- "United States is a service and information economy": Finance, real estate, insurance, SaaS.
- "Nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away": here's a video from Smarter everyday on how atrophied manufacturing has become in the US: [I Tried to Make Something in America](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZTGwcHQfLY)
- "Technological power in the hands of very few": AWS, Google Cloud, Azure.
- "People have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority [...] unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true": Fun house mirror of Twitter/X. Attention economy. Algorithm that maximizes engagement. AI Slop. Deepfakes. War in Iran.
- "our critical faculties in decline": NYT Article [Why U.S. Test Scores Are in a Generation-Long Decline](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/13/upshot/test-scores-school...)
- "the 30-second sound bites now down to 10 seconds or less": TikTok, Instagram reels
- "credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition": RFK Jr, Tate, Fuentes, conspiracies, Qanon, Vaccine hesitancy.