The Great American Reset

Donald Trump has done this country a huge favor. We owe him a debt of gratitude because, in just four years – love him or hate him – he has exposed every single weakness within our government and brought to the surface the deep fault lines that have destabilized this nation for decades. Before him, it was like this slow drip, drip, drip. We could feel in our hearts that things were off, but had a hard time identifying exactly what those things were. Most of us assumed a day of reckoning was coming eventually, and it most certainly was. Donald Trump just accelerated the process. Some of the things mentioned in this podcast are subjective and, therefore, leave room for opinion. For example, topics like the size our government should be and the role it should play, or whether we should or shouldn’t have withdrawn from major international agreements. On the other hand, many of the things mentioned are objective. We actually have the data necessary to assess things like Donald Trump’s trade wars and tax cuts. We actually have provable outcomes and can clearly track the relationship between cause and effect. After all, numbers don’t lie. We now know. Support the show

A time will eventually come when Americans will demand better governance and true transformation will begin. We say that time is now. It is abundantly clear that finding actual solutions to our problems is not the goal of most of our politicians, and it hasn’t been for a really long time. Instead, it’s all about the game. The game of politics is being played by two ineffectual teams with nothing more in their arsenal than high-dollar lobbying, unconstitutional executive orders, self-serving earmarks, and despicable little tricks like gerrymandering and voter suppression. The game of politics is the reason that Russia was able to exploit our deep internal division and interfere in our sacred elections; why our total public debt is $32.3 trillion, our federal budget deficit is $1.4 trillion, and the reason we even know the term fiscal cliff; and why the U.S. debt rating was downgraded for the first time in history – now over a decade ago – because of “the gulf between the political parties”… then downgraded again in August 2023 due to “fiscal deterioration, a high and growing general government debt burden, and the erosion of governance that has manifested in repeated debt limit standoffs and last-minute resolutions.” The game of politics is why over 38 million Americans are trapped in poverty, why our inequality gaps in almost every category are massive, and why our Medicare and Social Security funds are virtually insolvent. It is why we still have broken health care, education, and criminal justice systems, and why our immigration policy is a complete cluster#*^#. It is why our checks and balances are completely out of whack, why governmental waste is colossal, and why lobbyists almost exclusively write our public policy. It’s the reason our early response to Covid-19 was a disaster – as was our exit from Afghanistan – and why our closest allies are still somewhat confused and concerned. The game of politics is why atrocities like “enhanced interrogation techniques” (i.e., torture) and Guantánamo called into question our national core values and threatened our global image; why Iran and China are resentful and resurgent; and why Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un are essentially shooting us the bird. It cannot be denied: The game of politics has brought this country to the brink, to the point where we literally have no choice but to make serious, significant changes. We're pretty sure most of us believe this to be true, but we always get stumped by the million-dollar question: How in the world do we do it? We are convinced there is only one answer to this question. To truly disrupt the game of politics, we have to fundamentally change the way it is played. And realistically, there is only one way to fundamentally change the way it is played: Add more players to the game. Support the show

The Great American Reset is finally here! We can absolutely change our direction, and we will. Regardless of our individual beliefs, it is critical we join together for positive progress. We have been underestimated long enough. Together we will overcome the tremendous challenges we face and, channeling our very best angels, unleash the greatest version of both ourselves and our country. What in the heck have we been waiting for? Americans are the most dynamic and innovative people in the world. We are courageous, convicted and confident and we possess a unique sense of assertiveness and adaptability. We have all of the necessary ingredients – unlimited talent and intelligence, unparalleled freedom of opportunity, and vast economic resources – to cultivate the strength and goodness of America that we all know exists but that, thanks to partisan politics, has been compromised. We simply need to incorporate the final component: a way to harness unrelenting will. Challenging authority is our right, our responsibility, our legacy. Since the two-party political dynamic in America has completely broken down, we will simply step in and fix this madness ourselves. The most beautiful thing about living in America is that we have the freedom and power to create a better future for ourselves without waiting for some piece of elusive legislation to pass. We don’t need anyone’s permission to define our destiny. Is this not the greatest country on the planet?!? The exciting news is that once we take matters into our own hands, our future will be brighter than ever! The American spirit is unmatched, and we can achieve absolutely anything we put our minds to. It’s a good thing too, because the time has finally come to tackle the most important effort we will ever take as fellow citizens: Saving our country. The time has come for each of us to honestly question our commitment to the future of this nation. Will our legacy be something we are proud of, or will we forever be known as the former superpower that recklessly relinquished our prominence because we lacked the will to protect it? Deep down, do we really want to make the necessary changes or are we satisfied with accepting our political circus as some sort of perverse entertainment? Support the show

The Butterfly Effect is the idea that small changes in the early state of a system can cause significant and unpredictable changes to its future state. For example, the flutter of a butterfly’s wings in Africa could possibly alter the atmosphere just enough to change a hurricane’s path from across the Gulf of Mexico to up the East Coast. Although the butterfly does not cause the hurricane, it’s a small part of a larger sequence of events that causes a major change in the ultimate outcome. Most often The Butterfly Effect is associated with chaos theory, a field of study in mathematics. But this profound concept can extend far beyond mathematical equations or weather patterns. The power of this phenomenon is what Americans so desperately need to embrace to solve our national challenges and change the way our dysfunctional political system operates once and for all. Just as the butterfly and the hurricane are elaborately connected, our domestic and foreign policies are linked in intricate ways. If we don’t pay close attention, a policy decision that we make today can have significant consequences down the road – in ways we may never have considered. The Butterfly Effect can work either for us or against us. Decisions can be altruistic and intelligent and therefore have a positive impact on our future. Or they can be self-serving and illogical and therefore lead this nation into chaos. Lately it’s been the latter, but that trend is about to end. This book will prove that even the slightest disruption can transform our severely broken political system. Better yet, a large one can transform the world. Support the show