there-enough-evidence-of-health-risks-for-the-epa-to-ban-paraquat/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=USDA%20Funding%20Freeze%20Threatens%20Farmers%20%20Financial%20Stability&utm_campaign=Weekly%20Newsletter%2020250212

https://www.apdaparkinson.org/article/parkinsons-disease-registries/#:~:text=How%20many%20people%20have%20Parkinson’s%20disease%3F,and%20will%20continue%20to%20increase.

https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/147/8/2668/7716154?login=false

https://nebraskapublicmedia.org/en/news/news-articles/study-finds-link-between-parkinsons-disease-and-pesticide-use-in-the-great-plains-region/

https://www.parkinson.org/about-us/news/economic-burden-of-parkinsons-disease-study

Is it Bubble Time again?

Few would dispute the investment wisdom of Warren Buffett, the “Oracle of Omaha”.
From Kiplingers:
“The bottom line is that over the past six decades, Buffett – through acquisitions, investments and opportunistic ventures – did something that’s unlikely to ever be repeated. He essentially doubled the performance of the broader market.

What that meant for anyone lucky enough to get in on the ground floor with Buffett has been nothing less than astonishing. If you invested $1,000 in Berkshire stock in 1965, it would today be worth about $33 million.

The same sum invested in the S&P 500 would be worth about $336,000 today.”

From a July article in MSN:
”The stock market just blew through Warren Buffett’s favorite danger signal”

”U.S. stocks have soared, with the Wilshire 5000 market cap hitting a new all-time high of 212% of GDP, one of Warren Buffett’s key warning levels. Despite global indexes near record highs, we’re seeing mild selloffs this morning. In addition, Goldman Sachs reported a high level of speculative trading activity.”

From GuruFocus on September 4:

”The Ratio of Wilshire 5000 over GNP compares the total market value of all publicly traded stocks in the Wilshire 5000 index to the Gross National Product of the United States. This ratio, essentially the Buffett Indicator provides an assessment of the stock market’s valuation relative to the nation’s economic output.

Buffett Indicator was 2.143 as of 2025-09-04, according to GuruFocus. Historically, Buffett Indicator reached a record high of 2.143 and a record low of 0.312, the median value is 0.89. Typical value range is from 1.26 to 1.84.”

To recap. Warren Buffett, our most respected investor, based on performance over decades, that guy is telling us something.

So what could go wrong now? We are obviously in bubble territory. Everything feels fragile. Will it be a “crypto crash”? Probably sooner or later. After all, crypto is only as valuable as it is popular. Someday, someone will start to sell quickly after having made a quick buck. The panic will be contagious. All Ponzi schemes end that way.

However, there is another “speculation” that is attracting hundreds of billions of “investment” dollars. Real dollars. On the way to trillions. That investment has shown very little ROI (return on investment). And promises to blow through billions more before providing a profit.

Welcome to the world of Artificial Intelligence. Arguably the most overbought, over promised tech development – ever. Some of us of a certain age remember that the “Internet” was going to make everyone rich. Look up the “dotcom” crash of 2000.

AI or artificial intelligence has become a “given”. The ARE ways that it will help us. And we float along trusting that computer science will deliver to us another “printing press” or another “automobile” or another “internet” – another wonder of human ingenuity that will transform our lives and make us all wealthier.

But the industry has become over invested based on a simple idea – a promise of something greater. The “bet” is that AI can become AGI – “Artificial General Intelligence”. A system that is so smart it can teach itself, correct it’s own errors and grow organically into something that will provide enormous return on investment (ROI).

While AI is a natural outgrowth of the computer age, it also has become the greatest financial bet in human history. And it doesn’t expect to make any money for several years. What could go wrong?

The recent release of ChatGPT-5 has been a flop.

Here are some clips from a revealing article in The American Prospect.

”If the AGI dream is over or even delayed, the investor nightmare is just beginning. The fallout from AGI hucksters like Altman won’t just devastate Silicon Valley and the tech sector. The U.S. economy is dangerously dependent on Big Tech and has priced its investments on the promise of AGI. What happens, not just to the Valley but to the global economy, if there is no AGI coming?”

“Unlike most software we’re familiar with, LLMs are probabilistic in nature. This means the link between the dataset and the model is broken and unstable. This instability is the source of generative AI’s power, but it also consigns AI to never quite knowing the 100 percent truth of its thinking. This explains the chasm in model performance by ChatGPT. One day, it is helping conduct Ph.D.-level research, and the next it is miscounting the number of R’s in strawberry, or struggling to answer whether 9.11 or 9.9 is a bigger number. (Note: 9.9 is bigger, a fact I determined without the use of AI.)

“Hallucinations are a by-product of this structural flaw in the way LLMs operate. Because pre-training scaling makes the models bigger but does not constrain or shape their behavior, it cannot solve the hallucination issue. We saw this when GPT-4o was released last year, and its hallucination rate increased compared to earlier models.”

”The technological struggles are in some ways beside the point. The financial bet on artificial general intelligence is so big that failure could cause a depression.”

”….if AGI is still a faraway dream and the industry’s technical leader (OpenAI) has no clear pathway to it, then the Valley has made a terrible bet. According to CB Insights, there are 498 AI unicorns, or startups worth at least $1 billion, turning the $350 billion in VC investments since 2021 into a total valuation of $2.7 trillion. Those valuations will be hard to justify if no one has a ready solution to keep the current pace of progress going.”

”By 2026, OpenAI projects its losses to grow to $14 billion a year, despite seeing another jump in ARR to around $30 billion. The startup doesn’t expect to break even until it can clear $100 billion a year in revenue, the number targeted for 2029. Zitron considers OpenAI the paradigmatic example of what he calls “the rot economy,” a company that “burns billions to lose billions.”

”On the one hand, this is a testament to the sheer scale of the AGI buildout; on the other, it is a flashing red light for an economy with frightened consumers, a softening labor market, a frozen housing market, and roiling uncertainty from Trump’s tariffs. The economic tide seems to be rushing out everywhere except the tech economy, but that may have already gone bust.”

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has recently been a net seller of equities. They are holding over $350 billion in cash equivalents.

https://www.kiplinger.com/investing/warren-buffett-quotes-for-investors-to-live-by

https://prospect.org/economy/2025-09-04-what-if-theres-no-agi/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=When%20the%20AI%20bubble%20pops&utm_campaign=Daily%20Prospect%2009-05-2025

A fresh face with ideas that transcend political party

Greg Casar Is Organizing to Win

If there is a winning future for the Democratic Party, it will emanate from young politicians like Greg Casar of Austin, Texas. His ideas cross party lines to connect with anyone who works for a living and is being challenged to live a viable life – as the price of everything escalates and wages are stagnant. Americans of every stripe are being crushed by the rising cost of housing, utilities, food, health insurance, home insurance – you name it. And the effect of the Chaos Tariffs have hardly been felt yet.

The new chair of the Progressive Caucus in the House of Representatives wants to do for Democrats what he did for construction workers in Texas. Organize around the economics of family survival.

From an article in Texas Monthly:

“TM: You’re not necessarily abandoning your progressive positions on LGBTQ issues, on abortion, on these culture-war issues that Republicans have used to great effect in Texas. But you want the conversation to start with—

GC: I want to start with those economic issues. We’re never going to be able to protect the rights of minority groups unless we win the majority of elections. I also think that economic populism is an answer to how we maintain our progressive ideals on other issues. Some people think that the way to deal with immigration issues is to go Republican lite on those issues or just hope nobody notices immigration anymore. That doesn’t work, right?
We need to go on offense on the economy so that then when somebody brings up immigration, we could say, “Look, I’m a defender of immigrant rights,” or, “Look, I’m a defender of LGBT rights. And even if you might disagree with me on trans issues, if we can agree that Congress’s first job should be driving down the cost of housing, if we can agree that Congress should make it so that childcare is never more than seven percent of your budget no matter who you are in this country, then maybe our disagreement on trans issues is less of a big deal, because honestly, that factors into the lives of most voters so little.”

From The American Prospect:

“What bothered Casar most was waning support for Democrats from working-class voters, something he had seen firsthand on the campaign trail for Harris. He saw it as an existential crisis for the party of the New Deal and Great Society, predicated on fighting for the common man and woman. “If we become a party of upper-income people, then I think we’re toast because we become a contradiction in and of ourselves as a party,” he said.

This year, Casar has focused squarely on reviving Democrats’ populist roots, while trusting that such positioning can play across the ideological divide. While the CPC has typically tended to its own membership in policy development and political strategy, Casar has pitched frontliners and swing-district members on his anti-oligarchy message.”

From The American Economic Liberties Project:

“Rep. Greg Casar (TX-35) kicked off the event by speaking to the broad recognition that our healthcare system, dominated by vertically-integrated giants, is severely broken, saying, “ There is a growing consensus [of lawmakers] who recognize that these middlemen pharmacy benefit managers, that these private equity mergers and that the monopolization of our healthcare system is hurting Texans, no matter who you vote for.”

“People from both sides of the aisle, people all over the country, and providers and patients alike are saying it is time to break up Big Medicine,” Rep. Casar concluded.”

The current partisan divide is so top of brain now that we forget that there were Bernie Sanders supporters who voted for Trump in 2016. Because they saw Hillary as part of the same system that Trump was challenging. A system where both parties had done not nearly enough to provide better jobs, lower prices – a sustainable life for average working people. Sanders and Trump were “change candidates”.
Hillary would have been a far better president than Trump, of course. But she represented the status quo that had provided bupkis for the workers who lost their jobs to outsourcing and automation.

The Democratic Party can shed its “coastal elite” image with the help of young leaders like Greg Casar. Let’s find them and applaud their WINNING messages!

Yes. And perhaps we need to rename the party. The Democratic Workers Party. DEMAND respect for LABOR. Not oligarchs, not guys with too much money and too many yachts. Workers in factories, stores, distribution centers and offices. Workers at home, in coffee shops and hotels. Workers providing us with food!
Workers everywhere.

Most of America is suffering while a few are wallowing in extreme luxury. It ain’t right.

It all sounds really “lefty” doesn’t it. Who cares!

What has the “right” done for us lately?
Raise wages? Nope.
Control inflation? Nope.
Make housing more affordable? Nope.
Provide a new and better health plan? Nope.

Flip the script.
Our retort?
“The Oligarchs of Russia have nothing on the ones in the US of A.”
The fight is on.
“End Socialism for the Rich”.

https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/greg-casar-texas-redistricting-economic-populism/

https://prospect.org/politics/2025-07-28-organizing-to-win-greg-casar/

https://www.economicliberties.us/press-release/rep-greg-casar-nurses-pharmacists-and-patient-advocates-demand-action-against-big-medicine-at-austin-roundtable/

Do We Love our Children?

I found this TikTok piece in the notes section of Substack. It was posted by “DMC”.

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Here is another video featuring Scott Galloway.

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And if you are still interested, below is Galloway giving a “Ted Talk”. He elaborates on the wealth transfer away from younger people. He further explains the corruption and kleptocracy we are now living in.

If there is going to be a revolution ousting the oligarchs, a revolt against money hoarding, a resurgence of economic fairness and opportunity – and an establishment of a better democracy where we don’t screw over our kids – people like Galloway will be leading the charge. Along with Bernie Sanders, Chris Murphy and others who are speaking about the unaffordability and unfair distribution of income and wealth in America.

THIS IS THE MESSAGE: Everything is too expensive and the vast majority of us don’t have enough money to pay for everything. That money is being hoarded by a few. Economic pain for the many. Yachts and multiple homes for a few. This is unsustainable.

Galloway asks: “Do we love our children?” Watch. Keep in mind this is from 2024. But the issues he describes have only accelerated since.

For the first time in our history, younger generations don’t have a shot at a life as good as or better than their parents. This is an American failure.

And that failure is currently being made worse by money hogging Oligarchs. As Scott says: “The fastest growing segment of our population is billionaires.” And the minimum wage hasn’t been increased in decades.

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Andy Borowitz posted this song yesterday. Just in case you missed it, here goes:

And don’t forget DEI!
Dementia (On display every day 🙂
Epstein (September 3 !)
Inflation (Thank you, Mr. TACO Tariff Sheriff)

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Step away from the firehose of evil, rebuild your resolve

This morning. The wonderful usual. Glad to wake up. Wake the dog. Walk the dog. Let dog sniff to her heart’s content. That’s her major sensory intake. That’s her vision. Now she stares at me. My face lit by the Chromebook screen. I drink terrific coffee. She naps. I type.

I am working on multiple Substack letters. They are about The Resistance. The next one will probably be about messaging. It’s not enough to be anti-fascist. It’s not enough to complain about the authoritarian lawbreaking. We will need to do more than rebel and complain. We will need to message a better way. A message of hope for a better American life.

But today, I share what I think is equally important. If you are not in the mood. I get it. I am in a fighting rage several times a day. Maybe come back to this post when you are exhausted.

But if you are ready, please read the post below from Dino Alonso. It changed the trajectory of my day and added to my superpowers – we all have them.

Rest and Reflection. Rejuvenation. Restoring our energy and enthusiasm. Rebuilding our resolve. Requires taking a break from the battles. And once recharged, we can resume the good fight and win.

So take a deep breath. Dump your thoughts. Read about being yourself. Not a reaction. Not a warrior. Not now. Just for a while. Time for battle later.

WHERE THE QUIET THINGS LIVE

—-A homily on stillness, interior peace, and soul-preserving silence in a world of noise

Lets come together.

Not with your feet. With your breath.

With the part of you that’s weary from holding it all together, from reacting, from replying, from always being on.

Come closer in the way a leaf drifts down to a forest floor and makes no sound.

Because today I want to talk about silence.

Not the absence of sound, but the presence of stillness.

Not retreat, but return.

Not an escape from the world, but a re-entry into yourself.

There is a place where the quiet things live.

And too many of us haven’t visited in years.

Not because we don’t want to.

But because we’ve forgotten the path.

I carry noise in my bones.

Not just the noise of machines and screens, but the noise of judgment, of demand, of a thousand imagined audiences watching every move.

And some days, I wonder: what if the soul doesn’t shout?

What if the soul only ever whispers?

“Be like the fox,” Wendell Berry once wrote,

“who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction.

Practice resurrection.”

What if resurrection isn’t a thunderclap but a hush?

What if peace doesn’t arrive with marching bands and hashtags but instead curls itself into the corner of the room like a cat, waiting for you to sit down long enough for it to find your lap?

There is a discipline to stillness.

It is not passive.

It is not easy.

It requires the ferocity of restraint, the courage to not respond, to not lash out, to not react in kind.

Stillness is not withdrawal.

Stillness is war fought on the battlefield of your nervous system.

And it is love.

Stillness is how you choose not to pass your pain on.

Stillness is how you hear what you actually believe before someone else tells you what to believe.

I have found, in the soft underbrush of my own healing,

that quiet is the native tongue of the soul.

And every time I let the noise of the world colonize me,

I forget how to speak it.

So I return.

Not always gracefully.

Sometimes I crawl.

But I return.

And in that return I rediscover the quiet things:

The way light falls across the floor in late afternoon.

The crinkle of a page turning.

The release that comes from an exhale held too long.

The memory of someone I loved who once sat with me and said nothing, and somehow that silence said everything.

You don’t need a monastery.

You don’t need a mountain.

You don’t need a sabbatical.

You need a corner, a minute, a single breath you don’t give away.

Carve out one moment.

Not for consumption. Not for commentary.

Just to be whole again, without explanation.

Find that place where the quiet things live.

And guard it like sacred ground.

Because it is.

“Only in silence the word, only in dark the light,

only in dying life: bright the hawk’s flight on the empty sky.”

— Ursula K. Le Guin

“In an age of speed, nothing could be more invigorating than going slow.

In an age of distraction, nothing more luxurious than paying attention.”

— Pico Iyer

I don’t have easy answers.

But I know this:

The world doesn’t need more noise.

It needs more souls who’ve made peace with their own.

Let the quiet find you.

Let it fill the cracks.

Let it speak where words fail.

You were never meant to shout over the world just to hear yourself think.

You were meant to sit beneath a tree of your own making

and remember that stillness was never the absence of life—

it was the root of it.

Dino’s Homily and Poetry Site

https://bio.site/Dinoalonso

I added the photos for emphasis.

Thank you, Dino.
For improving my day. For helping me re-center.

Like a violin – hear it screech!

The headlines are like dust in the wind. Obscuring our vision. Hogging our attention. We are addicted to the latest outrage. Troops in our cities. Trump welcomes a war criminal. Our neighbors are rounded up like cattle. Healthcare funding slashed. Tax breaks for the morbidly rich. NATO is bad, wait…NATO is good. HIGH tariffs, low tariffs, medium tariffs, WTF? Trump is not a serious adult. He is a dangerous moron. He is an endless stream of incomprehensible foolish obscenities.

But as horrible and despicable as all this is, it is minor in comparison.

Try this: Google something like: “Our three greatest threats are”. Below is the “AI Overview” response.

Identifying the three greatest threats is complex and depends on the specific context and perspective (e.g., individual, national, or global)

Based on recent reports and analyses, here are some widely acknowledged significant threats:

• Climate Change and Environmental Degradation: This encompasses extreme weather events, rising sea levels, biodiversity loss, pollution, and resource scarcity, posing existential risks to the planet and humanity.

• Geopolitical Instability and Conflict: This includes interstate wars, the erosion of international cooperation, and potential large-scale conflicts with devastating consequences, like nuclear war.

• Technological Risks: The rapid development and adoption of technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and biotechnology raise concerns about misuse, unforeseen consequences, and their potential to exacerbate inequalities and societal vulnerabilities.

“It is important to note that these threats are interconnected and often exacerbate one another. For example, climate change can fuel geopolitical instability through resource scarcity and migration, while technological advancements can be misused in conflicts or contribute to environmental problems.”

Or simply put:
* Climate change is an existential risk to the planet and humanity
* The erosion of international cooperation could lead to nuclear war
*AI could be a threat to society if not employed wisely

I think this is what an intelligent president should be thinking about most of the time he is awake. He could also be thinking about ways to be sure that the people who put him in office are healthier, better educated, have plenty of clean water and decent food. He could work towards solving the housing crisis. He could complete the expansion of Broadband Internet to the 6% of Americans who are deprived of it.

But Trump doesn’t. Think. Like a Normal Person.
He is Afraid. He is still trying to Prove that he is a genius.
He is terrified of his past being revealed. Russia. Putin.
Question: While meeting with European leaders and President Zelensky, why did Trump take a break and call Putin? For advice? For talking points? Marching orders?

Trump is making thousands of mistakes. He doesn’t have his eye on the ball. The Three Greatest Threats to America and the Planet are not within his scope of understanding.

He might as well have been a 19th century tycoon sent here in a time machine. He doesn’t use computers. He doesn’t read. He watches TV and gets his ideas from FOX News. He is a clueless old man who is losing it. What could go wrong?

Here is an opinion piece (no paywall) from the NY Times titled:
”How Short Term Thinking is Destroying America”
”Mr. Trump is a 79-year-old strongman nostalgic for the past. His domination of the present is not permanent, but it is leading many Americans to live in the status quo he commands while ignoring where we are going. To overcome that reality, Democrats must mobilize people to believe in the future.”

We are being played like a violin every day by a guy who knows how to distract us. But he is failing in his most important task: preparing for our children’s future.

But that’s not what’s in the news.

Epstein Files – not going away.

The DOJ released a transcript of the interview of Ghislaine Maxwell by Asst Director Todd Blanche (formerly Trump’s personal attorney 🙂 It is hundreds of pages – much of which is redacted. Surprise!

Here’s a taste:
”Maxwell told Blanche that she may have met Trump at some point in 1990 because he had been friendly with her father. She said Trump “was always very cordial and very kind to me,” adding that she never witnessed him in any “inappropriate setting.”
“I actually never saw the President in any type of massage setting. I never witnessed the President in any inappropriate setting in any way. The President was never inappropriate with anybody. In the times that I was with him, he was a gentleman in all respects,” Maxwell said.

Trump and his flunkies have flipped the story on Epstein so many times that it seems like a blur. Watch this very short clip of a very defensive Trump:

Here is the Timeline: Trump administration’s words as critics press for Epstein records

My take? If I were in a Federal prison serving 20 years (at age 61) and my fate was in the hands of a guy like Trump, I might say exactly what they want to hear. After all, my boyfriend and fellow sex trafficker of minors was found dead in his prison cell…

The Dementia is real:

Donald J. Trump IS suffering from the decline we sometimes see in the elderly.
Read this article from the Guardian – one of the few elements of the media who will talk about Trump’s OBVIOUS decline. He can’t complete a sentence or a thought.
If you have the stomach for it, here is an example of someone who is just plain nuts and probably belongs in an institution:

Inflation is real:

The impact of the tariffs on consumer spending – on products and services is just beginning to be felt. The guy did not “lower prices on day one”. He is launching inflation like a slow moving rocket that can’t be stopped.

“The Producer Price Index (PPI) for July surged to a three-year high, with services inflation playing a key role in the gains. A similar trend appeared in the latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) report…”

Concluding thoughts and a song to perk you up.

Diversity – good stuff, interesting, healthy, prevents inbreeding
Equity – a little fairness goes a long way!
Inclusion – a generally accepted concept by the founders of all major religions

Epstein – “The truth is out there” (on Bondi’s desk 🙂
Dementia – Every day, another example (“tilting at windmills!”)
Inflation – Tariffs and deporting essential workers are Trump’s suicide swords

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/11/opinion/america-short-term-thinking.html?unlocked_article_code=1.dk8.rTHF.EwgKHszW7k07&smid=url-share

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/03/donald-trump-mental-fitness?CMP=share_btn_url