Imagine visiting a foreign country where you are forced to surrender your phone at the border and give them your password. You are detained as they go through your social media accounts looking for anything they don't like. Welcome to Trumpmerica.
Monday, March 24, 2025
Saturday, March 15, 2025
WW3?
Trump had been hinting at WWIII. NATO is supposed to defend the nations of Europe with US support, however, the US now seems to be siding with Russia and implying that they will only support the EU if they are compensated for it. They are turning former allies like Denmark, Canada, Mexico, UK, France, Greenland, etc. into enemies. I can only presume that countries with nuclear capability will be ramping up their nuclear arsenals ASAP. A dirty bomb doesn't take much technical expertise.
Monday, March 10, 2025
Universal Basic Income
The MAGA supporters believe Trump's tariffs will create a nostalgic fantasy of factories packed with workers earning salaries high enough to buy houses and provide healthcare for their families. Unfortunately, those jobs are never coming back.
Most manufacturing today is highly automated. Steel factories only need a few workers to monitor the processes. Companies like Amazon intend to replace middle management with AI systems so there will no longer be a path for workers to move up. AI can code better than most programmers, write better than most writers, and design better than most designers. Soon it will be able to manage better than most managers and drive better than most drivers.
The social contract must change. One possible path to a future society would include universal basic income as described by Andrew Yang in his book, The War on Normal People. Yang proposes a sales tax on products (VAT or value-added tax) that could be used to pay for a universal basic income. Every citizen would receive enough monthly income to get by on.
Saturday, March 1, 2025
Thank You Very Much
Is he supposed to say thank you for allowing Trump to mine Ukraine's valuable rare earths without guaranteeing any security?