We watched Star Fleet Academy last night, which started slow in the first episode and got better in the second. Most likely because they have to build so much backstory. What I find amusing is that the show is set in San Francisco thousands of years in the future and the Golden Gate Bridge still stands in all its glory, and incredible feat of engineering if you ask me.
I wonder, is all the posturing about Greenland really about data centers for AI? What is the benefit of such a conquest to the wealthy class and how does Trump profit from it?
Ted Gioia, 25 Propositions About The New Romanticism:
The dominant system today is built on analysis. And it’s worth remembering that the root meaning of analysis is the reduction of things into parts. Holistic thinking, in contrast, is always inherently Romantic. You can also call this visionary thinking.
Productively Retired
I am less than a month in to my retirement and I am still feeling my way around. One thing I am noticing about myself are changes in some of my interests online. Over the years, like many people in tech, I have had an interest in productivity apps, particularly ones built around processes like Getting Things Done or PARA. Inevitably that leads me to installing an app or two and checking them out. Over the years I have tried so many todo apps!
Now that I am retired I think that my definition of productivity is not consistent with how most people on the Internet define it. Right now I am thinking retirement is less about getting things done and more about the best ways to spend my time, and none of the apps I’ve seen has this focus.
It is another bitterly cold day here, so much so that I really don’t want to go outside, which impedes my walking plan. I walk several times a day, primarily after eating, as a key tool for managing glucose. On days like today I take those walks on the treadmill, but that does not come with the benefits of being outdoors.
We Know The Problem
I think unrestrained capitalism is what is destroying the United States. One way is by corporate ownership of “the press,” often referred to as the “fourth estate” for its role in the U.S. as enshrined by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, because the capitalistic profit motive overrides reporting. We are seeing how threats made by the U.S. government toward the corporations that own “the press” results in either non-existent or bad reporting.
A Supreme Court that fulfills its responsibility for preventing tyranny would rule that threats made by the government to the press and their owners violates the First Amendment, but unfortunately our current Supreme Court sees its role as preserving/establishing the unitive executive theory as its prime directive.
Capitalism is also behind the money in PACS and lobbying resulting in Congress only representing a minority that provides its members with money. The corrosion of Congress is the ultimate problem because its law making role will ultimately need to be made to correct our current state, and those laws would work against politician’s self interests. What I think needs to happen is the classification of large financial donations, which would have to be defined, as the emoluments they are and not an act of free speech.
The Constitution has two emoluments clauses because the founders knew that quid pro quo was bad for democracy. Quid pro quo is the reason why Congress in reality only represents a minority of the United States and not the citizens as intended.
A society of no restraints, which is what we are becoming, is not a free society because vices become virtues. The greed that drives one for more and more wealth and power is seen by too many as the virtue of a successful American, but that greed expressed in our unrestrained capitalism leads to a zero sum game. Zero sum games cannot be won when democracy, freedom for all, is the prime directive. Democracy and unrestrained capitalism cannot co-exist.
It’s not often that the weather radio in our bedroom has an alert during winter but we heard one this morning for snow squall warning with white out conditions. Windy.com is indicating 22 mph winds which Accuweather is saying makes the real feel at 0 degrees.
This morning I watched this interview of James Talarico by Ezra Klein, and it was interesting enough to me that I did not fast forward through it. I think the most valuable information came toward the end when James talked about working with a Republican colleague on legislation because it had two valuable lessons.
First, form relationships with people you disagree with, particularly such people with whom you have to work with. Relationships take time to find common bonds and love to the point at which even though you have disagreements the bond, the love, is more important.
Second is humility, which is a willingness to admit that you might be wrong and be willing to change your mind. I find this second point so important because it is literally foundational to the teaching of Jesus.
It is so easy to hate the other that you do not know and with whom you are not in relationship, and progress is not possible without being willing to be vulnerable to admit you are wrong and publicly learn that lesson.
I agree with James that the path from where we are today in the United States to something better is the path of Jesus, which is counter to the norm of civilization as it existed in the time of Jesus and prevails today. What the world tells us is normal is the idol of power and that the only path to peace is through power. Power, like all idols, is made equivalent to God.
The path of Jesus leads to the cross. It is the exact opposite of power, and instead of an idol his path of self-emptying takes us to what is real and that is love.
“Heritage Americans: ‘You’re less American than I am because my ancestors built this country.’ Also Heritage Americans: ‘Don’t blame me for slavery or segregation. I’m not responsible for what my ancestors did,’” – Avik Roy.
Source: https://intellectualoid.com/2026/01/16/friday-1-16-26/
I was taught to not be a hypocrite, the implication being such a person cannot be trusted because you don’t know their true values. My childhood friend once told me what he dislikes the most is hypocrisy. I think we all at one time or another are a hypocrite, but the real problem is not recognizing it as a problem enough to be embarrassed by. In fact, it seems as though most people today have so little self-awareness that they can’t be embarrassed.
In his essay today Om Malik shared this quote from psychologist Rollo May, observing 1950s America:
The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity.
Malik says May diagnosed this when McCarthyism was literally hunting down anyone who thought differently. The subject of Malik’s post was technology platforms, but I think in reality the quote is most applicable to where we are in the United States today. Supremacy does not seek peaceful co-existence, which is the alleged premise of the founding of the U.S., but rather conformity and compliance to a hierachial world view of winners and losers.