Why Trump’s Inauguration is Not the Beginning of an Era -- but the End

I was a Democrat until I turned 30. I first voted Republican in 1994.

Young people can afford to be liberal. As you get older, you invariably become more conservative. Its called life.

That’s true for most people.

Nonsense, everyone knows that 2+2+2=222.

Whether it’s luck or the grace of God [Grace of God!], WE’VE BEEN GIVEN ONE LAST CHANCE TO SAVE THIS REPUBLIC in the form of Donald Trump and the current GOP majority in both houses of Congress, but IF WE BLOW IT THIS TIME, IT IS PROBABLY OVER FOR GOOD.

>What is said here is spot on. Notice my caps.

Peter Leyden’s Shorter Bio:

Peter Leyden is a leading expert on new technologies and trends shaping the future who frequently gives keynote talks about what’s next. Leyden worked for a series of innovative organizations that helped reinvent the fields of media, business and politics: He was managing editor at the original Wired Magazine that introduced the world to the digital revolution. He worked at Global Business Network, the pioneering think tank helping corporations plan for the future. He was founding director of the New Politics Institute that helped those in Washington transition to politics on the Internet.

Leyden currently is founder and CEO of Reinventors, a network of innovators using the new medium of group video to carry out a series of conversations about how to reinvent America. Before that he was founder and CEO of Next Agenda, a new media startup specializing in advancing big ideas through web video. Leyden started his career as a journalist, including serving as a special correspondent for Newsweek magazine in Asia. He is the coauthor of two books on new technologies and the future: The Long Boom and What’s Next.

http://www.peterleyden.com/about/bios/

CA is broke. Socialism is failure, always ...

There are three fundamentally different characteristics of this civilization: One, it will be run totally on digital technologies, smarter and smarter, more and more interconnected computers. Two, it will be totally global and operate on a planetary scale. And three, it will have to be sustainable, in its energy usage and its impact on the planet.

These assumptions need to be questioned.

"One, it will be run totally on digital technologies, smarter and smarter, more and more interconnected computers.": "Totally" digital? What is the source of energy for these digital technologies? What types of devices are we using to access these digital technologies? Are the goods and services they are used to sell "totally" digital? Are we going to live in digital houses? Are we going to eat digital food? "Digital" is only one part of the Internet of Things: the author forgot about the "things".

"Two, it will be totally global and operate on a planetary scale.": "Totally" global? What units make up this global totality?--does this means that regions, nations, cities, and neighborhoods disappear? If not, how do these smaller units relate to each other? What about language and cultural groups? Where do competing religious views such as Christianity, Islam, and secular atheism fit into this global world?--will these all inevitably coexist harmoniously? If Europe can't even stay united, if Syria and Israel can't settle differences peacefully, if China and Taiwan can't agree on how many Chinas there are, how is this global unification "almost inevitable"? And what is the timetable for this "almost inevitable" global unit to emerge, since the League of Nations and U.N. haven't been able to create it in the last hundred years?

"And three, it will have to be sustainable, in its energy usage and its impact on the planet.": "Sustainable" as measured by what?--how did we go about determining what level of energy usage is sustainable? What type of energy is being used? Is this assuming that technology for energy usage remains static?--what about new sources of energy and new technologies for harnessing existing sources of energy? And how do we know what impact energy usage has on the planet?--how are we measuring this?

I'd start there.

Another point:

I’ve long been thumping the idea that California is the future. The San Francisco Bay Area is obviously ground zero for Silicon Valley and tech. It’s about as good a melting pot of global influences as anywhere on the planet. And it’s on the front lip of clean energy and sustainability.

If Silicon Valley's practices are so "sustainable", why did Governor Brown have to issue emergency orders to cut consumer water usage back 25 percent so the agricultural industry that uses 80 percent of the state's water could continue "literally sucking California dry" (in the words of one environmentalist)? Is this a model the rest of the world should emulate?--what would happen if everybody else did this?

Excellent questions that deserve real answers, not the usual rainbows and unicorns kind of answers. The ones you pose on the digital technologies are ones already in my head since my area is manufacturing, one of the only real wealth creators.

“Most of all, for those who supported President Obama, stay hopeful. I truly believe that the politics and policies that President Obama helped usher in will prevail in the end. In the big-picture view of history, the brief Trump reign will be seen as a difficult but necessary step in the massive transition between one economic period to another.”

No one has addressed this statement. What are the policies that Obama helped usher in that will help build this new prosperity? Obamacare? Massive deficient spending? Infrastructure repair and rebuilding that never happened? Gay marriage? Women in combat? Disastrous school lunch programs that kids hate? Muslim outreach?

I see nothing that Obama has done that really changed anything, except for Obamacare which has been all negative, that will have a lasting impact beyond the hangover one experiences after too much partying.

*bump* for later