Surprise.

That hottie is a bot. Running from a server in Pakistan, Asia, Africa, or Eastern Europe. The praise is robot code. The followers are purchased fiction. And every fake account is making Elon a fortune while making Trump look beloved.

That's how well the slogan is actually working.

This is a post that's going to take on many forms in the months ahead. All I really want to accomplish today is getting you to start asking the same question I'm asking, what do you think we actually need, and to stop listening to the BS in the meantime.

Okay by you?

I've done it many times. It's uncomfortable. It's also the only thing that actually works.

The lies only work when we stop asking questions. Repetition turns lies into perceived truth, but only if nobody pushes back.

Push back.

Don't look surprised when the voting booth that was on Main Street last Tuesday got quietly moved overnight to a new, undisclosed location, with an ICE barricade out front checking tattoos.

And no. You are definitely not invited to the Ballroom Gala.

The government taking equity stakes in strategic industries is no longer a radical proposal. It happened with Intel. It happened with rare earth mining. It happened with U.S. Steel.

The only question is whether those stakes benefit the American people or simply give politicians another lever to pull.

That's right, freedom — we fought for freedom. But somewhere in there should be a guarantee of protection. And I don't see anyone way up the ladder caring about protecting anyone anymore, except themselves. Have you seen that bulletproof barrier they use now? I'd have loved that contract. Bet it didn't go to in-house cronies — not if he wanted it done right.

So: to impeach, or not to impeach. Maybe that's the question we put to Congress before they decide it on their own. After all, they work for us.

We are a wealthy country. We are — when we choose to be — a compassionate one. We should never fail to provide basic services to the people who need them. Not because it is politically convenient. Because it is who we said we were when we put that torch in Lady Liberty's hand.

That's the Vance problem. Not that he's Trump's successor. That he's Trump with the volume turned down and have the power already installed.

Not a perfect environmental policy. Not a zero extraction economy. Just the honest acknowledgment that exploitation without limit is not capitalism. It is not freedom. It is not progress.

It is greed. And more greed.