The Inner Monologue

There was a time when being human meant being capable. The Renaissance human could paint, invent, cook, build, fix, debate, and maybe even write a sonnet before lunch. Self-reliance wasn’t a lifestyle choice; it was the baseline. Fast forward to now, and we’re not Renaissance humans—we’re project managers of our own helplessness. We don’t do…

Every few years, Silicon Valley convinces itself it’s about to “reinvent” something that didn’t need fixing. First it was money. Then education. Then transportation. Now, apparently, it’s shopping. The new gospel from the tech-bro pulpit is that conversation will replace commerce — that one day soon, we won’t shop; we’ll just talk, and the machines…

The Myth of the Infinite Playground The business world loves to copy its heroes. “What would Google do?” has become a mantra whispered in boardrooms, business schools, and startup incubators. The problem is that almost no one asking that question lives in Google’s universe. Google doesn’t play the same game anymore. Once you’re a trillion-dollar…

There’s a peculiar arrogance in the notion of “planned development.” Whether it’s a business incubator, a new city district, or an innovation hub, the underlying assumption is that success can be engineered if one simply copies the visible architecture of success. The glass tower, the seed fund, the collaborative workspace—all borrowed from examples that “worked.”…

By a Nebraska Corn and Soybean FarmerOctober 2025 Most mornings, I’m up before sunrise, coffee in hand, watching the eastern sky turn gray over the fields. It’s a quiet time to think — about the weather, the markets, the next bill due, and now, about Washington. The news says the federal government has “shut down.”…

Across two different deserts, in two different states, two great inland seas are dying. One—the Salton Sea of Southern California—is a century-old accident of human engineering. The other—the Great Salt Lake of Utah—is a natural wonder, older than civilization. Both are shrinking fast. Both are exposing toxic lakebeds that were never meant to breathe the…

Every nation measures poverty, but few measure it well. Politicians and economists love tidy thresholds—line graphs, percentile markers, and tidy claims that “the bottom 20% live in poverty.” It sounds scientific, manageable, and objective. But the reality of poverty is never a straight line; it is a web, a vortex, and sometimes a trap. Measuring…

Every night, nearly 800,000 Americans sleep without a permanent home. That number has quietly surpassed every modern record, even as the United States boasts more vacant housing units than homeless citizens by a factor of thirty. We are not suffering from a housing shortage so much as a coordination failure — a moral and economic…

For generations, America led the world by inventing the future. But leadership isn’t guaranteed. While we’ve been busy arguing, other nations quietly tested, refined, and implemented ideas that actually work — ideas that made their streets safer, their children healthier, their governments more efficient, and their economies more resilient. They’ve built on the shoulders of…

Or: Why You’re Not Special Enough to Dodge the Universe’s Pranks Let’s play a game. Say this out loud:“That would never happen to me.” Now, congratulations! You’ve just jinxed yourself in 47 languages. Here’s the thing—humanity runs on a delightful little delusion that we’re somehow exempt from the chaos of existence. We eat our salads,…