Category: The Future

Reading With a Purpose

by James Wallace Harris, 11/12/25

I used to keep up with the world by watching NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, reading The New York Times on my iPhone, and bingeing YouTube videos. I felt well-informed. That was an illusion.

I then switched to reading The Atlantic, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, and Harper’s Magazine. I focused on the longer articles and developed the habit of reading one significant essay a day. That has taught me how superficial my previous methods were at informing me about what’s going on around the world. Television, the internet, and newspapers were giving me soundbites, while articles provide an education.

However, I still tend to forget this deeper knowledge just as quickly. I don’t like that. I feel like I learn something significant every day. What I’m learning feels heavy and philosophical. However, it drives me nuts that I forget everything so quickly. And I’m not talking about dementia. I think we all forget quickly. Just remember how hard it was to prepare for tests back in school.

I’ve watched dozens of YouTube videos about study methods, and they all show that if you don’t put information to use, it goes away. Use it or lose it. I’ve decided to start reading with a purpose.

At first, I thought I would just save the best articles and refer to them when I wanted to remember. That didn’t work. I quickly forget where I read something. Besides, that approach doesn’t apply any reinforcing methods.

I then thought about writing a blog post for each article. It turns out it takes about a day to do that. And I still forget. I needed something simpler.

I then found Recall AI.

It reads and analyzes whatever webpage you’re on. Providing something like this for today’s article by Vann R. Newkirk II, “What Climate Change Will Do to America by Mid-Century:”

Recall allows me to save this into a structure. But again, this is a lot of work and takes a lot of time. If I were writing an essay or book, this would be a great tool for gathering research.

Recall is also great for understanding what I read. Helpful with quick rereading.

This morning, I got a new idea to try. What if I’m trying to remember too much? What if I narrowed down what I wanted to remember to something specific?

Within today’s article, the author used the term “climate gentrification” referring to neighborhoods being bought up because they were safer from climate change, and thus displacing poor people. The article mentions Liberty City, a poor neighborhood in Miami, with a slightly higher elevation, bought up by developers moving away from low-lying beachfront development.

I think I can remember that concept, climate gentrification. What if I only worked on remembering specific concepts? This got me thinking. I could collect concepts. As my collection grew, I could develop a classification system. A taxonomy of problems that humanity faces. Maybe a Dewey Decimal system of things to know.

I use a note-taking system called Obsidian. It uses hyperlinks to connect your notes, creating relationships between ideas. I could create a vault for collecting concepts. Each time I come across a new concept, I’d enter it into Obsidian, along with a citation where I found it. That might not be too much work.

I picked several phrases I want to remember and study:

  • Climate gentrification
  • Heat islands
  • Climate dead zones
  • Insurance market collapse
  • Climate change acceleration
  • Economic no-go zones
  • Corporate takeover of public services
  • Climate change inequality
  • Histofuturism
  • Sacrifice zones
  • Corporate feudalism

Contemplating this list made me realize that remembering where I read about each concept will take too much work. I have a browser extension, Readwell Reader, that lets me save the content of a web page. I could save every article I want to remember into a folder and then use a program to search for the concept words I remember to find them.

I just did a web search on “climate gentrification” and found it’s already in wide use. I then searched for “corporate feudalism,” and found quite a bit on it too. This suggests I’m onto something. That instead of trying to remember specifically what I read and where, I focus on specific emerging concepts.

Searching on “histofuturism” brought up another article at The Atlantic that references Octavia Butler: “How Octavia Butler Told the Future.” Today’s article by  Vann R. Newkirk II is also built around Octavia Butler. This complicates my plan. It makes me want to research the evolution of the concept, which could be very time-consuming.

The point of focusing on key concepts from my reading is to give my reading purpose that will help me remember. But there might be more to it. Concepts are being identified all the time. And they spread. They really don’t become useful until they enter the vernacular. Until a majority of people use a phrase like “climate gentrification,” the reality it points to isn’t visible.

That realization reinforces my hunch to focus on concepts rather than details in my reading. Maybe reading isn’t about specific facts, but about spreading concepts?

JWH

Visiting the ER Makes Me Philosophical

by James Wallace Harris, 8/25/25

Friday night, I went to the ER. I arrived at 7:15 pm and left at 2:45 am. At 73, I’ve been to the ER more than a few times. It’s always a fascinating experience despite the pain that brought me there and the agony of waiting to be seen.

Rejuvenation

Last fall, I started working in the yard and began to feel stronger. It made me more active. By spring, I had lost twenty pounds. When it got warm, I switched to walking for exercising, something I hadn’t been able to do since Obama was President. In other words, I felt better than I had in years.

That was quite a dramatic transformation. I had been having various health problems since my forties and had undergone surgeries three years running, starting in 2020. I had accepted I was on a downward path and couldn’t imagine having my health on an upward trajectory again.

Mentally, this rejuvenation changed me. I was having more people over and going out more. I felt like I was turning back the clock. I felt younger. I started doing things I haven’t done in years and began hoping to do even more in the future. One of the fun things I had started doing was playing Mahjong. Susan and I had begun to visit games around town. It made me want to get out again, which probably surprised Susan. Mahjong is hard. I need to think faster to play it, and that felt challenging.

I even went to my doctor to have tests done on my heart to see how much I could push things. I wanted to do more physical things.

I wasn’t completely healthy. I still had aches and pains. But I was keeping them under control with physical therapy exercises. But the miracle was walking for exercise. I started out by walking around one small block once. Over weeks, I built up stamina. Eventually, I was walking three or four laps every morning. It felt great.

I was worried about my heart and the strange twinges of pain in my right side. I asked my doctor. We talked about some possibilities. We knew I had gallstones. We were going to run tests after doing the tests on my heart. Because I’ve had heart problems before, she was more concerned about that.

The ER

Two days before the ER, I felt more rejuvenated than I had in years, so it was a shock to need to go to the ER again. I didn’t feel bad mentally. I felt healthy and clear-headed, except that I had intense shooting pains in my side and back. At 6:30 pm Friday, I decided Susan should drive me to the ER to see if they meant something serious.

We got to the ER at 7:15 pm. They checked my vitals, set up an IV, and then told me to wait in chairs. The place was crowded. I knew it would take hours, so I told Susan to go home. She’s been having her own health problems, and she had left dinner half-prepared. I didn’t want to waste that food.

Being alone made me think about what it would be like if I didn’t have Susan. I imagined living on my own, doing everything by myself. I love working alone at home, but I hate being alone in life. Getting old makes you philosophical, and so does waiting in an ER for hours.

Looking around, I saw some people were by themselves, some were with spouses, and some were with their whole families. From listening in on conversations, I learned that many in the waiting room had been there for hours. Some of those people were waiting for a hospital room to free up. Many of those had wrapped themselves in white blankets and were trying to sleep. The ER had two racks of warm blankets. I love it when they put those warm blankets on you in surgery.

Most of the people in the waiting room were waiting in silence. Some were moaning, one guy was softly crying while his wife hugged him. One poor girl was loudly groaning in pain periodically. I wondered if she was in labor. I was glad that only one person was coughing.

I tried to be still because moving sent shooting pains through me. I wanted to be as stoic as possible. But sometimes pains just shot through me, and I had to jerk about a bit. I knew a few people were looking at me like I was looking at them and wondering what was wrong. I wished I knew.

Before midnight, they called me back. They put me in a small room divided by a cloth curtain. In the other half, they were examining a teenage boy while his mother watched. I heard all the details. They weren’t nice.

They took more vitals from me, and eventually, a tech took me to get a CT scan. I love the sound CT scanners make. It was quite painful to get into position and then back on my feet again. Everywhere I went, they asked if I wanted a wheelchair. I knew I looked bad, but I didn’t want to be bad enough to need a wheelchair. I’ve often seen old people refuse help; now I know why.

They took me back to the room. A sign on the wall said it took three hours to get a CT result. But the PA told the kid who also got a CT scan it would take about an hour.

Around 1:30 am Saturday morning the CT scan results came back. It was nothing I had imagined. I had two more hernias. I’ve already had three repaired surgically. And one hernia was interfering with the tube that goes from my kidney to my bladder. That might explain the weird pains in my side. And then the PA said, “And you have a stone in one of your kidneys.” She explained it wasn’t causing the pain now.

At least it wasn’t cancer, a ruptured gallbladder, or a blocked intestine, or any of the other scary conditions I fantasized about.

The kidney stone did scare me. It wasn’t descending so it shouldn’t be causing pain but they warned me it could try to pass. It might not happen, or happen years from now, or next week.

Evidently, the pain that made moving or standing so unpleasant was my old ordinary sciatica and muscle spasms caused by spinal stenosis. That was diagnosed almost twenty years ago. Sitting at the computer or standing or walking for any length of time aggravates it.

Because I was walking more, and writing more at the computer, I thought maybe my spinal stenosis was better because I had lost twenty pounds. I can’t explain why I was given a temporary reprieve.

The PA gave me 15mg of Toradol in my IV. It was magic. Thirty minutes later I would stand up. I still hurt, but I didn’t look like I needed a wheelchair.

The Future

I have to admit this episode put me in a tailspin. I was all geared up to feel younger and healthier again. I got a taste of being more active, and I liked it. I want that feeling back.

However, aging doesn’t work that way. It’s always a slow decline. Now I knew there could be some upswings in my health, too. I feel like I’m flying a plane I know is going to crash. For a few months, I forgot that. Going to the ER reminded me that it’s still going to crash. However, the past months taught me I could sometimes regain altitude.

Experiencing feeling younger for several months makes me wonder if I could get that feeling back again. I’m back where I can’t walk for exercise. And sitting at the computer makes my back hurt worse. I’m scheduled to see a urologist this coming Friday. I figure another surgery is in my future, and then there’s a time ticking bomb in my kidney. It took me months to recover from my last hernia surgery.

But what can I do to get that healthy feeling back? It might take months, or even years. I’m not giving up. Could losing another twenty pounds help? What diet or exercise to I need to pursue?

I’ve already returned to my adapted methods of coping. I’m back to using a laptop while reclined in a La-Z-Boy. I can walk long enough to do the dishes or go grocery shopping. But I really want to walk again for exercise. I wonder if that’s possible?

I only know one person my age that hasn’t had any health problems. It’s normal to break down in your seventies. I have to keep philosophical about that. But I also want to beat the system.

I’m reminded of a Vaugh Bode underground comic strip from the 1970s. In it two lizard like creatures are tied up. They’ve been blinded, and their legs have been cut off. One of them says to the other, “When it gets dark, I’z is gonna escape” That’s me at this moment.

When I left the ER, I took a Lyft home at 2:45 am. Several friends offered to come take me home. I appreciate that. But I like the feeling of still being able to take care of myself. I know that won’t always be true.

Riding through the dark, deserted streets was surreal. It was quite pleasant. I knew I would need another surgery, but I’ve been through them before. Passing a kidney stone sounded extremely unpleasant. I know just how unpleasant. I once watched a man in the urologist’s office passing a stone. But like the Stoics say, this too will pass. I’m lucky that it wasn’t something that couldn’t be fixed. Too many people I’ve known have already died, and almost everyone I know my age is suffering from something.

Many of my friends are worse off than I am. It’s funny, but I think everyone suffers what they know and wouldn’t trade it for someone else’s kind of suffering.

I remember how being healthier made me feel positive about the future. It was just for a few months. I want that feeling back.

The most unsettling aspect of all this is not knowing the answers. Doctors are more likely to know than I do, but I’m not sure they always know. I certainly can only speculate, and that’s often dangerous.

I just wish I could find some answers to simple questions. Does pain cause more pain? Do pain pills stop the cycle of pain? They stop pain, but what else do they do over the long run? I know they cause constipation. I had a kind of hangover from the Toradol. I know my mother got hooked on pain pills. She lived with chronic pain for over a decade.

Maybe I should have talked with the people in the ER waiting room. Some of them might know things I don’t. Susan and I have been binge-watching ER. We’re in the 14th season.

Real ERs aren’t like the TV program. The sets look similar, and the machines, but I wasn’t suffering anything dramatic, so I didn’t have a flock of doctors surrounding me. I wasn’t an interesting story. Most of the action was behind closed doors, so I couldn’t see it. I saw nurses, PAs, techs, and janitors going to and fro. I’m not sure I even saw a doctor in the hallways. Doctors were busy somewhere fixing people they could fix. I couldn’t be fixed, so I was sent home. The kid behind the curtain was waiting for surgery.

I have endless questions about my aging body. My regular doctor is very patient with me. She will answer many questions. But I don’t think I’ll ever know what I want to know. It’s not like in TV shows where things are explained so precisely.

JWH

What Should I Major in at Old Age University?

by James Wallace Harris, 8/16/25

I’ve decided to earn an equivalent of a graduate degree before I turn 77. I need a project that will keep me occupied in retirement. I’ve always been one to know a tiny bit about hundreds of subjects rather than a lot about a few. I want to pick one subject and stick with it.

I could get a master’s degree from the University of Memphis, where I used to work, since I can take courses for free. I’m not sure they have a major that fulfills my interests. I will check it out. I’ll also check out available online universities. Mainly, I’m borrowing the structure of a graduate degree for my plan.

I decided a book-length thesis will be my measure of success. Since a master’s degree usually takes two or three years, I’m giving myself until I turn 77, which is November 25, 2028.

Over the next few months, I will decide what I want to study. There are many things to consider and think about. Most graduate programs have lots of prerequisites. Before I retired, I considered taking an M.S. in Computer Science. That program required 24 hours of math courses and 12 hours of computer courses to be accepted into the program. The degree itself was 36 hours.

It’s doubtful I could finish a computer science degree before turning 77. And in all honesty, I no longer have the cognitive ability to retake all that math.

My undergraduate degree is in English. I did 24 hours towards an M.A. in Creative Writing before I dropped out. I was also interested in American, British, and European literature. I’d have to start over from scratch because those 24 hours would have timed out. But I no longer want to study English or creative writing.

I’ve also thought of pursuing an Art History degree. I’ve been collecting art books and art history books for a couple of decades, and I have friends with degrees in Art History. One gave me a list of 200 artworks that I’d be required to discuss to pass the oral exam for the master’s degree. I started reading about those works.

I realized I would have to commit several years of dedicated study to pass the oral. I don’t want to do that. I don’t love art that much. I’m not sure what single subject would be worth that much dedication.

I’ll study college catalogs for inspiration, but it’s doubtful that I will want to complete an actual degree from a university. Instead, I will need to make up my own degree.

Let’s say a master’s degree involves twelve courses, and each course requires studying five books. Then my custom-designed degree will require distilling sixty books into a single thesis volume. That thesis should present an original idea.

The single subject I do know a lot about is science fiction. And I’ve thought it would be fun to write a book that parallels the development of science with the evolution of science fiction. I probably already own the books I’d need to research the subject. And it would be the easiest goal for me to achieve because it’s a subject I love and would have no trouble sticking with.

However, I’ve become obsessed with a couple of ideas that I want to study. I believe they are especially fascinating for the last years of my life.

The first is about how humans are delusional. I’d like to chronicle all the ways we fool ourselves. I want to study all the cognitive processes to discover if we can interact with reality without delusion. Current affairs is the perfect laboratory for such a study.

Second, I’m fascinated by how personality is formed. I’d like to answer this question: If I knew then what I know now, how would I have reshaped my personality?

There is a synergy between the two interests. How do delusions shape our personality?

Ever since I read Ed Yong’s An Immense World, I’ve been fascinated by the concept of Umwelt. Our senses limit and define how we perceive reality. Our personality and cognitive abilities determine how we choose to react to that perception of reality.

I haven’t decided yet on what I will pick, but I’m leaning towards delusion and personality development. If I choose that, I’d start this project by collecting books on the subjects and by reading popular periodicals. Eventually, I’d get to academic journals. I don’t think my made-up degree will be very rigorous, though. I’d consider a two-hundred-page book at a modest popular science reading level to merit my do-it-yourself degree.

JWH

Listing Every Subject I’m Interested In Based on the Books I Own

by James Wallace Harris, 8/14/25

I bought more than a thousand books, preparing for retirement, thinking that after I left the nine-to-five grind, I’d have all the time in the world to read them. It’s not working out like I planned. All the time in the world has turned out to be much less than I imagined. Old age does a number on your temporal sense, which I didn’t anticipate. Being retired turns off the “gotta do this soon” mechanism in the brain, so it’s much easier to tell myself I’ll get around to that someday.

I’ve always wanted a catchy saying about buying more books than I can read, that parallels that old idiom about eating, “My eyes were bigger than my stomach.” My ability to acquire books far exceeds my ability to read them.

This problem is mainly due to my inability to commit. Learning is about specializing. To go deep into any subject requires ignoring all other subjects. I’m as indecisive as Hamlet when it comes to picking a project and sticking with it. However, I feel like I’m zeroing in on something. I don’t know what. I’d like to write a book. I have several ideas. I just can’t commit to one.

Looking through my books, I see that I’m torn between understanding the past, working in the present, and anticipating the future. The momentum of aging makes me retrospective, but I need to fight that. The present is real, and the past and future aren’t. However, to survive well in the present requires some knowledge of the past. And since we always act in the moment, we still feel we’re preparing for the future.

The Lesson of Destination Moon

Destination Moon was a 1950 science fiction film about the first manned rocket to the Moon. It was loosely based on Robert A. Heinlein’s Rocket Ship Galileo, and Heinlein contributed to the screenplay. In the story, the astronauts use too much fuel when landing on the Moon. To have enough fuel to take off and return to Earth, the astronauts must reduce the weight of the rocket and its contents. They throw everything they can out of their rocket ship, including the radio, equipment, seats, and their space suits. With the reduced weight, they take off for Earth.

In old age, I have too many goals, desires, and possessions holding me down. Their weight keeps me from accomplishing any larger goal. I need to jettison everything I can. I’m starting by evaluating my book collection and tallying all the subjects I want to study and read about.

This will be a multi-stage process. In this essay, I’m looking at all my books and listing the subjects I thought I wanted to study. Here is the current list, and even though it’s long, it’s still partial:

  • 1939 World Fair
  • 1960s
  • 1960s Counter Culture
  • Aging
  • Alexander von Humboldt
  • Alfred Hitchcock
  • American History
  • American Literature
  • Amor Towles – Writer
  • Anthony Powell – Writer
  • Anthropology
  • Archaeology
  • Art history
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Astronomy
  • Bible Archaeology
  • Bible History
  • Biographies
  • Bob Dylan
  • Books – History
  • Boston – 19th Century History
  • British Literature
  • British Literature Between the Wars
  • Charles Darwin
  • Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall – Writers
  • Chess
  • Classical Music
  • Classical Studies
  • Climate Change
  • Computer History
  • Computers
  • Country Music
  • Creative Fiction
  • Creative Nonfiction
  • Databases
  • Democracy
  • Drawing
  • Early Christianity
  • Economics
  • Electronics – Learning
  • Elizabeth Strout – Writer
  • Environmentalism
  • Ernest Hemingway – Writer
  • Feminism
  • Feminist History
  • Fiction
  • Future
  • Gerontology
  • Go Programming
  • H. G. Wells
  • Hollywood vs. History
  • Impressionism
  • Information and Information Theory
  • Information Hierarchy
  • Jack Kerouac – Writer
  • Jazz
  • Lady Dorothy Mills – Writer
  • Learning – Study Methods
  • Linux / Unix
  • Literary History
  • Literature
  • MacOS
  • Magazines – History
  • Mark Twain
  • Mathematics – History
  • Mathematics – Pure
  • Memory
  • Miami – History
  • Mitford Sisters
  • Movies – History
  • Music – History
  • Nassim Nicholas Taleb – Writer
  • Network Attached Storage (NAS)
  • Nostalgia
  • Note Taking Systems
  • Obsidian – Software
  • Old West
  • Particle Physics
  • Philip K. Dick – Writer
  • Philosophy
  • Photography – History
  • Photography – How To
  • Politics
  • Power Grid
  • Pulp Magazines
  • Python Programming
  • Quantum Mechanics
  • Reading
  • Renewable Energy
  • Rhetoric
  • Robert A. Heinlein – Writer
  • Rock Music
  • Scanning – Books and Magazines
  • Science
  • Science – History
  • Science Fiction
  • Science Fiction – Criticism
  • Science Fiction – History
  • Science Fiction – Magazines
  • Short Stories
  • Sustainability
  • Taxonomy
  • Technology
  • Television – History
  • The Beats
  • The Lost Generation
  • Westerns – Books
  • Westerns – Movies
  • Westerns – Television Shows
  • Windows – OS
  • Writing
  • Yuval Noah Harari – Writer

One of the first decisions I made was to give up on westerns. I have collected many westerns on DVDs. Along the way, I started collecting books on movie and TV westerns. I decided that in the remaining years of my life, I didn’t need to know that much about Westerns. I also gave away my books on TV history.

I’m approaching each subject like I did with Westerns.

Another example, while flipping through my math books, I decided to abandon any hope of relearning math. I gave away my books on pure math. However, I kept books on the history of math. I still want to see the big picture of history. In the long run, I might have to abandon any interest in math. I just don’t know at the moment. This is a process.

Do I Keep Books I’ve Already Read?

I’ve always kept books I’ve read as a form of external memory. The painful truth is, I seldom consult those books. I’ve long known it’s cheaper to buy books at full price when I need them rather than to stockpile them when I find them as bargain used books or Kindle deals. I think the same thing might apply to keeping books. The time and energy that goes into maintaining them in my library is more expensive than just rebuying a book if I want to reread it.

For example, I gave all my Elizabeth Strout books to my friend Ann. If I ever want to reread them, I’ll try the library.

Whatever Happened to Libraries?

It used to be that libraries were depositories of knowledge. I don’t feel that anymore. I’ve gone to the public library too many times to research a subject only to find a battered collection of old books. That’s why I’ve bought my own. However, I don’t think it’s practical to be my own public library.

We can find massive collections of information on the Internet or with AIs. Unfortunately, I don’t trust those sources.

I wish I had a trusted source of online knowledge.

Kindle and Audible Books

I’m not worrying about my digital books because they are out of sight, and thus out of mind.

I decided to get rid of any physical fiction books that I had on Kindle, but not if I owned them on Audible. I like seeing the words. For now, I’ll keep the physical copies of nonfiction books if I also own them as an ebook. I prefer flipping through the pages of a book when studying.

The Limits of Memory

There are many books I’ve kept because I hoped to study a subject. For instance, I’ve long fantasized about relearning mathematics. I got through Calculus I in college, but then I waited too long to take Calculus II. This is why I gave away my pure math books. I can no longer remember things well enough to study a complex subject.

Whatever books I choose to read in this last part of my life, they need to be books that expand my overall impression of reality, but don’t require me to remember the details.

I guess I’m going for wisdom over data.

Limits of Time

I’m hesitant to keep my art history books. I enjoy looking at the pictures, but I just don’t have time to study many more subjects in this lifetime. My interests include several subjects that could become a black hole of study. I really should flee from them.

I’m trying to decide my “Major” for old age. All my life, I’ve been a knowledge grazer. I nibble at one subject and then move on to another. I’ve always wanted to go deep into one area, to specialize. However, I never could settle down. I’m probably too old to change my ways now. I’m going to try, though. The process of selecting my major will be the topic of the next essay.

Shrinking My Library to Focus My Mind

I gave the library a lot of books today. I love buying books. I love owning books. But I own too many for this time of my life. I also have too many things I’m interested in. Too many for the time and energy I have at age 73. I’m like the rocket in Destination Moon. I’m too heavy for the fuel in my tanks.

It would help if I had a committed destination. I’d know what to keep and what to jettison.

JWH

What Will Be the Pivotal Issues in 2026 and 2028?

by James Wallace Harris, 7/2/25

Peter Leyden claims that America undergoes 80-year cycles, which he calls epochs, with peaks of upheaval that last 25 years. The past peak was after World War II, from 1945 to 1970. Leyden claims we’re entering a new peak in 2025 that should last until 2050. He zeroes in on artificial intelligence, clean energy, and bioengineering as the driving forces. I’m not big on predicting the future or seeing patterns in history, but there are ideas in his theory that are worth contemplating. I do believe we’re living through a historic period of change.

David Brooks claims America is moving away from thinking of itself as an idea that inspires the world to a homeland that we should defend. Brooks has moved away from being a traditional conservative to becoming a spiritual guru who teaches morality. I find all his recent speeches to be both uplifting and inspirational. Brooks feels the changes we are experiencing are undermining our individual characters and altering our collective national character.

CBS News asks if we’re moving into a new Gilded Age. But this time, the oligarchs are far richer and much more powerful. There is a synergy between this documentary and the videos of David Brooks and Peter Leyden. Everyone feels a massive paradigm shift coming. In 2025, I believe we’re living through the largest social and political upheaval since 1968.

If history does go through cycles, can we alter their course? The average person does not have much power. But in 2026, we do get to vote, and again in 2028. I believe the Democrats lost in 2024 because they had no clear vision. Being against Trump is not a political plan. In 2024, the Americans voted for Darwinian rule. Let the strong thrive and the weak die. The current administration is enacting laws to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. Essentially, civilization on the cheap. They appeal to greed. They appeal to resentment. They believe everyone should be responsible only for themselves.

It’s a very Darwinian philosophy. There’s no way we could call America a Christian Nation anymore. This is what America wanted through a fair and square election. But now that they are seeing what it means, do they want to keep it?

I don’t think we should wait until 2026 or 2028 to decide what we want. The Republicans won by clearly defining their goals in 2024. Democrats need to produce their own version of Project 2025. Project 2028 needs to be specific, and all Democrats need to support it. It can’t be too radical. It will need to be liberal yet practical. It needs to appeal to independents and old-style conservatives.

I have no idea what that plan should be, but I wish it would be something David Brooks would back. It needs a moral foundation because, as much as I accept the scientific theories of Darwin, I don’t think survival-of-the-fittest makes for an appealing political philosophy.

JWH