Category Politics/Culture

History tells us over and over that freedom is never free, that it must be fought for, maintained and renewed ever and again, in all the circumstances that a particular epoch requires. Lulled half to to sleep by two oceans, the abundance of our lands, the enduring vision of our Founders, and the sacrifices of our forebears, we came to think of our country as impervious to ruin, a citadel of freedom and prosperity that would always fend off invaders from without and nefarious forces from within.

That no matter our external challenges or inner turmoil, we would, in the end, aright ourselves with the strength of our institutions and the can-do goodness of our people.

After yesterday’s Oval Office disgrace with an American president and vice-president taking the side of our arch-enemy and its evil dictator against a country and its people who have endured invasion, rape, torture, the abduction of its children ...

Sometime words fail, and only your stomach can fully inform you about the revulsion you’re feeling when confronted with imagery and words that are contrary to the most basic human decency and every good intention humankind has nurtured over the eons. Not to mention the wisdom of all the world’s religions warning forevermore about the sin of making idols of either fallible human beings or money.

Such was the case yet again for me earlier today when coming across the latest media offering that President Trump himself shared on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday. I will try not to say too much here as the imagery speaks so powerfully and revoltingly on its own.

The barely half-minute, AI-generated video opens with imagery from war-torn Gaza streets, but quickly morphs into a fantasy of children romping on beaches, towering golden statues of Trump gazing down at a city center, buildings emblazoned with “Trum...

I spent my working life in three different fields—four years each in special education and basketball coaching, then some 35 years in the communications field split between journalism and PR/advertising. My special ed knowledge is no doubt dated since I haven’t really kept up with the field, my basketball knowledge is a bit dated but still highly functional, and my communications work quite current since I remain a close follower of matters related to the absorption and conveyance of words and ideas.

One thing I’ve noticed repeatedly over that now long span is that whenever someone with no direct experience in those fields begins speaking with an air of authority and strong opinions on them (“The media ALWAYS…”….”Why doesn’t the coach…?”), my internal response, which I do not share with them unless we’re extremely good buddies, tends toward: “They have no idea what they’re talking about.”

How could they?

In these not-much-United States, we live, by any statistical measure one applies, in a new Gilded Age. Not since the age of the robber barons and the current president’s favorite predecessor, William McKinley, has the gap been so yawning between the upper and lower wealth strata of our society, not to mention the gap between the developed and undeveloped economies around the world.

The data are most everywhere one cares to look, a bare fraction of which we will touch on in this post. The common fact binding them together is that the rich keep getting richer at an accelerating pace.

According to the Federal Reserve, in the U.S. as of 2022, the bottom 50% of the population owned only 2.8% of the wealth. On the near-bottom rung in a country of 340 million that has long been the richest in the world, somewhere between 27 million-40 million people live below the official poverty line, which is $32,150 for a fam...