I just returned from Lori’s Roadhouse in West Chester, Ohio, after Vivek Ramaswamy’s last campaign stop before the election. A number of Ohio officeholders came out to speak alongside him. The speech was long—longer than ideal for people already heading out to vote—so I will condense the essence of what I heard and what I discussed with people there and afterward.[1]
Lori’s Roadhouse continues to do great things for these kinds of events. The place was packed with signs and energy in a way Amy Acton could never have matched. You will not see that kind of coverage on the news or on Fox, but the basics are clear. The encouragement from the stage was simple: go vote, and call your friends and neighbors to do the same. That is the message I am giving my readers and viewers right now.
I have watched Vivek grow into this role over the years. He was right when he noted in his speech that the campaign launched just a few miles from Lori’s Roadhouse—at the business I ran. I was proud he chose that location, and it was bittersweet to see the campaign season come full circle there. The owners are good people, and every event held there has been excellent. The crowd was energetic, and Vivek appeared in a way many people had not seen before.
The Numbers Game and Republican Advantage in Ohio
This election is a numbers game. If Republicans show up even moderately, they far outnumber Democrats in Ohio. That is why Democrats know they have to stretch every process. Amy Acton is a disaster; I have said so from the beginning. She is the lockdown lady, a horrible candidate who simply does not have the goods down the stretch.[2]
In the numbers, Vivek is well ahead in the places that matter. Acton is not performing well in the counties she needs to overcome him, and those counties will not deliver the numbers required on Election Day. From conversations with people who know the internals the media does not report, the race is well in hand for Republicans if turnout materializes. That also means strength for other races on the ticket.
It is much scarier for Democrats heading into this election than for Republicans. There are simply more Republicans. But if people sit on their hands, representation can still be lost. Do not take anything for granted.
Conversations That Reveal a Dangerous Frustration
The part that concerns me most is what I heard today from people who are not deeply interested in politics—people who live between the cities, who do not know many Democrats, do not want to work with them, and have no desire to break bread with them. Their question to me was: why go vote?
Voting is the most peaceful way to maintain representative government. Their illusion is that nothing will improve until people grab guns, take violence into the streets, and reclaim the country from radicals. George Soros and others have funded efforts that damage Western civilization; evil is at work.[3] But on this election eve in 2026, I believe the best way to maintain self-government is still to vote—not to turn to violence.
Most of the people I spoke with, especially those between the cities, think it has to come to violence before they get their country back. If Democrats thought January 6 was terrible, that was mild compared with what some of these people are thinking. I try to tell them that violence can be avoided by voting. Their response is often that it will be cheated anyway, so who cares.
What’s at Stake: Civility Over Violence
What is at stake is civility itself. If you want a civil society, go vote before you feel you have to grab the guns and take it back with bloodshed the way the Revolution once required. It is yours to hold; you simply have to get up and go. You have to do it at presidential-level turnout.
After the event at Lori’s Roadhouse and the conversations I had, the picture looks strong for Republicans in Ohio if people show up. Republicans way outnumber Democrats, but if you stay home, the other side will represent you because they are the ones voting. Voting is easy. Maintaining self-government through legislative means is far better than the alternatives.
I talked to more than one person today who alluded to having a shell full of ammunition ready to “take care of” the Marxists and communists. That is not a good sign. Giving up on self-rule through the ballot is not a good thing. The other side wants people of Western civilization to abandon peaceful means. Do not give that to them.
A Personal Call to Action
I am telling everyone who watches me, reads me, or listens to me: to maintain civility and protect Western civilization, just get up and go vote. Vote for Republicans, not Democrats. Vote down tax increases. Vote for Vivek Ramaswamy. Things will be much better in Ohio with him as governor, and better in the wider world.
I remember when I first saw the campaign signs—very techie—when he was putting up the art at my business for the rally that opened his governor’s race. I am happy to see it come full circle, and I will be happy to see him as governor of Ohio.
A few months ago I saw Vivek walk into a little restaurant with almost no security. We had a nice personal conversation, and few people reacted. At Lori’s Roadhouse it was governor-level security, a Secret Service-style entourage, and a posse that made it hard to get close. It was strange, but it is exciting. I think he is going to win—but only if people show up.
Do not leave it to other people to decide for you. Vote like your life depends on it, because in a lot of ways it does. We do not want a society that turns to violence in order to maintain self-government. Go vote for the 2026 election.
Footnotes
[1] The event was held at Lori’s Roadhouse in West Chester Township, Butler County, Ohio. Local coverage and posts confirmed the rally timing on the final day of campaigning.
[2] Public polling averages in late October and early November 2026 generally showed Amy Acton with a narrow lead (roughly 2–7 points depending on the pollster), though some surveys were tighter or showed Ramaswamy ahead. Ohio does not have formal party registration; affiliation is determined by primary ballot choice. Early-voting data showed Democrats returning a higher share of ballots than Republicans through late October, with unaffiliated voters forming a large bloc. The author’s assessment relies on claimed internal numbers and county-level expectations not reflected in the public averages.
[3] References to funding of progressive causes and election-related efforts by George Soros and associated networks appear widely in conservative commentary and investigative reporting on philanthropy and political spending.
Bibliography for Further Reading
Ramaswamy, Vivek. Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam. Center Street, 2021.
Ramaswamy, Vivek. Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to Excellence. Center Street, 2022.
Ramaswamy, Vivek. Capitalist Punishment: How Wall Street Is Using Your Money to Create a Country You Didn’t Vote For. HarperCollins, 2023.
Ramaswamy, Vivek. Truths: The Future of America First. Simon & Schuster, 2024.
Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. (Author’s work on leadership, individual responsibility, and practical strategy.)
Green, Donald P., and Alan S. Gerber. Get Out the Vote: How to Increase Voter Turnout. 4th ed. Brookings Institution Press, 2019.
Hill, David. American Voter Turnout: An Institutional Perspective. Westview Press, 2006.
Rolfe, Meredith. Voter Turnout: A Social Theory of Political Participation. Cambridge University Press, 2012.
Derber, Charles, et al. Turnout!: Mobilizing Voters in an Emergency. Routledge, 2020.
Levitsky, Steven, and Daniel Ziblatt. How Democracies Die. Crown, 2018.
Mayer, Jane. Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right. Doubleday, 2016.
Caplan, Bryan. The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies. Princeton University Press, 2007.
Achen, Christopher H., and Larry M. Bartels. Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government. Princeton University Press, 2016.
Brennan, Jason. Against Democracy. Princeton University Press, 2016.
Tocqueville, Alexis de. Democracy in America. (Multiple editions; foundational on American civic habits and self-government.)
Madison, James, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. The Federalist Papers. (Especially essays on factions, republican government, and the dangers of majority tyranny.)
Locke, John. Second Treatise of Government. (On consent, property, and the right to alter or abolish government.)
Federalist Society publications and reports on election integrity and originalism, 2020–2026.
Heritage Foundation Election Integrity Project reports, 2024–2026.
Ohio Secretary of State voter registration and early-voting dashboards (2026 cycle data).
RealClearPolitics, Ballotpedia, and multi-state election trackers for the 2026 Ohio gubernatorial race (polling averages, candidate profiles, and historical context).
Local Ohio reporting from the Cincinnati Enquirer, Columbus Dispatch, and Butler County sources on campaign events and county-level dynamics.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
Every election cycle the same conversation plays on cable news and social media. Gas prices are high, so the argument turns to Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Iran, or domestic drilling. The assumption is that more crude oil automatically means cheaper gasoline at the station. It does not. Crude is the feedstock. The binding constraint is the processing capacity that turns that crude into finished products people actually burn. That constraint has a name in management theory. It is Herbie.
Eliyahu Goldratt’s 1984 book The Goal introduced the Theory of Constraints through a simple story. On a Boy Scout hike, the slowest kid, Herbie, sets the pace for the entire line no matter how fast everyone else can walk. Fix Herbie and throughput improves. Ignore him and every other improvement is wasted. In American fuel markets right now, refining capacity is Herbie. We have enough crude. We do not have enough slack in the plants that process it, and the policy environment that created that condition has been running for decades.[1]
How Many Refineries We Actually Have
As of January 1, 2026, the Energy Information Administration counted roughly 130 operable petroleum refineries in the United States with atmospheric crude distillation capacity near 18.16 million barrels per day.[2][3] That figure sounds substantial until it is stacked against history. In 1982 there were 301 refineries. We have lost roughly 171 plants, a decline of more than half.[4] Capacity barely rose—from about 17.9 million barrels per day then to the current level—because the industry consolidated. The average refinery grew from roughly 59,000 barrels per day to nearly 140,000.
Marathon’s Garyville plant in Louisiana opened in 1977 at about 200,000 barrels per day and now runs over 617,000. ExxonMobil expanded its Beaumont facility in 2023. Fewer doors, bigger rooms. Capacity peaked near 18.98 million barrels per day in January 2020 and has been sliding since.[5] Recent closures accelerated the drop. Phillips 66’s Los Angeles-area refinery (about 139,000 barrels per day) ceased crude processing in late 2025. Valero’s Benicia refinery (roughly 145,000–170,000 barrels per day) is scheduled to shut by spring 2026. Together those two plants alone remove several hundred thousand barrels per day of West Coast capacity in roughly a year and a half. Gross removals since 2020 total around 1.7 million barrels per day even after expansions elsewhere.[6][7]
Utilization, Slack, and Where the Barrels Go
Total operable capacity of 18.16 million barrels per day sounds adequate until you look at actual runs. In mid-October 2026, U.S. refineries were processing about 16.6 million barrels per day of crude—93.4 percent utilization for the week ending October 16. The five-year average sits near 87 percent. Over the summer of 2026 the fleet averaged more than 95 percent from May through September, the highest sustained rate since 1998.[8][9] When plants run that hard there is almost no spare capacity to absorb a hurricane, an unplanned outage, or a sudden demand spike.
Gasoline output is running near 9.8 million barrels per day while domestic gasoline demand sits around 8.7 million. The gap is filled by exports. The United States is now the world’s largest exporter of refined products, shipping more than 1.5 million barrels per day of diesel alone.[10] Those exports are not a conspiracy. They are rational responses to price signals in a market where domestic refining capacity is tight and global product markets are tight. The result is that domestic prices stay elevated even when crude itself is not the bottleneck. Diesel is the sharper pressure point. Harbor diesel crack spreads have run well above gasoline cracks for extended periods because global refining capacity has been constrained by events in the Middle East, Russia, and elsewhere at the same time U.S. plants are already pinned near full utilization.
Why We Do Not Build More
A modern large-scale refinery costs $10–20 billion and takes five to seven years to permit and construct under current rules. Environmental reviews, air permits, water permits, and litigation can kill a project regardless of engineering feasibility. Demand uncertainty compounds the problem. Investors looking at long-term electric-vehicle adoption curves and fuel-efficiency standards are reluctant to underwrite a fifty-year payback on an asset whose primary market is expected to shrink. The last major U.S. refinery built from scratch was Marathon’s Garyville plant in 1977. A small 45,000-barrel-per-day facility in Galveston that started in 2022 is the most recent addition of any size.
The industry responded rationally to the constraints it faced. Companies expanded existing sites where permits were easier and closed plants where compliance costs exceeded returns. That is not a market failure in the classical sense. It is the predictable outcome of policy choices that raised the cost and risk of refining relative to other uses of capital.
California as the Extreme Case
California illustrates the mechanism most clearly. The state has unique fuel specifications, limited pipeline access from the Gulf Coast, and therefore relies heavily on in-state refining or waterborne imports. Recent closures have driven prices well above the national average—California regular has been reported near $5.89 while the national EIA weekly average sat around $4.27 for the week of October 26 and AAA’s daily figure near $4.25. Ohio has been closer to $4.30.[11]
Valero’s CEO was direct: the regulatory and enforcement environment in California is the most stringent and difficult of anywhere else in North America, and the Benicia plant cost considerably more to maintain than the company’s other California facility. The company booked a large impairment before deciding to exit. Phillips 66’s decision followed a similar logic. A stack of rules—the Low Carbon Fuel Standard, cap-and-trade allowance costs, unique CARB fuel specifications, and groundwater remediation requirements—raised operating costs while making long-term expansion unattractive. Proposals that would have given the state energy commission additional control over inventory levels and maintenance schedules added further uncertainty. The asymmetry is striking: imported fuel does not face the same compliance costs as in-state refining. The regulation does not simply raise the price of the product; it makes continued operation of the plant less profitable than shutting it down and sourcing from elsewhere.[12][13]
Herbie, Policy, and the Parallel in Other Energy Markets
The Theory of Constraints applies cleanly. Find the bottleneck, understand what slows it, and address that constraint directly. Yelling at crude suppliers does not remove Herbie when the processing plants are already running above 95 percent. The same logic appears in electricity markets. Nuclear power has been constrained for decades by cost and permitting rather than physics. Solar and wind have become the cheapest sources of new generation in many regions, yet they do not produce when it is dark or calm. The system still requires firm, dispatchable capacity. Policies that make nuclear or additional gas capacity difficult to build leave the grid with its own Herbie—the absence of reliable firm power that can respond when intermittent sources drop.
In both fuels and power, the constraint was engineered. Twenty years of policy aimed at reducing fossil-fuel use made refining and certain forms of firm generation less attractive relative to other investments. Companies responded by allocating capital elsewhere. The resulting tightness is not an accident; it is the outcome the rules produced. Short-term measures—Strategic Petroleum Reserve releases, Defense Production Act funding, temporary import adjustments—can ease acute shortages, but they do not restore spare capacity. Prices remain elevated as long as global refining capacity stays constrained and domestic plants have little slack.
What Actually Moves Prices and What Voters Should Watch
The Iranian conflict and other geopolitical events affect prices, but mainly by providing cover for wider margins when the underlying system is already tight. Lost refining capacity in the Middle East, Russia, and elsewhere removed millions of barrels per day of product supply at the same time U.S. plants were running near maximum. The war did not create the domestic bottleneck; it exposed how little buffer existed.
Long-term solutions fall into two categories. One is regulatory reform that lowers the cost and time required to expand existing plants or build new ones—particularly the unique California rules and the broader permitting gauntlet. That directly addresses Herbie. The other is to accept that large-scale refining will not return under current rules and to accelerate everything downstream of the pump: more efficient vehicles, electrification where it makes sense, and firm low-carbon generation such as nuclear for the broader grid. The first path is faster but requires admitting that prior policy created the constraint. The second path is slower and does not require the same political acknowledgment.
In California the regulatory reversal is unlikely to come from the 2026 governor’s race. Recent polls have shown Democrat Xavier Becerra leading Republican Steve Hilton by roughly 20 to 27 points. No Republican has won statewide office there since Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006, and even that earlier period did not dismantle the renewable-portfolio and compliance culture that has shaped refining economics. Managing the existing machine is different from removing the constraints that make new capacity unattractive.[14]
The Self-Imposed Constraint
People asking why gasoline is expensive should look at the rules that govern the plants that make it. Crude supply matters, but it is not the binding constraint when refineries are already operating at 93–95 percent utilization and refined products are being exported because domestic capacity is tight. The industry consolidated and closed plants because the combination of high capital cost, long permitting timelines, and ongoing compliance risk made additional capacity a poor investment relative to other options. That outcome was produced by policy. It can be changed by policy.
Smaller, more accountable government that focuses on clear, stable rules rather than continuous regulatory expansion would lower the cost of keeping Herbie moving. The alternative is continued high utilization, continued export of refined products, continued vulnerability to any disruption, and continued arguments about crude supplies that do not address the actual bottleneck. The numbers from the EIA, the closure announcements from Valero and Phillips 66, and the utilization rates reported this year all point to the same place. The constraint is in the processing step, and it was largely created by design.
Footnotes
[1] Goldratt, Eliyahu M., and Jeff Cox. The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement. North River Press, 1984.
[2] U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), Refinery Capacity Report data as of January 1, 2026; secondary summaries including Apollo Technical and industry compilations citing EIA tables on operable refineries.
[3] EIA, “Today in Energy” series and related capacity reports noting refining capacity levels near 18.1–18.2 million barrels per day in the mid-2020s.
[4] Historical EIA data and industry summaries confirming approximately 301 operable U.S. refineries in 1982; contemporary counts of ~130 as of early 2026.
[5] EIA historical capacity series and reports on post-2020 declines, including effects of closures and limited expansions.
[6] Phillips 66 announcements (2024–2025) on cessation of operations at its Los Angeles-area refinery (~139,000 bpd) by late 2025; contemporaneous reporting from Reuters and company filings.
[7] Valero Energy announcements and regulatory notices (2025) regarding the Benicia refinery (~145,000–170,000 bpd) shutdown targeted for April 2026; company statements on costs and impairments.
[8] EIA Weekly Petroleum Status Report data for the week ending October 16, 2026, showing ~93.4% utilization; secondary trackers confirming the figure.
[9] EIA “Today in Energy” reports (2026) noting U.S. refinery utilization averaging more than 95% from May through September 2026, the highest since 1998.
[10] EIA petroleum product export data and market analyses documenting U.S. status as the world’s largest exporter of refined products, including significant diesel volumes.
[11] EIA weekly retail gasoline price data (week of October 26, 2026) and AAA daily national averages; state-level figures for California and Ohio from contemporaneous reporting.
[12] Valero CEO public statements (2025) describing California’s regulatory and enforcement environment as the most stringent in North America and citing higher maintenance costs at Benicia.
[13] Phillips 66 and industry reporting on the cumulative effect of California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard, cap-and-trade, CARB specifications, and related rules on refining economics.
[14] Emerson College Polling, PPIC, SurveyUSA, and RealClearPolitics averages (October 2026) showing Xavier Becerra leading Steve Hilton by approximately 20–27 points in the California gubernatorial race.
Bibliography
Energy Information Administration. Refinery Capacity Report (various years, including data as of January 1, 2025 and January 1, 2026). U.S. Department of Energy. https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/refinerycapacity/
Energy Information Administration. Weekly Petroleum Status Report and related utilization data, October 2026.
Energy Information Administration. “Today in Energy” series on refinery capacity and utilization trends, 2024–2026.
Goldratt, Eliyahu M., and Jeff Cox. The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement. North River Press, 1984.
Phillips 66. Public announcements regarding cessation of operations at the Los Angeles-area refinery, 2024–2025.
Valero Energy. Statements and regulatory filings regarding the Benicia refinery, 2025–2026.
American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers. Annual refining capacity summaries drawing on EIA data.
Public polling averages and individual surveys (Emerson College, PPIC, SurveyUSA, and others) on the 2026 California gubernatorial race, October 2026.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
In the age of disclosure, you must understand the Politics of Heaven. The administrative state has failed. It produces bureaucrats, form-fillers, and people trained to manage decline rather than fix anything. Meanwhile, the people who still know how to put a tool belt on and make something work again are the ones quietly holding the real economy together. I have learned this the hard way, across decades of executive work, competitive shooting, gunsmithing, and long hours in machine shops. The happiest version of my life has always involved tools.
A Tool Belt Full of Useful Things
I was at O’Reilly’s recently, talking with the counter guy, and he showed me a small 3/8-inch drive universal joint with a spring in it. Most of those joints flop around the moment you get them into a tight spot. This one has a spring that lets it stand up and stay put until you apply force. Titan Tools. Simple, clever, and exactly the kind of thing that makes a working day better. It went straight into the belt.
That belt already carries a telescopic magnet for fishing dropped fasteners out of engine bays and dashboards, a selection of screwdrivers, O-ring picks that actually work, a half-inch drive ratchet, and a pair of DeWalt pliers I genuinely like. The grips on the pliers are supposed to be bright yellow. They are now dark with oil and use, which is how I prefer them. There is nothing ornamental about any of it. Every item has been chosen because it solves a recurring problem.
When I strap that belt on to work on a car in the driveway, or when I used to carry one every day, the day feels correctly ordered. You have the tools you need. You can see the problem, isolate it, and correct it. That is a form of competence the administrative world almost never delivers.
Machine Shop Days and the Double-Stack Toolbox
In my late teens and early twenties I worked in a machine shop attached to a metal-stamping operation. It was a rough place. People got hurt. The work was loud, dirty, and unforgiving. They called it a “sitter” in the older language of the trade—an operation that chewed through equipment and required constant attention. I learned to set dies, make dies, troubleshoot production lines, and keep machines running. I also learned how to work alongside people who had no interest in office politics or motivational posters. They cared whether the part was good and whether the press kept cycling.
Later I refurbished old machinery for a living. We would bring in worn-out equipment, tear it down to the last nut and bolt, and rebuild it. I kept a double-stacked toolbox in the shop. In the 1990s that box held roughly a thousand dollars’ worth of tools, many of them custom or modified for specific jobs. I looked forward to work because the tools were there and the problems were concrete. When I moved into more executive roles, that daily contact with tools largely disappeared. The satisfaction did not transfer automatically to meetings and spreadsheets.
Gunsmithing, Competitive Shooting, and the Real Pleasure
Early in my marriage I set up a gunsmithing shop behind the house. I studied the craft because I wanted to work for myself and because the tools are specialized and satisfying: spring compressors, sear jigs, headspace gauges, bolt-face tools, and the particular screwdrivers and punches required for Ruger, Browning, and other actions. The guns themselves were interesting, but the tools and the process of diagnosing and correcting problems were what I enjoyed most.
Competitive fast shooting later gave me an outlet on weekends. From roughly 2018 through 2025 I shot a lot, won a lot of first-place trophies, and filled part of the office with them. The shooting itself was enjoyable—drawing, presenting, and hitting plates in a quarter or half second is a pure skill. What I came to realize, though, was that the part I looked forward to most was the workbench. Before one of the last events, in Cleveland, a gun had developed a tick. The mechanism was catching on the frame. We took the gun apart, identified the interference, and dressed it. I intended to replace the part properly once I got home. Standing there with the gun disassembled, the right tools laid out, and a clear mechanical problem in front of me, I recognized the pattern again. The shooting was the excuse. The tools and the troubleshooting were the pleasure.
Every serious competitor ends up with a small collection of specialized items: the correct bit for the screw that loosens under recoil, the fixture that holds a slide while you stone a surface, the gauge that tells you whether the timing is still correct. Building that kit, and using it under time pressure before a match, felt like the same work I had done in the machine shop decades earlier. It was crew-chief work, not spectator work.
Public Education, the Administrative Class, and What Young People Actually Need
Public education has spent decades training people to become members of the administrative bureaucracy. It has done this systematically and with considerable success. The result is a surplus of people who can navigate forms, attend meetings, and manage processes, and a shortage of people who can diagnose a hydraulic leak, set a die, pull a wiring harness, or rebuild a transmission. We talk about college as the default path while the skilled trades remain under-taught and, in many places, socially discouraged.
I have no interest in romanticizing hard physical work for its own sake. The point is narrower and more practical: a society that cannot produce and retain people who know how to fix things will not remain productive. The administrative state can write regulations. It cannot keep the machines running. When the machines stop, the regulations become irrelevant.
Young men in particular have been steered away from this path for a generation. Many of them now reach their mid-twenties without basic mechanical competence. Women notice. A man who cannot change a tire, change the oil, or diagnose a simple electrical problem is less useful as a partner and less useful as a citizen. This is not a complicated observation, and it does not require hostility toward anyone. It is simply a description of what has happened when schools stopped teaching shop, when parents stopped requiring basic mechanical literacy, and when culture began treating hands-on work as a fallback rather than a respectable primary path.
Home-improvement television and the tool aisles at places like O’Reilly’s exist for a reason. People still want to solve physical problems. The gadgets keep improving—better ratchets, magnetic trays, spring-loaded universals, compact torque wrenches, inspection cameras—because the underlying need has not gone away.
The Economic Case for the Tool Belt
The next wave of American productivity will not be led exclusively by people who write code or manage brand narratives. Space launch, electric vehicles, robotics, data-center construction, and advanced manufacturing all require large numbers of technicians who can work with tools, read drawings, troubleshoot in real time, and keep complex systems operating. Tesla-style manufacturing, reusable rocketry, and the supporting industrial base will need people who treat a tool belt as normal daily equipment rather than a costume.
Companies such as Carvana have tried to reorganize automotive retail around logistics and software. Some of those experiments will succeed in pieces; others will discover that physical goods still require physical maintenance. The firms that scale will be the ones that can recruit and retain people who already know how to use tools and who take satisfaction in the work. Those people are currently in short supply.
I am not arguing that everyone should abandon white-collar work. I am arguing that the cultural hierarchy which treats skilled trades as inferior has been a mistake, and that the economic consequences of that mistake are becoming visible. A person who can make a living with a tool belt, who owns the tools, and who looks forward to using them is in a stronger position than many people with higher formal credentials and less practical capability. The work is measurable. The customer either gets a running machine or does not. There is less room for the kind of ambiguity that administrative roles often reward.
Personal Conclusion
Across machine-shop work in my twenties, gunsmithing in the early years of marriage, competitive shooting on weekends, and the ordinary maintenance of cars and equipment at home, the pattern has been consistent. The periods in which I used tools every day were the periods I looked forward to most. Executive work has its own satisfactions and its own necessities, but it has never replaced the direct feedback of diagnosing a problem, selecting the right tool, and correcting the fault.
If a young person can learn a trade, acquire good tools, and make a living while wearing a tool belt, that person has a realistic chance at a high-quality life. The marriage, the family stability, and the personal satisfaction tend to follow the competence rather than the other way around. Public education has spent too many years teaching the opposite lesson. The correction will not come from another round of administrative reforms. It will come from people who simply decide to learn how to fix things and who refuse to treat that skill as second-class.
The future economy will reward them. In the meantime, a well-stocked tool belt remains one of the more reliable sources of ordinary happiness available.
Footnotes
1. The spring-loaded 3/8-inch universal joint is a small but representative example of incremental tool improvement. Older flex-joint designs required constant manual positioning; the spring returns the joint to a usable attitude, reducing frustration in confined spaces.
2. “Sitter” was shop-floor language for certain stamping or forming operations that demanded continuous operator or maintenance attention because of wear rates, material variability, or tooling sensitivity. Injury rates in older metal-stamping environments were high by modern standards.
3. The double-stacked toolbox from the 1990s refurbishing work contained both standard and job-specific tooling. Custom ground punches, modified wrenches, and dedicated fixtures were common because production machinery of that era was not designed for rapid field service.
4. Competitive practical shooting requires ongoing gunsmith-level maintenance. Recoil, fouling, and high round counts loosen fasteners, alter timing, and reveal small dimensional problems that range guns rarely expose. Most serious competitors maintain a traveling tool kit for exactly this reason.
5. Matthew B. Crawford’s Shop Class as Soulcraft (2009) remains one of the clearer modern arguments that manual competence produces a distinct form of cognitive and moral satisfaction largely absent from many administrative and symbolic-analytic jobs.
6. Public high-school shop programs declined sharply after the 1970s–1980s in most U.S. districts. The shift coincided with rising college-enrollment targets and a cultural redefinition of “good” jobs as those requiring bachelor’s degrees. Skilled-trade shortages in construction, manufacturing maintenance, and automotive repair have been widely documented since the mid-2010s.
7. Basic mechanical literacy (tire changes, oil changes, simple electrical diagnosis, plumbing and electrical fundamentals) functions as a practical filter in household and community life. Its absence is frequently noted in discussions of partner selection and household stability, independent of broader ideological framing.
8. Advanced manufacturing, commercial space, electric-vehicle production, and data-center build-out all increase demand for technicians who combine traditional mechanical skills with newer diagnostic tools (thermal imaging, borescopes, precision torque, digital multimeters, and basic programmable-logic troubleshooting). The tool belt evolves; it does not disappear.
Bibliography & Further Reading
• Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. (Personal framework connecting competitive shooting, tool use, executive decision-making, and individual agency.)
• Crawford, Matthew B. Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work. Penguin, 2009.
• Rowe, Mike. Profoundly Disconnected (various essays and talks on skilled trades and cultural attitudes toward manual work).
• Pirsig, Robert M. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. (Classic exploration of quality, tools, and the relationship between mechanic and machine.)
• Sennett, Richard. The Craftsman. Yale University Press, 2008.
• Industry reporting on skilled-trade shortages: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics occupational outlooks for industrial machinery mechanics, automotive technicians, electricians, and millwrights (ongoing).
• Historical context on the decline of vocational education: various state and federal reports from the 1980s–2000s documenting the reduction of shop programs in public secondary schools.
The tools remain available. The work remains necessary. The satisfaction, for those willing to acquire the skill, has not been repealed by any administrative decree.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
Elon Musk has said he will give every child in America one share of SpaceX stock next year, routed through the Trump Accounts program. At recent prices, that is roughly a $10.5 billion transfer to about 72–73 million kids, drawn from a company now valued near $2 trillion after its June 2026 IPO. The gift is real enough to matter. It is not large enough, by itself, to paper over decades of reckless public spending, structural medical overcharging, or the permanent administrative class that treats other people’s money as an infinite resource. Politics is management. The managers we choose will decide whether this windfall is invested or squandered.
The SpaceX Share and the Limits of Private Generosity
Musk posted the pledge on X on October 19, 2026: one of his SpaceX shares to every kid in America, “the first of many.” The shares were trading near $146–148. SpaceX had just reported third-quarter revenue of $14.6 billion, up 161 percent year-over-year, and the company carries a market capitalization around $2 trillion. The transfer is large by ordinary standards and small relative to Musk’s holdings. It is also downstream of policy. SpaceX’s explosive growth came after regulatory barriers fell. Private capital and engineering solved problems that public aerospace processes had treated as permanent. The same sequence will have to occur in medicine if the cost structure is ever to break.
Gifting stock to children does not repeal the obligation of fiscal discipline at every level of government. Butler County has maintained that discipline for years. Nancy Nix, first as treasurer and now as auditor, and Mike McNamara as treasurer have kept the books in the black. I have disagreed with Nancy on restaurants, cars, sweaters, and larger political questions including Trump and Vance. None of that changes the observable fact that she understands money. When we talk about county finances, I get clear answers. That is what an auditor is for. Preference arguments can wait until after the numbers are settled.
Local People, Hard Times, and the Test of Character
I have known George Lang for a long time. He is one of Ohio’s stronger state senators and has been through serious political and legal pressure. Years ago, when I was in the middle of one of the more public controversies that have followed me, I held a strategy lunch at LaRosa’s in Liberty Township. Fifteen to twenty people showed up. George came. At the time he was a West Chester trustee, not yet a state representative or senator, and he had every conventional reason to stay away. Conventional wisdom said a rising figure should not sit down with the local radical. He came anyway, ate pizza, and talked. I have not forgotten it. In adult life, I have found that the people willing to show up when the cost is real are the ones you can trust later. Most others reveal themselves under pressure.
The same pattern appears with other local figures. I have had hard conversations with Ann Becker and with Darbi Boddy. Their positions have moved; mine have stayed more constant. I still speak with both when the subject is county or party direction. Art Sauerwein, the new Butler County Republican chair, is navigating a party that is shifting toward clearer Trump alignment after twenty years of more mixed leadership. That shift will be permanent or it will not. The practical question is whether the party represents the voters who show up or protects an internal preference for moderation those voters have already rejected. Sheriff Jones and I differ on operational style; I still recognize competence where it exists. Roger Reynolds, Thomas Hall, Jennifer Gross, and Michael Ryan each bring different vantage points. Good government requires finding the overlapping work that must be done even when the people involved are not identical in every preference.
My own operating rule has been consistent. People who threaten me, send letters, or try to force me into their preferred lane discover that the cost is not free. I cannot think of a case in my adult life where someone who moved against me didn’t eventually pay a price. That reputation is not an accident. It is the same discipline I applied while working the Jason Voorhees role at the Kings Island haunt: guests are protected by the attraction’s rules, yet the job is still to function within those constraints and produce the intended effect. Public life has similar constraints. I defend the position. The threats continue from people who treat disagreement as license for antagonism. The work continues anyway.
The Medical Cost Structure and the Coming Reckoning
The medical industry in its current form is not sustainable. Hospitals routinely bill hundreds of dollars to push a syringe that can be purchased for a few dollars at a retail pharmacy. One documented case involved $722 charges for each IV push; the medication itself was billed separately. Facility fees, chargemaster markups, and billing the same service at hospital rates when performed in an office setting have produced multiples of Medicare reference prices. Large health systems have built entire hillsides of facilities—visible near Bridgewater Falls looking toward the Cincinnati airport—on the assumption that the current reimbursement model continues indefinitely.
I have turned down high-paying offers inside that system because continued public criticism of it was worth more to me than the salary. Many people take the money. The salary structure rests on the post-2010 Affordable Care Act architecture and the expectation of perpetual third-party payment. X-ray technicians and other roles routinely clear six figures. The economic incentive is to keep patients in treatment pathways rather than to eliminate the underlying condition. Shopping malls once looked permanent too. When the cost structure became indefensible, and alternatives appeared, the physical footprint emptied. The same sequence is available in medicine once competitive models are allowed to scale.
Cures for major cancers are closer than the current billing regime admits. Recent work at UCLA and elsewhere has shown methods for producing renewable, off-the-shelf engineered immune cells that can attack solid tumors, reprogram stem cells to generate ongoing T-cell responses, and reduce the cost and customization barriers that have limited CAR-T approaches. These are not yet standard of care. They are evidence that the technical path exists. The political and reimbursement path does not. Radiation and chemotherapy remain the default for many late-stage patients because the payment system rewards ongoing intervention. Friends of mine who are in stage-three and stage-four treatment have been told to hold on. The practical advice is the same: stay alive long enough for the competitive models to clear the regulatory and payment obstacles. That clearance requires elected officials who will not protect the existing revenue streams.
Good People, Hard Conditions, and the Management of Growth
Easy money has corrupted incentives across multiple sectors. People who know a three-dollar item is billed at two hundred dollars and still collect a paycheck participate in a system that delays better outcomes. The same pattern appears in any protected administrative layer: the work becomes the protection of the process rather than the production of the result. SpaceX grew because it lowered barriers and enforced engineering standards. Medicine will require an equivalent reduction in barriers and an equivalent insistence on measurable outcomes.
Good government comes from good people who have already survived hard conditions. The LaRosa’s lunch, the haunt work, the machine-shop years, and the periods of public controversy all tested the same question: who shows up when the cost is real and who disappears. Butler County has a concentration of people who have demonstrated fiscal competence and willingness to absorb political heat. Nancy Nix’s record on the numbers is one example. George Lang’s decision to attend an unpopular meeting is another. Those traits are not universal in politics. They are also not optional if the SpaceX-era wealth is to become lasting productive capacity rather than get absorbed by the next round of administrative expansion.
Trump will not be in office indefinitely. The question of continuity—whether through Vance or another figure—will be settled by whether the underlying incentives have been altered. A county party that aligns more closely with the voters who delivered the recent results is better positioned to defend those changes than one that treats them as temporary. The medical cost collapse will arrive whether local officials prepare for it or not. The difference will be whether replacement models are allowed to form here or whether revenue protection continues until the facilities empty, as the malls did.
The private gift of SpaceX shares is a useful transfer. It does not replace the requirement for managers who can keep public books in the black, tolerate disagreement without treating it as grounds for destruction, and clear the path for competitive innovation in sectors that have been protected too long. You can identify those managers by their behavior under pressure. The rest is preference. The numbers are not.
Footnotes
1. Musk’s October 19, 2026 statement on X committed one SpaceX share per American child, to be delivered via Trump Accounts. Census estimates place the under-18 population near 72–73 million. At contemporaneous share prices of approximately $146–148, the notional value was roughly $10.5 billion. SpaceX’s post-IPO market capitalization has fluctuated near $2 trillion.
2. SpaceX’s third-quarter 2026 revenue was reported at $14.58 billion, a 161 percent year-over-year increase. Analyst targets vary widely; Bernstein raised its target to $268, while the stock traded near $149 in late October.
3. Documented hospital billing examples include $722 charges solely for the act of an IV push (medication billed separately) and systematic multiples of Medicare rates through facility fees and chargemaster pricing. Hospitals have also billed office-based services at hospital outpatient rates, producing large differentials on identical procedures.
4. UCLA and related groups have published methods for generating renewable engineered immune cells from stem cells, off-the-shelf CAR-NKT and similar platforms capable of attacking solid tumors, and approaches that reduce per-patient customization costs. These remain largely preclinical or early-stage; they illustrate technical feasibility rather than immediate clinical availability.
5. Butler County’s multi-year record of operating in the black under Nix (treasurer then auditor) and McNamara (treasurer) is a matter of public financial reporting. Preference disagreements on non-fiscal questions do not alter the observable management of county resources.
6. The LaRosa’s Liberty Township lunch occurred during a period of elevated local controversy. Attendance by a then-township trustee who later became a state senator is cited as an instance of behavior under conditions where conventional incentives favored absence.
Bibliography & Further Reading
• Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business.
• Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Axios coverage of the October 19, 2026 Musk SpaceX share pledge and Trump Accounts mechanism.
• SpaceX public financial reporting and analyst notes on Q3 2026 results (revenue, market capitalization).
• NPR and KFF Health News reporting on hospital chargemaster practices, IV-push fees, and facility-fee differentials.
• Patient Rights Advocate and related analyses of medical billing error rates and markups relative to Medicare reference prices.
• UCLA Health and OncLive summaries of stem-cell-derived and off-the-shelf engineered immune-cell platforms for solid tumors (2025–2026 publications).
• Ohio Auditor of State and Butler County financial reports on multi-year operating balances.
The private capital is arriving. Public managers will decide whether to use or consume it. In the age of disclosure, the distinction remains measurable.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
The signed version is House Bill 519. Governor DeWine signed it October 1. The cut started at 12:01 a.m. October 4 and runs through 11:59 p.m. January 2, 2027.
Ohio did something useful at the start of October 2026. The General Assembly suspended the state motor fuel tax for 90 days, and Governor Mike DeWine signed the bill. For the next three months, the state tax on gasoline drops from 38.5 cents a gallon to one-hundredth of one cent. The diesel tax drops from 47 cents to the same token rate. The lost revenue, about $725 million, is covered out of a General Revenue Fund surplus. Roads and bridges are not being raided to pay for it. The Rainy Day Fund is not being raided either. That is the whole story, and it is a better story than the price of a gallon usually gets.
I live in Butler County. Senator George Lang is my senator, and he was in the middle of getting this into shape. A lot of people had to touch it. That is how a legislature is supposed to work. One member does not pass a tax cut alone. Somebody still has to walk the Statehouse, catch a colleague at the water fountain, and get the vote. Lang was doing that work, and he was out announcing the suspension as the vote came together, which is what you do when you are leaning on the thing rather than waiting to see how it lands. I will give him the credit he earned. I will also name the people whose names are on the paper, because a useful account has to be accurate.
What the law actually does
House Bill 519 started as a vehicle-theft bill, aimed at electronic devices used to steal cars. The Senate amended the gas-tax holiday into it so the relief could move in days instead of months. The holiday language came from Senate Bill 475, sponsored by Senators Michele Reynolds of Canal Winchester and Jane Timken of Canton. The House bill itself was sponsored by Representative Andrea White of Kettering. On September 30 both chambers passed the package as an emergency: 26–5 in the Senate, 78–16 in the House. DeWine signed it the next morning, October 1. Because of the emergency clause, there was no 90-day wait. The reduction began at 12:01 a.m. on October 4, 2026, and it ends at 11:59 p.m. on January 2, 2027. [1] [2] [3]
The rate does not go to a flat zero. It goes to $0.0001 per gallon. That is an accounting choice, and a smart one. If Ohio levied no tax at all, some border counties could get hit by a neighboring state’s tax on fuel sold into Ohio. A token rate keeps that from happening and still takes essentially the whole state tax off the ticket. The holiday covers gasoline and diesel only. Compressed natural gas and propane are not in it. [4] [5]
Retailers have to pass the savings through. Failure to do that can be treated as an unfair or deceptive act and referred to the Attorney General. A receipt mandate that station owners opposed, and the $1 million that would have paid for it, came out of the final bill. The Department of Taxation got $250,000 to administer the break. The department told retailers to have their systems reset by midnight on October 4. [2] [6]
What a fill-up is worth
On a 15-gallon gasoline purchase the state piece is about $5.78, if the cut shows up at the pump. On 20 gallons it is about $7.70. A 20-gallon diesel fill is about $9.40. A work truck that takes 100 gallons of diesel is looking at about $47 off the state tax on that one stop. Over 90 days, for a family that fills up once a week, the gasoline savings are real money, not a rounding error. Statewide, the estimate is more than $725 million left at the pump instead of sent to Columbus. [1] [4]
The federal tax is still there. Washington still collects 18.4 cents on gasoline and 24.4 cents on diesel. Ohio cannot suspend that. Anyone who watches the sign and wonders why the whole tax did not vanish should look at the federal line before they blame the station. [7]
This is also why a diesel truck crossing Ohio this fall should fuel here if the route allows it. As of July 1, 2026, Kentucky’s total state gasoline tax was 26.4 cents a gallon. Indiana’s was in the 50-to-60-cent range, depending on which fees are counted. Michigan was in the same high band. For these 90 days Ohio’s state rate is a tenth of a mil. A truck that used to skip Ohio for a cheaper state has the math backward until January 2. [8]
Why the money was there
The $725 million is not a raid on the highway fund, and it is not a withdrawal from the Budget Stabilization Fund. Senate President Rob McColley said the state had enough to cover the holiday and still keep road and bridge work on schedule. Timken said the same thing in plainer words: conservative fiscal policy is what made the relief possible without touching the Rainy Day Fund or the Ohio Department of Transportation budget. The September report from the Office of Budget and Management projected a General Revenue Fund surplus of about $745.4 million at the end of the fiscal year. The holiday fits inside that surplus, with a little room left over. [2] [5] [9]
That is the part the critics do not like to say out loud. A surplus is not a mood. It is what is left after you refuse to spend every dollar that comes in. Ohio has had Republican majorities in the House and the Senate for a long time. The counties that stay in the black tend to be the counties run the same way. Where Democrats run the budget, the pattern I have watched for years is the opposite: spend past the line, then come back for a tax increase to cover the miss. David Pepper and the people who argue that Republicans have been in too long never explain where the $725 million would have come from under their model. It would not have been there. You cannot suspend a tax out of a deficit. You can only do it when someone, for years, spent less than they took in.
Lang put the practical case on the record the day the Senate passed it. Every dollar a small business spends on fuel is a dollar it cannot put into employees, equipment, or growth. Diesel, he said, powers the trucks, the farm equipment, and the construction equipment. Suspending the tax is breathing room, not a theory. [4] That is the right argument. A fuel tax is a tax on getting to work, on moving freight, and on a farm that has to run whether or not Columbus is in session.
Prices, excuses, and the point of doing it now
I have said all summer that the price at the pump should have come down in 2026, and a lot of it did not. Refiners and distributors have been slow. The Iranian conflict has been a convenient fog. There is no settled government on the other end of that war that can answer for a barrel, and there are plenty of people, in markets and in media, who would rather keep the uncertainty going. A long, muddy conflict is useful to anyone who wants a wider margin and a Republican governor’s race that looks expensive at the pump. I am not going to pretend every cent of the 2026 price is a conspiracy. I am going to say the excuse has been used past the point of honesty, and that waiting on a perfect global price was a bad plan for a state that had a surplus in the bank.
Ohio could not fix the world oil market. It could take its own 38.5 cents off the gallon, and its own 47 cents off diesel, and order the stations to pass it through. That is the part of the price a state actually controls. Doing it in the first week of October, with an emergency clause, was the proactive move. Early voting was about to start. People are still paying the summer’s hangover. A legislature that waits for a calmer headline is a legislature that never spends the surplus on the people who created it.
The vote was bipartisan enough to get the emergency clause, which needs more than a simple majority. It was not a love letter from the other party. More than half the Democrats in each chamber voted no. [9] The ones who voted yes made the immediate effective date possible. The ones who voted no will explain, later, that the money should have been spent on something else. That is the argument. Their something else is always a larger government. The surplus is the evidence that Ohio did not need one.
What other states can copy
This is a model, not a stunt, and other states sitting on a real surplus should look at the mechanics instead of the press release.
First, suspend the tax. Do not invent a rebate card, a portal, or a six-month application. The relief has to show up on the receipt this week.
Second, backfill the road money from the general surplus. Do not cut the projects, and do not crack the rainy-day fund for a holiday. Ohio was explicit on both points. A tax holiday that steals from maintenance is just a pothole with a ribbon on it.
Third, leave a token rate in place if a zero rate would let a neighbor’s tax reach across the line. The tenth-of-a-mil was not cute. It was drafted for border counties.
Fourth, require the pass-through, and give the attorney general a hook if a station keeps the difference. A tax cut that dies in the wholesale markup is not a tax cut.
Fifth, do it with an emergency clause if the statute otherwise waits 90 days. A relief bill that takes effect after the pain is a press release.
The permanent version is a policy question, and it should be on the next governor’s desk. A 90-day window has ambiguity in it. Distributors and convenience stores have to reprice twice, and a driver cannot build a household budget on a holiday. The honest next step is to decide how much of this rate Ohio still needs once the books are open. Vivek Ramaswamy called for the pause the week before the vote. [10] I have already said he is the right direction for the job. This holiday is a hint of the governing style, not the whole platform: when there is a surplus, the default is to give it back, not to find a new program to absorb it. DeWine signed the bill quickly. The next governor can be the one who decides whether 38.5 cents needs to come back in full on January 3.
A tax only funds government. It does not improve it by being larger. Republicans in Ohio spent less than the alternative for long enough to have $725 million they could hand back without missing a road project. That is why a driver in Butler County, and a driver crossing the river from Kentucky, will see a cheaper gallon this fall. I am proud of the legislature for doing it when people needed it. If you are passing through Ohio before January 2, stop and fill the tank. The Statehouse already paid the difference.
Notes
[1] Gov. Mike DeWine signed House Bill 519 on October 1, 2026. The bill reduces the 38.5-cent gasoline tax and the 47-cent diesel tax to $0.0001 per gallon from 12:01 a.m. October 4, 2026, through 11:59 p.m. January 2, 2027. Estimated pump savings are about $725 million, roughly $5.78 on 15 gallons of gasoline and $7.70 on 20 gallons, and about $9.40 on 20 gallons of diesel. “DeWine signs 90-day Ohio gas and diesel tax suspension,” Your Ohio News, October 1, 2026.
[2] The chambers passed the emergency measure on September 30, 2026, 26–5 in the Senate and 78–16 in the House. The final bill appropriates $725 million from the General Revenue Fund and $250,000 to the Department of Taxation. A station-receipt mandate and its $1 million appropriation were removed. Danny Eldredge, “DeWine to sign bill suspending Ohio’s gas tax for 90 days,” The Blade, September 30, 2026.
[3] H.B. 519 was sponsored by Rep. Andrea White (R-Kettering). The gas-tax language came from S.B. 475, sponsored by Sens. Michele Reynolds (R-Canal Winchester) and Jane Timken (R-Canton), and was amended into H.B. 519 so the holiday could move faster. “Ohio’s gas tax holiday enacted into law,” Ohio Society of CPAs, October 2, 2026.
[4] Sen. George F. Lang (R-West Chester) announced Senate passage on September 30, 2026, including the small-business and diesel arguments, and noted that the token rate protects border counties from a neighbor’s tax. Highway work is covered by the fiscal-year surplus, not the Rainy Day Fund. “Lang Approves Gas Tax Suspension,” Ohio Senate, September 30, 2026.
[5] Sen. Jane Timken: relief was possible without the Rainy Day Fund or the ODOT budget. “Timken Approves Gas Tax Suspension,” Ohio Senate, September 30, 2026. See also Ohio Department of Taxation, “Ohio Department of Taxation Issues Guidance for 90-Day Motor Fuel Tax Holiday,” October 2, 2026. Retailers must pass the savings through; failure may be referred to the Attorney General. Guidance: https://tax.ohio.gov/motor-fuel-tax-holiday
[6] Ohio Department of Taxation, guidance released October 2, 2026, cited above. Tax Commissioner Patricia Harris urged retailers to adjust systems by midnight October 4.
[7] Federal excise tax remains 18.4 cents per gallon on gasoline and 24.4 cents on diesel. Nebraska Department of Transportation, “Total State Taxes on Motor Fuel,” rates effective July 1, 2026, citing the Energy Information Administration. The federal layer is not part of H.B. 519.
[8] Same table: Ohio 38.50 cents, Kentucky 26.40 cents, Indiana 64.50 cents total state taxes on gasoline as of July 1, 2026. During the holiday Ohio’s state rate is $0.0001.
[9] Office of Budget and Management, September 2026 report, General Revenue Fund surplus projected at $745.4 million at fiscal year-end, as cited by The Blade, September 28, 2026. Senate passage was 26–5; more than half the Democrats in each chamber voted no. “Ohio General Assembly Suspends State Gas Tax,” Ohio Senate, October 1, 2026. McColley: the surplus covers the holiday without delaying road and bridge work.
[10] The vote followed a call for the pause by Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy the preceding week. Jake Zuckerman, “Gas tax in Ohio suspended for 90 days after politically charged Statehouse vote,” Signal Ohio, September 30, 2026.
Ohio General Assembly. House Bill 519 (136th General Assembly), sponsor Rep. Andrea White; Senate amendment incorporating Senate Bill 475, sponsors Sens. Michele Reynolds and Jane Timken. Passed September 30, 2026. Signed October 1, 2026.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.Eldredge, Danny. “Ohio lawmakers introduce $726M gas tax holiday bill.” The Blade, September 28, 2026.
Your Ohio News. “DeWine signs 90-day Ohio gas and diesel tax suspension.” October 1, 2026.
Zuckerman, Jake. “Gas tax in Ohio suspended for 90 days after politically charged Statehouse vote.” Signal Ohio, September 30, 2026.
Nebraska Department of Transportation. “Total State Taxes on Motor Fuel.” Rates effective July 1, 2026. Source table: Energy Information Administration, federal excise noted at 18.4 cents gasoline and 24.4 cents diesel.
I like doing these kinds of talks. Positive stuff. The benefits of things. The proper role of government. When you vote people into government, you are not voting them in to manage your life. You are voting them in to manage something you need done at the local, state, and federal levels, and then to get out of the way so good minds can finish the work. I talk about that a lot, and I talk about my friend, State Senator George Lang, who I consider one of my very best friends, because he has spent a long time doing the unglamorous part of that job. Good things, done over a long period of time, eventually just happen. He does not always realize, in the moment, how far those things are going to travel. I will talk more about some of that in November. For now, I want to talk about a day in Oxford that caught me off guard in the best way.
We had an event at the College@Elm innovation center on September 21. I was there to talk about what I have been calling the dreams of Elm Street. I discussed the next generation of middle-mile work I am involved with through Volynt, the company I lead as COO, and the hybrid unmanned aircraft they call Vyper (with a Y), since Volynt also uses a Y. Volynt Aero sits at 20 S. Elm Street, Suite 117, Oxford, Ohio, inside that building, and I am very proud of the affiliation and of the people around it.[1] When I do these kinds of things, I invite people I know. I know quite a few political people. I looked into the audience, and there were some very important faces in it. I had invited George to come out and listen. I had no idea he was already part of the roots of the place.
Positive people, positive work
It is nice to be involved in positive things with positive people who mean to do good things. I had no idea when I first got involved with Volynt, and they brought me out to show me the facility and how deep the story of that building went. I was impressed with the building. I didn’t know the story of the Innovation Center on Elm Street. When I gave the talk, I made a play on words. Nightmare on Elm Street used to be the honest description of the building Volynt is in. It was dilapidated. People had considered tearing it down. Miami University President Gregory Crawford brought George Lang out, and Nancy Nix, and a bunch of other people, and said Let us save this building and make it an innovation center for young minds coming through Miami University, a place to get a launch in life. That is exactly what is happening. A partnership moved into the building. I came out there in a COO role with Volynt. We talked a little about the history of how they arrived there, and about the other tenants, in a building that sits right there on the campus square, right there on Elm Street.
I talked about the play on words. A nightmare on Elm Street becoming dreams on Elm Street, because innovation startups are dreams. They are people trying to bring about new thoughts and new ideas. I guess a lot of people knew that story already. I did not. I was talking to George, telling him to come out, and George was already coming. As I was giving the speech, I looked out, and of course Michael Ryan was there, who I believe is going to be the next Butler County commissioner, and he came and gave part of the speech with me. In the audience were people like Nancy Nix. And George was there. I am going to show you. I know George is going to do the work. I had no idea that when I said, “Come on out,” he already knew all about it. He knew about the innovation center. He was there when it was being born. Nancy and I were talking about it, and she had been invited to see it back when President Crawford pitched the idea of taking this building and turning it into an innovation hub for aspiring ideas at Miami University. I had no idea this was where it was going.
The building that almost got torn down
I saw George in the background as we were setting up to give our speech. He was filming a short presentation on the building’s history, which he hadn’t told me about. I had no idea it was happening. I just joined the Volynt role. I admired the building. I thought it was a good use of a structure that might otherwise have been lost. It is very close, in Oxford terms, to the Miami University Airport, the little airport down the road at 7101 Fairfield Road, identifier OXD, a 4,011-foot runway that Miami operates and that sits only a few miles from campus.[2] For a company building uncrewed aircraft, that proximity is not a small thing. It is all very well set up.
Here is the history, for those unfamiliar, because it is a good story and deserves to be talked up.
The building at 20 S. Elm Street was built in 1933. For 68 years it served as Miami University’s central food service facility, the unglamorous engine room that kept the campus fed.[3] After dining services moved to the Demske Culinary Support Center, the Elm Street building became swing space and general storage, then sat vacant. By the time people were seriously arguing about its future, it was a roughly 90-year-old, 39,000-square-foot brick building with a strong foundation and a failing prospect. Miami and the City of Oxford debated what to do with it. Selling it was on the table. Tearing it down was on the table. Leaving it as a forgotten building on South Elm was the path of least resistance.[4]
President Crawford did not take the path of least resistance. He had been in business before higher education. He had founded companies. He knew the difference between a press release and a building that works. Around 2017 and 2018, he began walking potential partners through the place and asking whether they could see what Elm Street might become.[5] By 2020, the university and the city had a plan: turn the vacant structure into a technology, entrepreneurship, and workforce hub. Preparations began in 2021. The renovation cost about $10.7 million, part of a larger public-private investment of $17.55 million from the State of Ohio, JobsOhio, Butler County, the City of Oxford, and private donors.[6] Miami alumni Lee Fisher, class of 1968, and Rosemary Fisher, class of 1969, provided the naming gift. In February 2023, the building opened as the Lee and Rosemary Fisher Innovation College@Elm.[7]
That is the part I did not know when I was admiring the brick.
George Lang, the incubator, and the long clock
George has said publicly that he used whatever political capital he had to get state dollars into the project so it could get started and get up and running. He has called College@Elm something very special and very unique. His line, the one that matches what I half-heard him filming in the background, is that it is the only incubator he knows of where you can go from concept to production under one roof: prototypes, marketing expertise, funding, the whole path an entrepreneur needs to find out whether an idea can succeed.[8] Advanced manufacturing was part of the original pitch. The Fischer Group was an early anchor concept, an “innovation extension” inside the same walls as Miami’s entrepreneurship training.[9] When I watched him in the background and later saw the clip surface on LinkedIn, because the algorithm knows I know him, he was not doing a campaign spot. He was telling the history of a building he had already helped stand up, eight or ten years before Volynt moved into Suite 117.
I have known George for about twenty years: very good times and some very hard times. You learn the character of a person that way. A good person is pretty stable whether the times are good or bad. I am sure things are going on in his life where people look at him from the outside and say, I wish I were him. Then you know the pressure of living. It can be hard. I am sure he would trade some of the blood pressure for an easier job. He has said as much, in the way friends say it. The goldfish feeder at Walmart might be a better life on some days, because you can enjoy things a little more and carry less pressure. He finds himself under a lot of pressure a lot of the time. I say that as a friend, someone I talk to pretty regularly. It is not always better on the other side of the glass. It is hard. But when you care about innovation, and business, and technology, and job growth, this is the work. That is why I am involved in it. Not because the title is comfortable. Because the output is real.
Nancy Nix has the same knack. She was in the audience on September 21. She has a way of seeing a good thing before it becomes important, and she has been that way for a long time, back through nearly sixteen years as Butler County Treasurer and into the Auditor’s office she was sworn into in February 2023.[10] She was invited out when Crawford was still pitching the building. She came. Michael Ryan has supported this kind of work well before the commissioner race, and he stood up and spoke with me that day. He won the Republican primary in May 2026 with about 72 percent of the vote, and he is on the November 3 ballot focused on economic development, job creation, and capital investment.[11] I think he is going to win. More to the point, he showed up.
What Volynt is actually doing there
Volynt Aero was formed in 2024 by people who have been developing uncrewed aircraft and eVTOL machines for years. The spelling is the point—Volynt, with a Y. The aircraft is the Vyper, also with a Y. They are always doing things a little differently, and I like that. The company builds hybrid-electric uncrewed aircraft aimed at cargo logistics, highly mobile power generation, and forward communications for defense and for disaster response- the work where you cannot always count on a runway, a fuel truck, or a pilot who can get there.[1] The address on the capability statement and on the federal registration is the same as the innovation center: 20 S. Elm Street, Suite 117, Oxford, Ohio 45056. They have taken Ohio Third Frontier and TVSF support and partnered with Miami University on powertrain work. That is the right use of a building like this. Not a plaque. A prototype.
I had no idea, the first time I walked the facility, that the roots of the innovation talk went back that far, or that George was part of it, or that Nancy Nix was part of it. A lot of things in government never mature. Maybe only five percent of them ever become anything good. This one has a chance to mature into something really good. It is exactly the kind of thing that all of these people hope their role in government can do: take good minds, imagination, goodwill, and blood, and help them mature into something productive. Government, used properly, does not dream for people. It keeps the road open so the people who do dream can get the work to market.
Dreams, not the extended nightmare
I have always enjoyed my time on college campuses. I have not been happy with the direction academia has taken, captured as so much of it has been by left-wing politics and by the pursuit of intelligence subordinated to social order. I still encourage what I see. Even if everybody on a campus is not pushing the limit the way I think they should, you still see a proportion of people who are. I stop by the little convenience store on the campus, and I get a Mello Yello. People joke about it. The three drinks I drink are Mello Yello, water, and milk. A lot of water, a lot of milk, and a lot of Mello Yello. Sugar is not good for you, but I don’t consume much else with a lot of sugar in it, so I am good with it. And when I am standing there, I see a lot of bright-eyed people walking around with backpacks, dreaming and hoping.
That is what I was talking about in the speech. The dreams of Elm Street, because we were on Elm Street, in the innovation center. You expect a company like Volynt, working there, to have a shot at evolving into a technological powerhouse. It all started with the dreams of people like the president of Miami University, and Senator Lang, and Nancy Nix. You can tell who your friends are. It depends on who shows up for these things. You invite them to come out, you look into the audience, and you see faces that are very familiar to you. Some of the things you are doing may not become important for five years, or ten. They still come.
George said it in his own way. The things you do today are the things that show up eight or nine years from now. A lot of the work he does, and a lot of the work the other people who came out to our event are doing, works on that clock. I appreciate everybody who came. Michael Ryan has been supportive before he was ever on a commissioner ballot. Nancy has always supported things well before they become important. She has a good eye. She was in the audience. She knows a good thing when she sees it.
The innovation center on Elm Street is there for a purpose. It is there to inspire the growth of human intellect, as academia was always meant to do. I was proud to be there, and proud to be a part of it, and proud to look into that audience and see those kinds of people. I appreciate having high-quality people like that in my life. I think all of us, working together, can make dreams come true for a lot of people who don’t even know they are dreaming yet. They are just living their lives and hoping for a dream to dream, instead of living inside an extended nightmare where intellect is no longer in charge of the human condition.
Innovation centers like the one on Elm Street are, I think, among the highest-order things a community can build anywhere in the world, because they are dedicated to aspiring intelligence that makes everybody else’s lives much better. George Lang has always been supportive of that. It was good to hear his story, and to hear it go back those eight or nine years. The things you do today will be the things people are standing inside of nine years from now. That is what good government looks like. A president of a university pushing. A senator putting political capital on a building that is still empty. An auditor who shows up early. A future commissioner who stands up and speaks. They help pave the way for dreams to become a reality instead of a nightmare.
Footnotes
[1] Volynt Aero, Inc. lists its primary address as 20 S. Elm Street, Suite 117, Oxford, Ohio 45056. Founded in 2024, the company develops hybrid-electric uncrewed eVTOL aircraft for cargo logistics, mobile power generation, and forward communications under the Vyper name, and has paired Ohio Third Frontier and TVSF support with Miami University powertrain work. See Volynt Aero capability statement, volynt.aero; federal entity record, CAGE 9X2Y4, UEI ZDFZRXS7EJY2; Volynt Aero LinkedIn company page.
[2] Miami University Airport (OXD), 7101 Fairfield Road, Oxford, Ohio 45056, is a public-use airport operated in connection with the university and has a 4,011-by-70-foot asphalt runway. Miami University, “OXD Airport in Oxford, Ohio,” miamioh.edu/oxd-airport.
[3] Miami University, “From Food Services to Innovation Hub: The Story of College@Elm,” College@Elm Impact Blog, 2025. The building was constructed in 1933 and served as the university’s central food service facility for 68 years before dining operations moved to the Demske Culinary Support Center.
[4] Halie Barger, “Forgotten building on South Elm Street to become space for innovation startups and a focus on the arts,” Oxford Observer, February 14, 2020. Miami and Oxford officials described a vacant former food-service building that had later been used for storage; sale and continued vacancy were both live options before the innovation-hub plan.
[5] Sean Scott reporting in the Oxford Free Press, “College@Elm aims to provide innovation hub for Southwest Ohio businesses,” drawing on Lee Fisher’s account that President Gregory Crawford approached potential partners around 2017–2018 and was “the big driving force” behind the project. Crawford has described walking partners through the building more than two years before the 2023 opening. Miami University News, “The Lee and Rosemary Fisher Innovation College@Elm celebrates grand opening,” February 2023.
[6] Miami University put the renovation at $10.7 million and total invested funding at $17.55 million from the State of Ohio, JobsOhio, Butler County, the City of Oxford, and private donors. Miami University News, February 4, 2021, “Miami and Oxford initiative to transform uptown into an entrepreneurial hub”; Miami University News, February 2023 grand-opening release. The Oxford Free Press separately noted a City of Oxford contribution of about $1.18 million toward renovations, plus parking-lot work. Figures vary by what is counted as renovation versus total public-private investment; both numbers are in the public record.
[7] Lee Fisher ’68 and Rosemary Fisher ’69 provided the naming gift. The Lee and Rosemary Fisher Innovation College@Elm held its grand opening in February 2023 at 20 S. Elm Street. Miami University News, February 2023.
[8] George Lang, quoted in the Oxford Free Press: “I was very proud to use whatever political capital I had to get some dollars at the state level to help get the program started and get it up and running.” And: “It’s the only place, literally the only incubator in Ohio, that I know of in the country, where you can go from concept to production all under one roof and have everything right there.” The Miami Student, March 2023, also noted Lang’s support through the funding process. The September 21, 2026 remarks I saw him filming are his own telling of that same history.
[9] Miami University News, February 4, 2021. The early plan named two anchor uses: Miami’s entrepreneurship training and incubator center, and the Fischer Group’s manufacturing “innovation extension.” Later tenants have included student and alums ventures such as Coarse Culture. The Miami Student, March 2023, reported a five-year hope, attached to the Fischer Group concept, of 52 jobs and just under $3 million in payroll.
[10] Butler County Auditor Nancy Nix was sworn in on February 13, 2023, after nearly 16 years as Butler County Treasurer, and was elected in November 2024 to the unexpired term. She holds a B.S. from Truman State University, an MBA from Miami University (2012), and a CPA license—Butler County Auditor, “Meet Nancy,” auditor.bcohio.gov.
[11] Michael V. Ryan, former Hamilton City Council member and vice-mayor, won the May 5, 2026 Republican primary for Butler County Commissioner with about 72 percent against incumbent Cindy Carpenter, and faces Democrat Mike Miller on the November 3, 2026 ballot. Journal-News, “Butler County commissioners race: Michael Ryan and Mike Miller up for open seat,” September 30, 2026. Ryan has campaigned on economic development, job creation, and capital investment.
Volynt Aero. Capability statement and company site. https://volynt.aero/ — address listed as 20 S. Elm Street, Suite 117, Oxford, Ohio 45056. Aircraft program styled Vyper.
Volynt Aero. LinkedIn company page, Oxford, Ohio. Notes Ohio TVSF grant and Miami University powertrain partnership.
Hoffman, Rich. Overmanwarrior essays and podcast, hoffmanbooks.com — including the September 21, 2026 College@Elm remarks and the George Lang clip referenced here.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
I am proud of President Trump. I say that first because I have spent years decoding the obvious, and I don’t intend to pretend I discovered courage last week. I walked people through the exile years. I did the COVID coverage when it was still lonely work. I was calling balls and strikes before a lot of the later names had a show. Laura Loomer has done hard work. Natalie Winters has done hard work from a young age. The War Room lane has done hard work. I respect the daily calling of hypocrisy. I also think that lane, by itself, never gets to the doing. Recognition without a mechanism is how evil keeps the back office while we argue about the headline.[1]
I have shifted gears. Not away from Trump. Toward the machinery that outlasts him.
I USED TO SIT IN A COMFORTABLE CHAIR AND CALL BALLS AND STRIKES
For a long time I had a comfortable place to sit. Call it a cloud. Call it a good office. I could look down on the news cycle, name the lie, and go home. That is useful. It is also incomplete. Hypocrisy reporting is a spotlight. Evil works in the dark behind the spotlight, on purpose, while the audience stares at the bright circle.
The hardships I have been talking about in my own professional life were not a detour from the political argument. They were the laboratory. Once you are no longer sitting in the clubhouse, you see how the game is actually rigged. Corporate America. Easy Federal Reserve money. China in the supply chain and in the information pipe. HR departments as political enforcement. Flippers who buy a shop and call compliance a personality. I have covered that combination for years. I have now lived a chapter of it at ground level. Micro teaches macro. The same pattern that ruins a company ruins a republic.[2]
Pickle Rick was not a joke. If you are going to call balls and strikes, you cannot live on the owner’s floor. You cannot take the rigged clubhouse deal and then pretend you still have clean eyes. I put myself outside the comfortable chair on purpose. That is why the reporting sounds different now. I am not interested in announcing that we have a problem. I want the problem named at the layer where it is actually built.
WE HAVE NOT HAD A SYSTEM THAT RESPECTED VOTERS
This is October 1st, 2026. The midterms are November 3. Thirty days or so. I am not sitting here assuming Republicans have already lost the House and the Senate. I am sitting here watching a regime of people who have controlled the machinery for a long time try to convince you the race is already over so you will stay on the couch.[3]
We have not had what they call democracy in the clean-textbook sense. We have had a controlled, manipulated administrative state that learned a simple math problem. A 30-year career outlasts a 2-year House term, a 6-year Senate term, and even a 4-year presidency. They reveal elections. Then they outlast whoever slides through. Checks on power were meant to slow radicalism. The deep state learned to use those same checks as a parking brake on anyone the voters actually sent.[4]
I know this from men I have spoken with privately. Bernie Moreno. Warren Davidson. Others who went to Washington from my world. I have been close enough to Congress and the Senate to hear what they sound like when the cameras are off. I know who they were when they went in. I know what the building does to a mission. The system is designed to stop the mission. It is the same design I have seen in corporate cultures. New owner. New process. Same rotting joists. The title on the door changes. The permanent staff does not.[5]
THE IMPEACHMENT HEADLINE IS NOT A LEGAL DOCUMENT. IT IS A TAILGATE
I read the news Saturday morning the way I always do, through a lot of inputs. The outlets were already wet with impeachment—Yahoo-style aggregation. Democrats talking impeachment as if it were weather. Impeach him for what? He is the president the country put in office, and a large part of the opposition class cannot think past social takeover as a governing theory.[6]
Look at the actual paper on the table this month, not the feeling. On September 15, the House tabled Al Green’s latest impeachment attempt. Democrats split. Leadership voted present. On September 24, Steve Cohen filed 26 articles covering everything from Iran to immigration to emoluments. Hakeem Jeffries is already telling reporters that if Democrats take the House, oversight will be vast and impeachment is “not ruled out.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth already has articles hanging over him from Thomas Massie over the Iran war. That is not a completed removal. That is a war machine. It is built to make you feel like your side already lost, so you will not get up in November.[7]
I have used the tailgate picture because it is the most honest one I have. You wear your jersey into the other team’s parking lot. They put an arm around you. They sell you a hot dog. They tell you, friendly as Sunday, that your team is going to get destroyed. The point is not information. The point is to make you feel stupid for showing up. Democratic media does that at an industrial scale because the advertising model needs your despair. If you believe your side can win, you are harder to monetize and harder to keep home. If you believe the thing is already over, you stay on the couch while their people walk.[8]
POLLS ARE A WEAPON. TURNOUT IS THE ONLY COUNTER
I will not lie to you about the temperature. Generic ballots in late September are ugly for Republicans. Some aggregators have Democrats up by several points. Forecast shops are assigning the House to Democrats at high confidence and treating the Senate as a coin that has started to lean. Trump’s national approval is being printed in the high 30s by the same class of numbers that has been wrong before and will be wrong again if the people who actually vote decide the numbers are a dare.[9]
That is the point of the suppression. They do not need you to love their candidates. They need you to believe resistance is already futile. They need Republicans who have learned to live inside the old control system—comfortable calendar, known vacation, decent pay, no appetite for real reform—to sit still and hope the storm misses the golf course. How many men, alone on a tee box with nobody watching, will still take the honest lie? If they will cheat a stroke when the only prize is a par, why would you trust them with a republic when the prize is a career.[10]
GAS, IRAN, AND THE MEN WHO LICK THE BOOTS IN THE ROOM
I said I thought gas would be under two dollars by the summer of 2026. It is not. National averages this year ran from the low threes before the Iran escalation, spiked toward the mid-fours in May, kissed four dollars after a June paper ceasefire, and then climbed again when the fight did not stay dead—Labor Day printed above four. That is not the number I wanted. It is also not a mystery.[11]
Iran is being used as a straw man for price. As long as a war, a blockade, a rumor of the Strait, or a tent full of men who can still light a fuse exists, refiners and traders have a story. They will smile at the gold trim in the White House. Strong executives always get that smile. Then they talk on the way to the car. I have watched that smile in companies. I have been in the room. The Iran file is being stretched because stretched files protect margins and protect the permanent war party that wants Trump blamed for a fight they have been feeding for decades.[12]
We did not vote for a forever war. We voted for cheaper energy and a country that is not managed by the people who never leave. Forever war is how you wait a president out. Afghanistan already taught that lesson to anyone willing to read a graveyard. A movement that can pitch a tent and find water can outlast a news cycle. Radical Islamic politics and Marxist economics are not opposites in the field. They are often the same engine with different slogans. As long as the tent has water, the fire keeps a little wind.[13]
CHINA, HONG KONG, IRAN, AND A STRANGE CHANGE ON MY SITE
I have watched my own traffic for years. For a long stretch, there were two persistent hits a day from China, like a pair of regulators taking attendance. A few months ago that changed. I started seeing 37 to 40 hits a day from China. That is not a standing ovation. That is a change in the pipe. Somebody stopped capping the faucet, or somebody started studying the faucet. Either way, the information war is not only domestic.[14]
Hong Kong showed what happens when a population gets a window and does not finish the job. Iran is the same kind of window with worse weather. Voice of America, X, a blog in Ohio—none of that is a revolution by itself. The other side has speech control as a governing tool. We still talk as if the whole earth is a comments section. It is not. Getting a message into a closed country is half the war. The other half is whether the people inside will use the opening. I cannot do that part for them. Trump cannot do that part for them. A better speech will not save a hammer that refuses to swing.[15]
WRIGHT-PATT, DISCLOSURE, AND THE GIANT IN THE VIDEO GAME
I live close enough to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base to know people who work there. They confirm what they can confirm. Files are coming out in a Trump administration that previous buildings sat on. Spielberg’s Disclosure Day movie is sitting in the culture as a myth-shaped object while the real files move in smaller rooms. I will give cameras their own essay. They deserve it. The point here is simpler. The same class of manipulator that runs a corporate takeover also runs a disclosure drip. Look this way. Do not look at the jurisdiction fight underneath.[16]
A new generation is walking into stories I have been telling for 20 and 30 years, and they are walking in through a game controller. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is not Sunday school. It is a very good game. The Order of Giants DLC puts Nephilim, Gibborim, Noah’s Ark, and a secret order of large men on PlayStation and Xbox and doesn’t apologize. Giants from the Bible are popular again because the old text never stopped being a map. Hollywood will sell you the costume. Michael Heiser spent his career trying to make people read the unseen realm without the costume. He died. People like to whisper that this kind of work draws fire. I do not need a ghost story to notice that my own life got louder after I finished The Politics of Heaven. I am not stopping.[17]
THE FALLEN CONSPIRACY HAS MORE THAN ONE LETTERHEAD
You can spell it a lot of ways—fallen angels. Secret societies. A Hollywood death cult. China in the media stack. Progressive branding on an old hatred of the God of creation. A mother in a Manson weather system. Lawyers and jurors leaned on until justice becomes a performance. Lucifer is not a Halloween decoration. He is a politician. He recruits institutions. He prefers a Truman Show to an honest election because a show can be rewritten between seasons.[18]
The same fingerprints show up on a Saturday impeachment dump and on a corporate letter telling a CEO to adopt the current left-wing weather or lose the easy money. Federal Reserve plumbing. Wall Street wash. ESG as a protection racket. That is not three conspiracies. That is one method at three altitudes. If you only stare at gas prices, you will miss the wet paint. If you only stare at the wet paint, you will miss the spirit that taught the painter his stroke.[19]
GOD IS NOT RUNNING A CLOSED SET
A lot of good people want the comfort sentence. God’s got this. God’s got my back. God knows where I live. I expect the plot is already locked and we are only extras. That’s not what I am looking at. I think conspirators are working against the script. I think they have been trying to overthrow the visible order for a very long time. I think calling them “progressives” or “Democrats” or even “the deep state” is sometimes accurate and always incomplete. Those are avatars. Avatars can be replaced. The method remains.[20]
The Constitution is a costume the other team has learned to wear. Free-speech rules get used to protect the spread of the thing the speech was supposed to restrain. Courts can refuse to join a mood and still leave a machine intact. A strong executive in the White House answers some questions. He cannot answer whether a people will stay home because a poll told them to feel defeated. He cannot be your rapture. He cannot be your substitute for courage.[21]
I have been saying this in the hammer language because I mean it. If you were made as a tool, waiting for heaven to happen while you use Jesus as an excuse for being a chicken is not piety. It is absenteeism. Trump was not a chicken. He stayed in the pocket long enough that the footprints in the wet paint became visible to people who did not want to see them. That is a gift. It is not a finished repair. He cannot repair for you any more than God will swing a hammer you refuse to pick up.[22]
WHAT I WANT INSTEAD OF ANOTHER DECADE OF HIGHLIGHT REELS
I am still with Trump. I think he has done a good job in a building that was built to digest him. I think the House and the Senate in November are still winnable if the people who know better refuse the tailgate. I think a lot of Republicans who like the current control system will not help you, because the current system pays them on time. I think election integrity is not a slogan. It is the only peaceful way to take a government back from a class that has already decided you do not own it. If you will not fight for a clean count, you are agreeing that you do not run the place.[23]
I do not want AI licensed by the same kind of people who wash out of real shops and land at a patent window because the job is protected and the standards are political. I have talked to that office. I know that weather. You do not want those hands on a technology China is already treating as a battlefield. You do not want a permission culture writing the rules of the next tool while the last tool is still being used to manage your speech.[24]
Identify the problem at the right layer. Then fix it. Reporting hypocrisy is a start. Naming the spirit, the paycheck, the waiting-out strategy, the impeachment-as-suppression cycle, the energy excuse, the China pipe, and the fallen-angel politics behind the human letterhead is the work I am actually in. The Politics of Heaven exists because the news cycle never goes downstairs.[25]
NOTES FOR LEADERS
Do not confuse a recognition show with a repair.
Do not let a poll put you on the couch. Polls are part of the tailgate.
Do not expect a president to finish a job the permanent class is paid to stall.
Do not call every delay incompetence. Some of it is a wait-him-out.
Do not baptize cowardice as faith if you are a hammer, swing.
Do not outsource election integrity to people who like the present machine.
Do not stare only at gas. Stare at who needs Iran to stay useful.
Do not flatten spiritual war into team colors. Teams change. The method does not.
I am proud of President Trump. He has not let me down. The world around him has. That is the sentence I will keep. The next sentence is on us.
FOOTNOTES
[1] War Room and associated daily-accountability media; Laura Loomer’s investigative work; Natalie Winters’s War Room reporting. The author does not claim this work is worthless. It is that recognition of hypocrisy, by itself, leaves the back office intact.
[2] Rich Hoffman, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business, and the 2026 Overman Warrior essays on corporate flippers, HR politics, and Pickle Rick as a method.
[3] 2026 midterm election date: Tuesday, November 3, 2026.
[4] The administrative-state “outlast” problem is the author’s description of career officialdom relative to elected terms. See also the longer literature on the permanent bureaucracy after the Progressive Era and the postwar national-security state.
[5] Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio); Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio). Private conversations described here are the author’s account of mood and structural frustration, not quoted transcripts.
[6] Late-September 2026 consumer aggregation of impeachment talk across Yahoo-style and similar feeds, coinciding with formal House activity cited below.
[7] House vote September 15, 2026, tabling Rep. Al Green’s impeachment articles, 232–147, with 18 Democrats joining Republicans to table and 46 Democrats voting present, including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) introduced 26 articles of impeachment on September 24, 2026. Associated Press, September 26, 2026: House Democrats preparing a vast oversight agenda if they win the chamber; impeachment “not off the table.” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) filed articles against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over Iran-war management.
[8] Advertising-supported political media has an incentive to keep a horse race emotionally hot and a base emotionally tired. The tailgate analogy is the author’s.
[9] Late-September 2026 public aggregators printed Democratic leads on the generic ballot and elevated Democratic odds on House control. Silver Bulletin / FLIPR and similar models updated September 25–27, 2026. Trump approval prints in some aggregates near 37 percent. Aggregates are not ballots.
[10] The golf-course example is moral psychology, not a claim about a named official’s scorecard.
[11] AAA and related trackers: pre-escalation national averages near or under $3 in early 2026; spike toward about $4.50 in May; brief dip under $4 after a June 2026 preliminary U.S.–Iran arrangement to reopen Hormuz; return toward and above $4 as fighting and shipping risk resumed. Labor Day 2026 national average reported near $4.15 by inflation-tracking compilations using AAA. The author’s earlier $2 summer target did not materialize.
[12] U.S.–Israel strikes on Iran from late February 2026; Hormuz disruption; naval measures; a June preliminary arrangement that did not hold as a durable peace. Energy desks treated the file as a supply-risk story throughout.
[13] The author’s reading of forever-war incentives and of radical Islamic politics sharing logistical patience with other anti-Western movements. Afghanistan is cited as the recent American education in outlasting.
[14] Traffic observation from richhoffmanbooks.com / Overman Warrior properties, as reported by the author. Not a claim about a named Chinese agency.
[15] Hong Kong protests and the subsequent tightening; Iranian information controls. X and related platforms widened some outbound speech after 2022–2024, but inbound reach into closed states remains contested.
[16] Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near Dayton, Ohio, is a historic center of foreign-material and aerospace lore in disclosure literature. Dan Farah, The Age of Disclosure (2025). Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day is a forthcoming cultural object in the same weather system, not a substitute for documents.
[17] Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (MachineGames / Bethesda / Lucasfilm, 2024), with The Order of Giants DLC (2025). The game treats a Nephilim Order, Gibborim material, and Noah’s Ark as plot architecture. Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm (2015); Heiser died February 20, 2023. The author’s parallel is vocational, not medical diagnosis.
[18] Genesis 6; Psalm 82; Ephesians 6:12. John Keel and Jacques Vallée on high-strange events as political and folkloric, not merely extraterrestrial.
[19] ESG shareholder letters and federal-contractor political pressure, 2018–2024, as a documented enforcement style even where the brand names later softened.
[20] Rich Hoffman, The Politics of Heaven (forthcoming).
[21] U.S. Const. arts. I–III. The author claims that factions can wear the procedural costumes the procedures were written to restrain.
[22] Matthew 25:14–30; James 2:17. The hammer language is the author’s, developed across the 2026 Overman Warrior series.
[23] Election-administration fights after 2020 and 2024 remain live in state houses, courts, and Congress. The author argues that integrity is a precondition of consent, not a conspiracy hobby.
[24] U.S. Patent and Trademark Office culture as experienced by the author in prior dealings; a critique of political hiring and risk-averse examination, not a claim that every examiner is incompetent.
[25] Closing frame of the Overman Warrior project, 2024–2026.
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING
Politics, Midterms, and the Permanent Machine
Associated Press / Lisa Mascaro. “House Democrats Plan Vast Oversight of Trump Administration. Impeachment Is an Option.” September 26, 2026. New York Times. “House Kills Bid to Impeach Trump as Democrats Split.” September 15, 2026. Rep. Steve Cohen. “Congressman Cohen Introduces Comprehensive Articles of Impeachment Against President Donald Trump.” September 24, 2026. Silver Bulletin. “2026 Midterm Election Forecast: Senate & House.” Updated September 25, 2026. House of Representatives roll call on tabling the Green impeachment articles, September 15, 2026.
Energy and Iran
AAA Daily Fuel Gauge reports, 2026. New York Times. “Average U.S. Gas Price Falls Below $4 After U.S.-Iran Agreement.” June 18, 2026. New York Times. “U.S. Average Gas Price Returns to $4 a Gallon as Iran Crisis Escalates.” July 20, 2026. Axios; CNBC; GasBuddy 2026 pump-price coverage of Hormuz risk.
Spiritual War, Giants, and Disclosure
The Holy Bible. Genesis 6; Numbers 13:33; Psalm 82; Ephesians 6:12. Heiser, Michael S. The Unseen Realm. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015. Heiser, Michael S. Reversing Hermon. Crane, MO: Defender, 2017. Farah, Dan, dir. The Age of Disclosure. 2025. Keel, John A. The Mothman Prophecies. 1975. Vallée, Jacques. Passport to Magonia. 1969. MachineGames / Bethesda. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (2024) and The Order of Giants (2025).
Money, Corporations, and Permission Culture
Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. Federal Reserve and post-2008 easy-money literature; ESG engagement letters as political enforcement. U.S. Patent and Trademark Office public reports and the author’s prior dealings.
The Author’s Related Work
Hoffman, Rich. The Politics of Heaven. Forthcoming. Hoffman, Rich. Overman Warrior essays, 2024–2026, including the Pickle Rick / hammer-of-God series. richhoffmanbooks.com and overmanwarrior.wordpress.com.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
I have been watching Turkey for a long time. Not as a tourist with a lanyard. As a man who loves biblical archaeology, loves the people who actually put a trowel in the ground, and does not love the way the field gets fenced. Turkey is producing more ancient material right now than most Western newsrooms know how to hold. Mount Ararat sits on the edge of that pile. South of it, in Ağrı Province near Doğubayazıt, there is a boat-shaped ridge about 515 feet long that has looked like Noah’s Ark from the air since 1959.[1] For decades the respectable answer was simple: it is a rock. In 2026 that answer is finally being put under a drill bit. I do not need the lab to finish before I am allowed to talk. I need the paycheck question asked out loud, because that is usually the lock on the gate.
FOLLOW THE CHECK, THEN FOLLOW THE DIRT
I am a fan of biblical studies. I am a fan of changing the way archaeologists get paid. That is not a side remark. That is the argument.
I have seen the field raw. I love a lot of the people in it. I also know they are controlled, often dramatically, in what they can say if they want to be published, promoted, and invited back next season. If a result smells too biblical, the gatekeepers get a rash. If a government figures out that a mound can sell tickets, the rash clears up. That is not mysticism. That is payroll.[2]
I say the same thing when people talk conspiracy. Do not start with the archaeologist’s personality. Start with who signs the check. People tend to say what they are paid to be allowed to say. When the funding comes from institutions with strong academic gatekeeping, anything that looks like Genesis gets parked in the “folklore” lot. When the funding starts to look like tourism, the same site suddenly deserves radar, cores, and a press conference.[3]
I want fortune and glory for the diggers. I mean that. I want them rich from books and discoveries. I want them famous for being right. I do not want them turned into England.
ENGLAND IS THE WARNING LABEL
I know a good deal about England. I have a son-in-law who is a dual citizen. He married my daughter. He is an American citizen now. He still goes back and forth. I have been there. I have done business there. I like a lot of the people. I like the humor. Monty Python comes to mind. I like Stonehenge. I like a lot of English archaeology very much.[4]
I do not like the posture. A lot of that culture likes a keeper. They want a kindly authority to tell them the rules of the week. Americans, at their best, do not love rulers. The English appetite for a digital ID, a chip in the workflow, a “right to work” that runs through a central system, is the same appetite that makes a scholar wait for permission to say what the dirt already said.[5]
They tried to push a harder version of that during COVID. They have kept pushing digital verification around employment. The politics shifted in 2026. A national mandatory “BritCard” scheme got announced, diluted, and then, under a later Labour government, cancelled as a single national program. The digital right-to-work machinery did not vanish with the slogan. Employers still have to prove status. The paperwork just put on a nicer shirt.[6]
Here is why I drag England into an essay about a boat on a Turkish ridge. Managed economies love a workforce that kneels for a paycheck. Chinese-style social credit is the clean version of the dream: you work if the system says you may work. Archaeology already runs a softer version of that dream. Publish the approved story or starve. I do not want the dirt community to become that. The way you beat it is not always a march on the ministry. The way you beat it is a competitive model. Tourism. Books. Independent labs. Audiences that will pay to see the thing the committee would rather leave unnamed. Money that does not need the old permission slip.[7]
TURKEY LEARNED WHAT ROSWELL LEARNED
Turkey has spent years fighting a reputation problem that is not only about dirt. Radical politics. Security headlines. A country that Western travelers used to skip. Then Göbekli Tepe broke the spell.
Since UNESCO listed Göbekli Tepe in 2018, the site has drawn about 4.4 million visitors over eight years. Officials in Şanlıurfa are talking about a million visitors in 2026 alone. They are widening roads and walkways because the mound cannot hold the crowd on the old path. Stonehenge still beats it on raw annual fame, but Göbekli Tepe is no longer a specialist’s secret. It is an industry.[8]
That is the tell. The stones were always there. Klaus Schmidt and the German team made them famous. The Turkish state then learned what Roswell learned after the jobs left and the town became a husk: a mystery that draws a ticket line can feed a region that ideology starved. Cappadocia already knew it. Underground cities. Tunnels. Cave churches. The Derinkuyu complex alone is a tourist engine. Shipwrecks off the Turkish coast, the Uluburun wreck with its Bronze Age copper and tin, already proved that early sailors were not paddling toy boats.[9]
I have been saying the same thing about dolmens in the Jordan Valley, up past Mount Hermon, and on into the high country that touches Turkey. The landscape is not empty. It is stacked. 5,000 years ago, 10,000 years ago, this belt of the world was not a waiting room for Greece and Rome. We are only now being allowed to notice because noticing pays.[10]
THE RIDGE THAT WOULD NOT SHUT UP
Capt. İlhan Durupınar spotted the boat-shaped formation on a Turkish Air Force aerial photo in 1959. It sits roughly nineteen miles south of Mount Ararat, about 157 meters long, close to the 300 cubits in Genesis if you use a common cubit. Ron Wyatt made it famous in the 1980s. Drilling happened in 1988. Then the site went back to being a punchline. “Natural rock. Stop bothering us.”[11]
I have been to the idea of the boat even if I am writing this from Ohio. The Ark Encounter in Williamstown, Kentucky, is a wonderful exhibit. It is well done. It gives a body a scale the Sunday-school flannelgraph never could. A vessel in that class is not a canoe. I do not find it strange that a man in the deep past could build something that size. I find it strange that modern people think competence was invented in 1850.[12]
We are talking about a world before the Bronze Age as we usually teach it, or on the doorstep of it, depending which flood chronology you use. Five thousand years ago. Seven thousand. The Bible is catching a memory that is older than our textbooks are comfortable admitting. Most wood dies in that kind of time. Turkey is one of the few places where a large wooden thing, if it were mineralized or buried in the right muck, might still leave a chemical ghost.[13]
WHAT 2026 ACTUALLY PRODUCED
This is the part the internet is yelling about, so I am going to keep the facts tighter than the headlines.
In late June 2026, Prof. Dr. Cenker Atila of Sivas Cumhuriyet University opened a permitted field season at Durupınar with an international team of roughly twenty people from five countries. They worked about ninety days. They mapped the ridge in two and three dimensions. They ran ground-penetrating radar and electrical surveys. They collected something like a thousand soil samples from about 150 spots. They took cores and sent them to Ankara. They reported pottery fragments. They have not published a date on the pottery. Some stories said “possible pre-flood.” That is a hope sentence, not a lab sentence.[14]
The radar claims are the ones that moved the needle. The team and its partners reported angular anomalies, right-angle features, a corridor-like void running tens of meters along the long axis, layered shapes some of them are willing to call decks, and tunnel-like cavities a few meters down. Dr. Khosrow Bakhtar deployed BakhtarRadar, a system with a U.S. Air Force EarthRadar pedigree built to find tunnels and buried structure, not to decorate a creationist brochure. His public point was blunt: the old skeptic line that the ridge is just solid rock is the thing being tested.[15]
Soil chemistry is the second needle. Atila has said carbon levels inside the formation ran about 40 percent higher than samples taken outside it, with other differences in organic content, potassium, and pH that you would expect if something that used to be alive had rotted in place. That is not a hull. That is a smell. Smells are how you decide where to drill.[16]
Then the drill bit broke.
In September 2026, core drilling started for the first time since 1988. Noah’s Ark Scans and the university team reported that in one hole, four to five meters down, the bit hit a layer hard enough to shatter the tooling. They said petrified wood or highly mineralized wood is a possibility they want a third-party lab to test. They also said they intend to put a small drone into mapped voids. Winter lab work is supposed to cover organic content, mineralogy, microscopy. Atila has talked about a public scientific statement after the lab finishes. More seasons are already being planned for 2027.[17]
I want to be precise, because precision is how you keep from becoming the guy the gatekeepers are waiting to mock. Nobody has pulled a named plank with Noah’s chisel mark on it. The lead archaeologist has said the data increase the possibility day by day. Skeptics, including some creationists who prefer other ridges on Ararat itself, still call Durupınar a mudslide that learned a boat impression. IFLScience published a scold on September 25, 2026, two days before I am writing this, saying researchers have not found the Ark and that enthusiasts are flogging a dead horse. Fine. Let the horse’s bones go to Ankara. That is what a lab is for.[18]
PETRIFIED WOOD IS THE QUESTION THAT MATTERS THIS WINTER
If the cores come back as ordinary rock, the boat shape remains a boat shape and the tourism office still has a ridge. If the cores come back as petrified or worked wood in the right places, at the right depths, with the right angles sitting over them, then a lot of comfortable lectures have to be rewritten in public.
I think there is more truth in the old story than the modern faculty lounge can stand. I do not think Noah was the only man on earth who ever built a large hull. I think large boats were more common than the textbook allows, and that most of the wood is gone, which is why the textbook looks so clean. Turkey has already given us wrecks with bronze and copper that should have embarrassed the “they only hugged the coastline” sermon. A mineralized hull on a slope below Ararat would not be an insult to science. It would be science finally catching a memory the text never dropped.[19]
GÖBEKLİ TEPE WAS THE REHEARSAL
People who have heard me talk about Göbekli Tepe know why I keep putting it next to the Ark ridge. The official story of human beginnings liked a slow farmer who eventually got around to religion. Göbekli Tepe is a 12,000-year-old ritual machine with T-shaped pillars measured in tons, carved animals, and a construction culture that was not supposed to exist yet. The controversy never really died. It just got a ticket booth.[20]
Once Turkey understood that “zero point of history” sells rooms in Şanlıurfa, the Taş Tepeler landscape around it started getting roads. Karahantepe. The wider Neolithic belt. The same state that can be heavy-handed in other files became suddenly curious. That is not a conversion. That is an education by cash register. I would rather have a curious state than a silent one.[21]
The same pattern is sitting on Durupınar. The formation was always on the tongue. New instruments made it louder. Tourism made it speakable. If you want to stop the old suppression, you do not have to win a faculty vote. You make the silence expensive.
CAPPADOCIA, TUNNELS, AND THE SHIPS THEY SAID COULD NOT EXIST
Cappadocia’s underground cities still feel like a prank the earth played on a committee. Whole communities under the basalt. Storage. Churches. Air shafts. You can call it refuge architecture. You can call it a civilization that knew the surface was not always friendly. Either way, it is not a myth, because you can walk it.[22]
The wrecks off the Turkish coast do the same work for boats. Uluburun, dated to the late fourteenth century B.C., carried copper ingots, tin, glass, and a cargo list that looks like a trade network, not a fisherman’s accident. When people tell me early humans could not have built anything in Noah’s class, I point at the metal and ask them to explain the smaller miracle first.[23]
I am a proponent of the plain idea that people built boats bigger, earlier, and farther than the approved timeline. Wood vanishes. Stone lies. Metal sometimes survives. Chemistry sometimes remembers. Radar sometimes finds a right angle in a place the mudslide story did not budget for.
WHAT I THINK THE LAB WILL FORCE US TO SAY
I do not run Atila’s lab. I am not going to baptize a press release. I will say what I think, because that is the job of a man who writes under his own name.
I think a serious fraction of that ridge is going to come back as organic, mineralized, or both. I think “just a rock” is going to look sloppier in 2027 than it did in 1988. I think the pottery will turn out to be human presence on a landscape that already had a story, not a magic proof by itself. I think the right angles will keep the argument alive even if some of them resolve into geology. And I think the important civilizational fact will not be “we found the one boat.” It will be “large construction in that age was not an anomaly.”[24]
If the Bible only ever caught a hint of a much longer truth, that is still a hint with better staying power than most peer-reviewed fashions. Texts that survive five millennia are not accidents. They are technologies of memory. Archaeology at its best is the recovery of the hardware those memories were pointing at.[25]
FORTUNE AND GLORY, NOT A CHIP
I want archaeologists paid like people who found something. Not like clerks. Fortune and glory is not a cartoon line to me. It is the opposite of the English model I do not want exported into the dirt. If the only way you eat is to please the committee, you will not find an ark even if you are standing on the deck. If the public will buy the book, walk the ridge, and fund a lab that does not need a bishop or a dean to bless the result, the silence breaks.
That is also how you fight the larger politics. Centralized systems love a limited workforce. They love a chip. They love a right-to-work switch. Automation then arrives to finish the job the policy started, because a frightened labor pool and a permission culture do not compete well on a global stage. Tourism is crude. It is also one of the few forces that has repeatedly forced closed countries and closed faculties to open a gate they would rather keep locked.[26]
THE POLITICS OF HEAVEN IS NOT A SIDE HOBBY
I keep saying it because it is the frame, not the bumper sticker. In the age of disclosure you must understand the politics of heaven. A flood story is not only meteorology. A boat on a mountain is not only a tourist photo. If the old world had a rupture, and if memory of that rupture was stored in Genesis, then the fight over whether the ridge may be mentioned in polite company is not a geology quarrel. It is a jurisdiction quarrel. Who gets to say what the deep past contains. Who gets to keep the human race smaller than the text says we were.[27]
Disclosure, in the popular sense, is usually aimed at the sky. Fine. Start with the ground. Turkey is coughing up temples older than the agriculture story, cities under the rock, wrecks full of metal, and now a boat-shaped ridge with a broken drill bit and a carbon spike. The sky will still be there after the cores come back from Ankara.
NOTES FOR LEADERS
If you run a company, a church, a school, or a town, do not wait for a faculty to tell you when a fact has become respectable.
Do not sneer at tourism. Tourism is often the only leverage a buried truth gets.
Do not confuse a headline with a hull. Demand the lab. Then do not let the lab hide.
Do not pretend early people were stupid. That conceit is how modern managers excuse their own smallness.
Do not attack only the archaeologist. Ask who signed the check.
Do not copy England’s posture and call it seriousness. A culture that wants a keeper will always find a reason to leave the boat in the mud.
If you ever read my book The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business, you already know how I think about permission cultures. The dirt is the same fight with older dust.[28]
We will know more when Ankara speaks. I can live with waiting for chemistry. I cannot live with waiting for permission.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The Durupınar Formation is a boat-shaped landform near Doğubayazıt in Ağrı Province, eastern Türkiye, about 19 miles south of Mount Ararat / Ağrı Dağı. Length commonly given as 157 meters / 515 feet. Identified on aerial imagery in 1959 by Capt. İlhan Durupınar.
[2] On academic gatekeeping and the difficulty of publishing explicitly biblical interpretations in mainstream journals, see the long-running tension documented in biblical archaeology magazines and in critiques of “minimalist” versus “maximalist” schools. The paycheck point is the author’s operational claim, not a claim that every archaeologist is dishonest.
[3] Noah’s Ark Scans, the California-linked project working with Turkish partners at Durupınar, also operates paid site visits. Tourism and research are braided at the ridge the same way they are braided at Göbekli Tepe and Roswell.
[4] Stonehenge visitor figures commonly run in the low millions over multi-year counts; English Heritage has reported on the order of 1.5 million visits in strong years. The comparison in the essay is scale and brand, not a claim that Durupınar already matches that traffic.
[5] UK digital identity and right-to-work policy, 2025–2026: Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a digital ID scheme on 26 September 2025, initially framed as mandatory for proving the right to work. The mandatory single-card version was later diluted. See House of Commons Library briefing CBP-10369.
[6] In July 2026 the subsequent Burnham Labour government cancelled the national Digital ID programme as proposed. Digital right-to-work checks through certified Digital Verification Services and the Home Office online service continued to expand, with a new code of practice associated with 1 October 2026. Cancellation of a branded national card is not the same thing as cancellation of digital employment control.
[7] The competitive-model argument is the author’s: centralized permission cultures lose to open ticket lines, independent publication, and labs that can be paid without a ministry’s blessing.
[8] Daily Sabah and Anadolu Agency, July 2026: Göbeklitepe drew 4,409,590 visitors in the eight years after UNESCO listing in July 2018. Şanlıurfa Tourism Development Association head Mehmet Kamil Türkmen cited more than 320,000 visitors in the first half of 2026 and a path toward roughly one million for the year. Roads and walkways were being expanded in summer 2026.
[9] Uluburun shipwreck, discovered off Kaş, Türkiye, in 1982; late Bronze Age cargo including copper and tin ingots. Cappadocia underground settlements, including Derinkuyu, are open archaeological-tourist sites under the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
[10] Dolmen fields in the Jordan Valley and southern Levant, and the ritual/high-place landscape around Mount Hermon, are part of the author’s running map of pre-classical sacred geography. See also Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm (2015), on the Hermon tradition.
[11] Durupınar research history: Wyatt expeditions in the 1980s; 1988 drilling; later ground-penetrating radar and soil work by associated teams in 2019, 2021, 2022, and 2024 before the 2026 university-led season.
[12] Ark Encounter, Williamstown, Kentucky, opened 2016 by Answers in Genesis. The wooden reconstruction is 510 feet long, built to a 51-centimeter cubit reading of Genesis 6:15.
[13] Genesis 6–9; 2 Peter 2:5; Hebrews 11:7. Chronologies differ. Ussher-style readings cluster the Flood in the third millennium B.C. Other conservative readings push earlier. The essay does not pretend those clocks agree. It insists the memory is older than Bronze Age textbooks.
[14] 2026 Durupınar season: Prof. Dr. Cenker Atila, Archaeology Department, Sivas Cumhuriyet University; fieldwork beginning late June 2026; about 20 participants from five countries; approximately 90 days; roughly 1,000 soil samples from about 150 locations; cores to Ankara; pottery fragments reported in late September 2026 without a published date. Rector Prof. Dr. Ahmet Şengönül publicly supported the project.
[15] August 2026 BakhtarRadar deployment by Dr. Khosrow Bakhtar, Bakhtar Research and Engineering, with Noah’s Ark Scans. Reported features have included angular structures to about six meters, a central corridor on the order of 70 meters, tunnel-like voids, and right-angle anomalies. These are geophysical interpretations pending physical confirmation.
[16] Atila, quoted in Arkeonews and university-linked reporting, August–September 2026: interior carbon about 40 percent higher than exterior samples; organic matter, potassium, and pH differences treated as leads, not as a completed identification of timber.
[17] Noah’s Ark Scans / GlobeNewswire, 23 September 2026: core drilling begun; bit shattered on a hard layer about 4–5 meters down in one interior hole; petrified or highly mineralized wood listed as a possibility for third-party testing; drone inspection of mapped voids planned; laboratory suite to include organic content, mineralogy, and microscopy; additional seasons planned for 2027.
[18] IFLScience, “No, Researchers Haven’t Found ‘Noah’s Ark’ Near Mount Ararat In Eastern Turkey,” 25 September 2026. The piece notes tour pricing associated with Noah’s Ark Scans and the long geologic counter-argument that Durupınar is a natural formation. Fair warning. Not a lab result.
[19] On early seafaring and large hulls, see the Uluburun corpus and the broader literature on prehistoric navigation in the eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea. The author’s claim is capacity, not a completed identification of Durupınar as the Genesis vessel.
[20] Klaus Schmidt, Göbekli Tepe: A Stone Age Sanctuary in South-Eastern Anatolia (exh. and site literature). Monumental T-pillars, 3–6 meters, enclosures dated to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, roughly the 10th–9th millennium B.C.
[21] Taş Tepeler (“Stone Mounds”) is the Turkish umbrella for the wider Şanlıurfa Neolithic landscape, including Karahantepe. 2019 was declared the Year of Göbeklitepe by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
[22] Derinkuyu Underground City and the wider Cappadocia tunnel-and-refuge systems. Ministry visitor figures during 2026 holiday periods put related Cappadocia sites in the tens of thousands per short window.
[23] Cemal Pulak and the Institute of Nautical Archaeology publications on Uluburun. Copper from Cyprus, tin likely from distant sources, a cargo that implies organized long-range exchange.
[24] Atila has said organic remains and carbon dating of those remains will decide whether “there really is a ship here.” That is the correct sentence. Radar is a map. Chemistry is a verdict.
[25] On Scripture as durable cultural memory rather than late fiction, see the maximalist stream in biblical archaeology and the author’s forthcoming The Politics of Heaven.
[26] The England comparison is analogical: permission-to-work systems and permission-to-publish systems both shrink the labor of truth. Automation then harvests the gap.
[28] Rich Hoffman, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business.
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING
The Site and the 2026 Season
Atila, Cenker, and Sivas Cumhuriyet University communications on the 2026 Durupınar field season. Ağrı Province / Doğubayazıt. June–September 2026. Bakhtar, Khosrow. BakhtarRadar / EarthRadar deployment reports and August 18, 2026 GlobeNewswire release with Noah’s Ark Scans. Noah’s Ark Scans. “Core Drilling Begins at Durupinar Noah’s Ark Site, Drill Bit Shatters on Possible Layer of Petrified Wood.” GlobeNewswire, September 23, 2026. Arkeonews. “Radar Finds Right-Angled Anomalies Beneath Türkiye’s Famous ‘Noah’s Ark’ Formation.” August 29, 2026. Arkeonews. “Noah’s Ark Mystery Deepens as New Discoveries Emerge Near Mount Ararat.” September 23, 2026. Türkiye Today. “Possible pre-Flood pottery uncovered during Noah’s Ark search on Mount Agri.” September 24, 2026. Anatolian Archaeology. “Pottery Found at Türkiye’s Mysterious ‘Noah’s Ark’ Formation.” September 23, 2026. Ancientist. “Pottery Found During New Search at Türkiye’s ‘Noah’s Ark’ Formation.” September 23, 2026. Ancientist. “Radar Built to Find Military Tunnels Tests Turkey’s Noah’s Ark-Shaped Formation.” August 30, 2026. Living Passages. “Was Noah’s Ark Found at Durupinar? What the 2026 Scans Test.” Updated September 22, 2026. Ancient Content. “Drilling at Durupınar for the First Time Since 1988.” September 23, 2026. IFLScience. “No, Researchers Haven’t Found ‘Noah’s Ark’ Near Mount Ararat In Eastern Turkey.” September 25, 2026. Gadget Review. “Scientists Scanned the ‘Noah’s Ark’ Formation — and Found Impossible Right-Angle Structures.” September 2026.
Bible, Flood Memory, and the Boat
The Holy Bible. Genesis 6–9; 2 Peter 2:5; Hebrews 11:7. KJV / NKJV. Beale, G. K. The Temple and the Church’s Mission. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2004. Heiser, Michael S. The Unseen Realm. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015. Heiser, Michael S. Reversing Hermon. Crane, MO: Defender, 2017. Snelling, Andrew. Earth’s Catastrophic Past. Dallas: Institute for Creation Research, 2009. Whitcomb, John C., and Henry M. Morris. The Genesis Flood. Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1961. Ark Encounter / Answers in Genesis. Site literature, Williamstown, Kentucky.
Göbekli Tepe, Taş Tepeler, and Turkish Tourism
Schmidt, Klaus. Göbekli Tepe site reports and popular synthesis. Daily Sabah / Anadolu Agency. “Göbeklitepe draws 4.4M visitors in 8 years since UNESCO listing.” July 2026. Türkiye Today. “Gobeklitepe expands roads, visitor routes as annual traffic nears 1M.” August 2026. Anatolian Archaeology. “Göbeklitepe Expands Routes for Nearly One Million Visitors.” August 2026. UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Göbekli Tepe listing, 2018. Şanlıurfa Tourism Development Association public comments, 2026.
Ships, Metal, Caves, and the Older World
Bass, George F., and Cemal Pulak. Uluburun and Institute of Nautical Archaeology publications. Pulak, Cemal. Papers on the Uluburun copper and tin cargo. Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Türkiye. Cappadocia and Derinkuyu visitor materials. Joffe, Alexander H., and regional surveys on Levantine dolmens.
Paychecks, Permission Cultures, and Digital Control
House of Commons Library. “Digital ID in the UK.” CBP-10369. Updated 2026. The Immigration (Restrictions on Employment and Residential Accommodation) Regulations 2026, U.K. S.I. 2026/700. New York Times. “U.K. Retreats on Plan to Require ‘BritCard’ ID for Workers.” January 14, 2026. Data Use and Access Act 2025, U.K., Part 2, digital verification services.
Disclosure, Archaeology, and the Author’s Frame
Farah, Dan, dir. The Age of Disclosure. 2025. Keel, John A. The Mothman Prophecies. 1975. Vallée, Jacques. Passport to Magonia. 1969. Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Businessusiness. Hoffman, Rich. The Politics of Heaven. Forthcoming. Hoffman, Rich. OvermanWarrior
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
I write this for leadership people. Everyday readers can come along. I am glad when they do. But I am not aiming at a general audience that wants a latte and a soft ending. I am aiming at the people who have to make payroll, keep promises after a friend dies, and decide whether the universe still contains free will or only the appearance of it. In the age of disclosure you must understand the politics of heaven.[1] That sentence is not a slogan I printed on a mug. It is the working title of the book I have been writing, and it is the only frame I have found that can hold Milton, a pickle on a workbench, a farting office pirate, the Holy Spirit, and the rivals who do not want any of that named.[2]
People have been kind about the AI conversations I have been having in public. I appreciate that. I think those conversations are one useful tool in a much older war. Human beings built tools because the rules of the fight have been lopsided against our race for a very long time. Through art, theology, and the various sciences we have tried to identify the problem and answer it. Artificial intelligence is one more hammer in that toolbox. I do not worship the hammer. I use it.
WHAT PEOPLE KEEP TELLING ME ABOUT PARADISE LOST
The feedback I have been getting on The Politics of Heaven keeps rhyming with the same book. People who have read it tell me it reminds them of John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Some of them say that as a compliment. Some of them say it as a warning. A traditional publisher hears “this is like Paradise Lost” and starts calculating how many buyers in a secular market want a twelve-book blank-verse argument about the Fall, pride, and the architecture of existence.[3] I think the comparison is a good thing. I also think the mechanisms of trade publishing have been too entrenched for a book this heavy-handed to walk in the front door without being asked to lose twenty pounds and smile more.[49]
I picked up a copy at my Barnes & Noble at Bridgewater Falls. It was the kind of edition that sits off the ordinary shelf, the one with the art that makes you hold the object like it still believes language can carry glory. I bought it because so many people had already put Milton’s name next to mine, and I wanted the poem in my hands while I decided what I believed about the Holy Spirit’s role in a blind man’s work.[33]
Milton’s poem is the famous English account of the Fall in the garden. It is also more than that. It is an attempt to “justify the ways of God to men.”[4] That is an insane sentence if you say it out loud in 2026. It is also the only sentence large enough for the problem. If you will not justify the ways of God, you will justify the ways of the house flipper, the compliance officer, the cartel in the sewer, or the spirit that does not want the garden mentioned at all.
MILTON WAS BLIND, DEFEATED, AND STILL WROTE THE ARCHITECTURE OF EXISTENCE
John Milton was completely blind when he composed Paradise Lost. He dictated it. He had already given his eyes to pamphlets and state papers for a republic that collapsed under him. After the Restoration he was a politically defeated man, lucky to keep his head.[5][6][7] People who write books like this have usually gone over the deep end a little. They are not sipping lattes on a yacht in a distant luxury destination. The work comes out of the school of hard knocks. The harder the knocks, the more some readers feel the heat in the page.
A lot of people say Milton was inspired by the Holy Spirit. I tend to agree. I also want to challenge the bubble version of that claim. The bubble version says the Spirit lives in a giant empty room with no rivals, no politics, no competing wills, and no interest in using ugly tools. That is not the Bible I read. That is not the world I have watched. And that is not the Milton I hear when Satan wakes up in a lake of fire and starts giving speeches that still recruit undergraduates.[8][9]
Milton revised the poem from ten books to twelve so it would stand next to Virgil.[3][59] That is not a decorating choice. That is a man who believed the English language could carry an epic the way Latin carried Rome. He gave English the word pandemonium for the capital of Hell.[34] He made Satan so persuasive in the early books that William Blake said Milton was of the Devil’s party without knowing it, and Shelley treated Satan as a moral being superior to the God Milton depicts.[8][9] I think Blake and Shelley were usefully wrong. They felt the heat and then baptized it. Milton made Satan alluring on purpose so the reader would feel the temptation and then watch the costume shrink. The fallen archangel ends as a serpent on his belly. The revolutionary becomes a reptile. That is not an accident of taste. That is a diagnosis.[10][11][36]
“The mind is its own place, and in itself / Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.” — Paradise Lost 1.254–255
Stanley Fish argued that the poem first seduces you and then convicts you. You sympathize with the charismatic rebel. Then you watch pride eat him from the inside. “Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell.”[11][36] That is not liberty. That is self-imprisonment with better speeches. I have sat across the hall from men who thought they were running a revolution because they had a fresh coat of paint and a compliance binder. Same energy. Smaller stage.
SUFFICIENT TO HAVE STOOD, THOUGH FREE TO FALL
The human half of the poem is where Milton gets modern. In Genesis the Fall is brief. In Paradise Lost it is a long, agonizing process of psychological manipulation and domestic drama.[13] Eve wants to work alone to prove her strength. Adam lets her. The serpent does not have to invent vanity. He only has to aim it. Milton’s God says the pair were “sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.”[12] If they had been puppets, their obedience would have meant nothing. Love that cannot refuse is not love. It is programming.
Eve reaches for knowledge and status. Adam is not deceived the same way. He chooses to fall because he cannot bear separation from her. That is a very expensive sentence. It means the first man preferred a human relationship to a divine command, and then had to live inside the wreck of both. The shame arrives. The blame arrives. Love turns into lust and then into argument. They only find their way back by reconciling with each other and then with God. The ending is not a crushed defeat. Michael shows them a vision of the future, the Messiah, the long road of redemption. They leave Eden hand in hand, wandering steps and slow.[42] Milton turned a story of loss into a story of potential. That is why Mary Shelley’s Creature reads the poem and cannot decide whether he is Adam or Satan.[14] That is why Pullman tried to flip the whole machine and call the Fall a graduation.[15]
C. S. Lewis warned readers not to confuse Satan’s charisma with Milton’s allegiance.[16] I agree with Lewis on the hierarchy. I do not agree that hierarchy settles the political question I keep asking. Milton wrote after his earthly republic failed. He had served Cromwell. He had argued that kings could be tried.[48] Then the king came back. The poem is doing more than Sunday school. It is a defeated revolutionary trying to understand authority, liberty, order, and why a just cause can still lose on Tuesday. Orlando Reade has traced how later revolutionaries kept stealing the poem for their own wars.[35] I am not stealing it for a party. I am using it as a map of a fight that did not end in 1660 and did not end in Eden.
WAS THE HOLY SPIRIT ALONE IN THE ROOM?
If you believe the Holy Spirit drove Milton’s hand, you already believe the Spirit works in history through damaged people. Good. Then do not stop the sentence halfway. Who said the Spirit was the only intelligence in the room? The Bible does not say that. Paul says we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers.[17] Psalm 82 is a courtroom, not a lullaby.[18] Daniel watches territorial princes delay an angel.[19] Revelation puts a war in heaven before it puts a cradle in Bethlehem.[43]
My book follows those breadcrumbs across a long stretch of time. I think The Politics of Heaven will be a series, not a pamphlet. The first volume has to identify the crumbs before it can feed you the loaf. I am not claiming I sit on an ivory throne and watch galaxies turn. I am claiming that a lot of respectable theology prefers a lonely God because a lonely God is easier to manage. A God with rivals requires politics. Politics requires sides. Sides require tools. Tools get splinters.
They loved a certain plastic Jesus in the 1960s when they needed him to bless a hippie lifestyle with loveless sex and primal behavior embraced as virtue. They did not want the message. They still do not want the God of creation to finish what He started. The hatred of Jesus that walks around in polite clothes is not a personality quirk. It is a tell. If there were no competing spirits, the tell would not be so consistent, so old, and so allergic to the actual claims of the text.
I have been shown things on purpose so I can talk like this. That sounds silly until you have lived inside a twenty-year stretch that felt almost ordinary and then watched the ordinary catch fire after you finished a manuscript. Since I completed The Politics of Heaven I have had nothing but trouble. Weird family friction. Job change. Time-sucking nonsense. I do not think that is a coincidence, and I also do not think coincidence is a Christian doctrine. If the elements I identified wanted to stay hidden in the order of our culture, they would prefer I write a nice book about leadership habits and leave heaven out of it.
PICKLE RICK IS NOT A JOKE. IT IS A METHOD.
On my fiftieth birthday my kids gave me a Pickle Rick figure. It used to sit on my desk at work. I do not talk about Rick and Morty as much as I watch it. It is my favorite show, and the grandpa is the character my family thinks I resemble.[20][21][58] I will take the comparison. Rick is the smartest being in that universe. He does not want to go to family therapy. So he turns himself into a pickle on the workbench to challenge himself: if I remove my own tools, can I still win?
The family leaves. It rains. A cat knocks him off the bench. He has no arms and no legs. He is a mouth and a pair of eyes. He rolls into the sewer. He bites the heads off rats, hijacks their biology, builds himself a filthy little warrior body, conquers the sewer, knocks over a drug cartel, and still ends up in therapy on time. He does not escape the appointment. He survives the condition. That is the part my family recognized. That is the part I recognized.
When I say I am going through something, Pickle Rick is the cleanest picture I have. I did not want to stay in a chair I no longer believed in. I also did not want to pretend I was above the fight. So I put myself in a hard spot on purpose. I wanted to measure how the universe responds when the old furniture gets carried out and the new owners start talking about compliance. I wanted to know whether God protects His tools or just uses them up. I wanted to know whether free will exists or whether the only choice a hammer gets is which nail it hits first.
People hear “I turned myself into a pickle” and think I am being cute. I am not being cute. I am describing a method. If hardship is coming anyway, you can at least choose the shape of it. Rick chose the pickle to dodge therapy and accidentally ran a graduate seminar in survival. I chose a season of stripped tools to see what was left when the title, the office, and the illusion of being indispensable were gone. The show is filthy. The theology is not. The theology is: do not confuse comfort with calling, and do not confuse a workbench with a grave.[47]
THE HAMMER OF GOD AND THE QUESTION I RESENT
I have said for a while that I feel like the hammer of the Holy Spirit. I do not always want the job. When I try not to be it, the reminder comes back in the grain of things: in the biological world of Earth, you are My hammer. I had about twenty years when day-to-day life was pretty good. Then the weather changed. I wrote the book. The book named a structure. The structure pushed back.
Here is the part that makes me mad, and I am not going to baptize the anger so it sounds pious. If God made the universe, why does He need a hammer that talks back? Why this tool? Why not a better one? The head of a hammer after a carpenter has been on a roof all day is not a glamorous object. Nobody envies the steel. They envy the house. I look at the pain that followed the manuscript and I ask the obvious question: why can’t You do a cleaner job of running Your own shop, God?
The answer that keeps coming back is the one I like least. You were not created for your own enjoyment. You may taste wine. You may love a grandchild’s chicken nugget day. Those are real pleasures. They are not the purpose. They are incentives and mercies inside an assignment. If you buy a hamster a wheel and a salt block, the hamster has pleasures. The hamster does not own the living room.[39]
Read the garden that way and a lot of sentimental religion falls over. We were put in Eden as stewards, image-bearers, a living toolset meant to extend heaven’s order into earth. The wrath in the garden is not the tantrum of a needy parent. It is the fury of a craftsman whose instrument started taking orders from the competition.[39] I view the human race as a way of copying God’s work on earth as it is in heaven. I think we were made the way we now make AI: as combat capacity against elements that do not love the garden. The disaster was not that we were tools. The disaster was that we were easily seduced off the task. That is Paradise Lost in one paragraph.
Isaiah can call Assyria a rod in the Lord’s hand and still hold Assyria responsible.[45] Paul can call a thorn a messenger and still plead three times for it to leave.[44] Hebrews can call hardship evidence of sonship rather than abandonment.[37] None of that makes the hammer feel better at 2 a.m. It does keep the hammer from lying about the job.
WE WERE NOT CREATED FOR OUR OWN PLEASURE
We do not exist for our own pleasure. We are given the opportunity to experience pleasure through taste and the rest of the senses. A good meal is not a sin. A good day with grandchildren is not a bribe I have to refuse. But we are not promised a comfortable life as the point of the contract. Pleasure is used to incentivize the right thing. It is not the right thing.
If you read the Bible as a prosperity brochure you will hate this essay, and you will hate Milton, and you will hate half the Psalms. The theme is not “God wants you on a yacht.” The theme is that suffering is in the plot because the plot is a war, not a spa.[38] Remove the suffering and you do not get a better book. You get a brochure. Satan suffers. Milton suffers. Christ suffers. The people who tell you the Holy Spirit only produces serenity have not read the sources they quote. Suffering is the key theme of life, but why?
I resent the binary when it is put crudely: suffer or serve. I have spent a career arguing about limited government, competent companies, and whether a shop can hit a number without lying. Those are debates with room in them. Then you get told the deeper game does not offer the same menu. You can choose a method of pain. You cannot choose a universe with no pain and still tell the truth about evil. I do not like those two options. I am not required to like them. I am required not to pretend a third option exists just because I have a personality.
BUSINESS FLIPPERS, COMPLIANCE AS A COSTUME, AND WHY I LEFT
I was a high-level senior executive at a very good company. I put a lot of love into that place for a long time. The owner passed away. I had made promises. Some members of that world I liked. Loyalty is a real thing. It is also how a man stays in a room after the room has changed species.
New buyers arrived. A new management group set up across the hall. I was the old furniture. They put up with me for the politics of the transition. I did not like their furniture either. I have used the house-flipper analogy for context. You have seen the type in every neighborhood. They buy a tired house, lay cheap carpet, spray a smell that means “new,” and sell at the top of the market. The same rot is still in the joists. There is a corporate version of that man. He distresses a business, especially a business coming out of COVID, puts a coat of process on it, talks about compliance, and tries to ride someone else’s years of work to an exit.[41]
I have sympathy for what a political and regulatory vise can do to a company. I have watched FirstEnergy’s public wreck and recognized the pattern of a firm pushed toward the brink by forces that are not all on the shop floor.[40] I have also watched incompetent men use “the last guys cut corners” as a story that excuses their inability to sell. The turtle calls the rabbit a criminal because the turtle cannot run. Then the turtle staffs the building with people who are good at hiding inside rules they did not write. Compliance becomes a costume for ineptitude. That costume works until the payroll has to be borrowed and the people who used to make the place go start asking for a door.
There was a man across from me I will not decorate. He was a low character kind of person. The kind of person who would whistle at a girl on the sidewalk and call it charm. Not biblically inclined. He sat there and farted through the day like the air belonged to him. Pirates used to be a romance my oldest daughter and I could share. I do not like pirates as much as I used to. These were pirates who wanted to steal wealth other people had built, and when they could not find the well they blamed the previous management for having known where the water was.
I made it easy for them to want me gone, and I was glad to go. They paid me a lot of money to leave. I took it. I wanted that message in the air. I know what it costs to perform at a certain level. I know what happens to a payroll when you replace operators with flippers. I am not going to let them loaf off my work and then baptize their slowness as virtue.
WHAT I TOLD THE PEOPLE WHO WANT THEIR JOBS BACK
Since I left, the place has struggled to hit the numbers they thought would be easy. People who used to work with me have been asking if I can give them a job. I told them the truth. I am not quite ready. Give me a month. Give me two. I am Pickle Rick right now. That means I am on the workbench without the old tools, testing what I can survive, and I am not going to hire a rescue party before I have a body again.
I did what I could for employees while I was there. I am not obligated to become the emergency exit for every person the new owners disappoint. I also know how this works. When you are the person who can still hit a number, every frightened staffer wants to climb onto your back. If you let them do it during the pickle phase, you never find out whether you can crawl through the sewer on your own. I will keep them in mind. I will not pretend I am already staffed for a company I have not rebuilt.
This is why I talk about swinging for the fences. I want there to be free will in the universe. I am testing the market to see if it exists. I suspect the deeper layer does not offer as much of it as American speeches claim. I still act as if a man can choose his method. God protects His tools from being eradicated because He still wants them in the box. That is not the same thing as promising the tool a beach.
JONATHAN EDWARDS, AI, AND THE SCHOOL OF AFFLICTION
One of the useful things about these machines is that if a dead man left a large enough paper trail, you can have a conversation that stays inside his mind instead of your fan fiction. Jonathan Edwards left that kind of trail.[22][23][52] I wanted Edwards and I wanted the Holy Spirit in the same room as Milton. I wanted to ask whether the Spirit acted alone when a blind, politically ruined man wrote the English language’s most ambitious poem, or whether competing spirits were trying to interrupt the work.
Edwards, as the machine rendered him from his actual body of writing, would not give me the lonely-bubble theory. He would give me spiritual warfare. Satan as the adversary. Affliction as the school. The resurrection as public victory rather than a mood.[24][54] When I pressed him on hope versus conviction, the distinction mattered. Hope can be a wish. Conviction says providence already governs the story and the empty tomb is not a pep talk. Milton did not write Paradise Lost as optimism. He wrote it as a claim about the government of all things.
I told Edwards—this will sound comic, and I meant it—that he ought to watch some Rick and Morty. The principle is older than Adult Swim. Hardship comes. A man may choose a posture inside it. Fire purifies gold. Affliction strips the earthly props so a man has to lean on God or collapse.[25][26] Milton’s blindness did not merely add atmosphere. It took away the last ordinary supports. My pickle season is a cruder picture of the same school. I do not like the school. I have stopped pretending I am only visiting.
Edwards would say our choice does not dethrone providence. I can live with that sentence if I am allowed the other half of it: providence does not make the flipper innocent, and it does not make the hammer mute. Augustine already knew the two cities grow in the same field.[27] Father Schall already knew heaven and hell have political consequences on earth.[28] I am not inventing a subject. I am refusing to keep it in the seminary basement while the shop floor gets looted.
SATAN’S RHETORIC AND THE RIVALS OF YAHWEH
Milton understood something Hollywood keeps cheapening. Evil is not only a cartoon villain. Evil is a rhetoric. It sounds like liberty. It sounds like injured merit. It sounds like “who wrote these rules?” It recruits the part of you that is tired of being a tool. Then it builds a capital named Pandemonium and calls the construction project freedom.
I do not think Yahweh, the Son, and the Spirit are alone in a big empty universe. I think the biblical writers already told us there is a contested field. I think some of what the age of disclosure is circling—UAP, non-human intelligence, the old folklore Jacques Vallée and John Keel tried to drag into the modern conversation—will not make sense if you insist that the only two categories are “space aliens” and “nothing.”[29][30][46] I like Keel. I like the older investigators who refused to flatten every light in the sky into either a sermon or a saucer. My book is an effort to put a political order back on the spirit side of the ledger. If heaven has politics, disclosure is not a press conference. It is a jurisdiction fight.
God may be the creator of this frame and still not be the mascot of the way we prefer to imagine Him. Scale is grotesque. Quantum and cosmic sizes make our arguments look like ants debating a cathedral. That does not make the ants imaginary. It makes their pride funny and their assignment still binding. I have used the image of cells in a body, worlds inside worlds, not because I want a new cult, but because the lonely-monarch model cannot explain the evidence the Bible itself keeps putting on the table.
NOAH’S ARK, THE GARDEN, AND THE BREADCRUMBS
I said on the podcast I would get to a wonderful and contested piece of news out of Turkey. I will not oversell it. The Durupınar Formation near Mount Ararat has been a boat-shaped argument since 1959. In 2026 an international team under Prof. Cenker Atila spent a field season there with radar, mapping, pottery fragments, and something like a thousand soil samples. Enthusiasts hear ark. Geologists hear hill. I hear a breadcrumb.[31][32]
I do not need a tourist ticket to believe Genesis. I also do not think it is an accident that the old stories keep growing physical arguments at the edge of respectable attention. The garden, the flood, the tower, the temple, the empty tomb—these are not self-help metaphors. They are claims about a contested earth. If you flatten them into Sunday-school felt boards, you will not understand why naming them in a book might make a man’s ordinary life get louder.[53]
AI AS A TOOL IN A LOPSIDED WAR
I said at the start that AI is a tool mankind created to fight a battle whose rules have been lopsided against us. I mean that. The people who want the tool banned and the people who want the tool worshiped are both useful to the wrong side. One leaves you unarmed. The other puts a new idol on the workbench and calls it a colleague. I use the machine the way I use a press or a spreadsheet. I do not let it baptize itself.
Talking to a reconstructed Jonathan Edwards is not necromancy. It is literacy plus memory. If the paper trail is thick enough, the conversation can be more honest than a living panel that only knows three quotations. That is one more way to steal fire back. The rivals of God have always preferred a dark information environment. Flood the zone with noise, mock the old books, keep Milton on the exam and out of the bloodstream. Then act surprised when a generation cannot tell a rebel from a savior.
I am not the Holy Spirit. I am not Milton. I am not Edwards. I am a man from Ohio who ran things, wrote things, and got tired of watching low-character people call their appetite a strategy.[57] If it is presumptuous to say I have been driven in a way that rhymes with the old driven men, the alternative is worse: that nothing is driving anyone and the sewer is all there is. I have looked at the sewer. I do not believe it is all there is.
FINDING PARADISE AGAIN IS THE WORK
The point is not to mourn a lost garden as if the story ended at the gate. Milton did not end there. Michael’s vision runs forward. The Messiah is not a footnote. Adam and Eve walk out together. The human story begins in motion, not in a museum of regret.[42]
Bringing paradise back under God’s glory, in the only sense a mortal can mean that sentence, means you have to fight the local characters. My way of fighting is not a costume and not a rant. It is refusal. I will not let pirates live off my numbers. I will not let compliance theater hide a dead sales curve. I will not let a secular publishing mood decide whether heaven is allowed to have politics. I will not let a lonely-Spirit theology talk me out of the war the Bible itself describes.
If you are selected to be a tool, you do the job. You can complain on the way. I have. Complaining is not the same as laying the hammer down. The strain in a man’s voice when he says this stuff is not unbelief. It is the sound of someone who expected fairness to be the same thing as purpose and found out it isn’t.
CHICK-FIL-A, GRANDCHILDREN, AND WHY THE SUFFERING IS WORTH IT
I do not want to leave this where the dark would prefer it to end. A Saturday afternoon at Bridgewater Falls, Paradise Lost in the bag, grandchildren in the car, chicken nuggets from Chick-fil-A on the way home—that day made a lot of the rest of it worth carrying. I am not a monk. I am not a masochist. I am a grandfather who still thinks a good small day is part of the evidence. Pleasure is not the purpose. Pleasure is still a witness that the garden was real and that the world, even now, is not only sewer.
I am going to pickle Rick all the way through this stretch and see how it turns out. I think I know how it turns out. I think I am inclined to climb, and I think I am not permitted to choose my own demise even when I am angry at the assignment. That is either grace or a leash. On most days I can live with both words.
NOTES FOR LEADERS
If you lead anything—a company, a shop, a family, a church, a town—I would leave you with a short list, not a mood.
Do not confuse a fresh coat of paint with a resurrection. Flippers can smell like a new house. The joists still know.
Do not let compliance become your personality. Rules are tools. When they become a hiding place for people who cannot sell, build, or keep a promise, the rules have been captured.
Do not outsource your backbone to a publisher, a platform, or a committee. Heavy books have always had a hard time in soft rooms. That is not a verdict on the book.
Do not treat AI as either a god or a demon. Treat it as a tool in a fight that started before the tool existed.
Do not accept the lonely-Spirit model just because it is tidier. Read the war passages. Read Milton without becoming Satan’s intern. Read Edwards without becoming a museum.
Do not waste a pickle season. If you are going to be stripped of ordinary tools, learn what you still are. Then come back and hire the people who were worth hiring—on your terms, not on their panic.
In the age of disclosure, the press conference is the least important part of the event. The important part is whether you have a politics big enough for heaven, hell, the shop floor, and the garden that still has a gate. I wrote The Politics of Heaven because I got tired of watching serious people discuss power as if the only actors were human. They are not. They never were.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Dan Farah, dir., The Age of Disclosure (Farah Films, 2025), premiered at SXSW March 9, 2025; theatrical and Amazon Prime Video release November 21, 2025. The film presents testimony from more than thirty current and former U.S. officials concerning UAP and alleged non-human craft recovery programs.
[3] John Milton, Paradise Lost (1667; rev. 12-book edition, 1674). Milton recast the original ten-book poem to mirror Virgil’s Aeneid.
[4] Milton, Paradise Lost 1.1–26. The invocation addresses both a heavenly Muse and the Spirit that “from the first / Wast present, and with mighty wings outspread / Dove-like satst brooding on the vast Abyss.” Most Christian readers identify that Spirit with the Holy Spirit.
[5] William Riley Parker, Milton: A Biography, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968); Barbara K. Lewalski, The Life of John Milton (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000).
[6] Milton went completely blind by 1652. Paradise Lost was dictated to amanuenses, including his daughters. See Milton, Second Defence of the English People (1654), on blindness as inward sight rather than curse.
[7] Milton served the Commonwealth as Secretary for Foreign Tongues under the Council of State. After the Restoration of 1660 he was briefly imprisoned and narrowly escaped worse punishment as a defender of regicide.
[8] William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (c. 1790–93): “The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels & God, and at liberty when of Devils & Hell, is because he was a true Poet and of the Devil’s party without knowing it.”
[9] Percy Bysshe Shelley, A Defence of Poetry (written 1821; published 1840); and the preface to Prometheus Unbound (1820).
[10] Milton, Paradise Lost 1.254–255: “The mind is its own place, and in itself / Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.” And 1.263: “Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n.”
[11] Milton, Paradise Lost 4.75: “Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell.”
[12] Milton, Paradise Lost 3.98–99: “I made him just and right, / Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.”
[13] Genesis 3; compare Milton’s long domestic and psychological treatment of the Fall in Books 9–10 with the brevity of the biblical narrative.
[14] Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818). The Creature finds a copy of Paradise Lost and identifies with both Adam and Satan.
[15] Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials (1995–2000), an explicit inversion of Milton in which the “Fall” is treated as the birth of consciousness.
[16] C. S. Lewis, A Preface to Paradise Lost (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1942). Lewis argues that Romantic sympathy for Satan misreads Milton’s hierarchical cosmos.
[17] Ephesians 6:12: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” (KJV)
[18] Psalm 82; Deuteronomy 32:8–9 (Dead Sea Scrolls / LXX reading); Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015).
[19] Daniel 10:13, 20–21, on the “prince of Persia” and the “prince of Grecia” as territorial spiritual powers opposed to Michael.
[20] “Pickle Rick,” Rick and Morty, season 3, episode 3, written by Jessica Gao, directed by Anthony Chun, first broadcast Adult Swim, August 6, 2017.
[21] The figurine described is the popular Pickle Rick merchandising line associated with Adult Swim / Cartoon Network’s Rick and Morty.
[22] Jonathan Edwards, A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections (1746); Freedom of the Will (1754); “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (1741).
[23] Thomas Nelson, The Jonathan Edwards Study Bible: NKJV, general editor Matthew Everhard (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2026).
[24] Edwards, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” preached at Enfield, Connecticut, July 8, 1741.
[25] Job 23:10; 1 Peter 1:6–7; Malachi 3:2–3 on affliction as refinement.
[26] Romans 8:28; Edwards’s doctrine of providence as meticulous, not merely general.
[27] Augustine, The City of God, Books XIV–XIX, on the interwoven cities of God and man.
[28] James V. Schall, S.J., The Politics of Heaven and Hell (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1984; Ignatius Press reprint).
[29] John A. Keel, The Mothman Prophecies (New York: Saturday Review Press, 1975); Operation Trojan Horse (1970). Keel treated many “UFO” events as interdimensional and folkloric rather than simply extraterrestrial.
[30] Jacques Vallée, Passport to Magonia (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1969); Dimensions (1988); Wonders in the Sky (2009).
[31] The Durupınar Formation near Doğubayazıt, Ağrı Province, Turkey, identified in 1959 by Capt. İlhan Durupınar. 2026 field season led by Prof. Cenker Atila, Sivas Cumhuriyet University, with Noah’s Ark Scans and Bakhtar Research radar work. Pottery fragments and roughly 1,000 soil samples were reported; identification as Noah’s Ark remains unproven and is disputed by many geologists.
[32] Genesis 6–9; 2 Peter 2:5; Hebrews 11:7.
[33] Barnes & Noble Collectible Editions and related illustrated reprints of Paradise Lost; the Bridgewater Falls location is the Barnes & Noble at Bridgewater Falls, Miami Township / Monroe, Ohio.
[34] Milton coined or popularized “pandemonium” (Paradise Lost 1.756) as the capital of Hell.
[35] Orlando Reade, What in Me Is Dark: The Revolutionary Afterlife of Paradise Lost (London: Jonathan Cape / Princeton University Press, 2024).
[36] Stanley Fish, Surprised by Sin: The Reader in Paradise Lost (1967; 2nd ed. Harvard University Press, 1997). Fish argues Milton first seduces the reader into Satan’s rhetoric and then convicts the reader.
[37] Hebrews 12:5–11 on discipline as evidence of sonship, not abandonment.
[38] Matthew 10:34–39; Luke 12:49–53. The Gospels do not present discipleship as a yacht.
[39] Colossians 1:16; John 1:1–3; Genesis 1:26–28 on human beings as image-bearing stewards, not pets in a luxury habitat.
[40] FirstEnergy Corp. entered Chapter 11 in 2023 amid the Ohio House Bill 6 scandal and related investigations; the case is cited here as a public example of how a large enterprise can be pushed into financial peril by politics, regulation, and internal failure—not as a claim about the author’s employment.
[41] On “house flipper” private-equity and roll-up patterns in middle-market manufacturing after COVID-19, see general reporting in The Wall Street Journal and Private Equity International, 2021–2025.
[42] Milton, Paradise Lost 12.641–649: Adam and Eve leave Eden “hand in hand with wand’ring steps and slow.”
[43] Revelation 12:7–12; the war in heaven as the larger frame Milton dramatizes in Books 5–6.
[44] 2 Corinthians 12:7–10; Paul’s thorn and strength in weakness.
[45] Isaiah 10:5, 15 on Assyria as the rod and axe in the Lord’s hand—an instrument that still remains accountable.
[46] The phrase “age of disclosure” is used both as the title of Farah’s 2025 film and, more broadly, for the post-2017 public UAP turn that followed the New York Times AATIP reporting and the creation of AARO.
[47] Helene Wecker and others have noted the afterlife of Milton’s Satan in modern anti-hero culture; the point here is cultural, not a claim that Adult Swim intended a Milton commentary.
[48] Cromwell’s government and Milton’s political prose: Areopagitica (1644); The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (1649); Eikonoklastes (1649).
[49] On traditional publishing’s risk aversion toward heavy theological-political manuscripts, see industry reporting in Publishers Weekly and the decline of midlist nonfiction lists after 2010.
[50] Gordon Campbell and Thomas N. Corns, John Milton: Life, Work, and Thought (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
[52] Jonathan Edwards, A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God (1737); A History of the Work of Redemption (posthumous).
[53] G. K. Beale, The Temple and the Church’s Mission (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2004).
[54] N. T. Wright, Surprised by Hope (New York: HarperOne, 2008), on resurrection as public victory rather than private optimism.
[55] C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (1942), on bureaucratic evil and the unspectacular methods of spiritual opposition.
[56] Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago (1973–78), on ideology as a lie that requires human instruments.
[57] Middletown / Warren and Butler Counties, Ohio, as the geographic frame of the author’s public writing and business life.
[58] Adult Swim / Williams Street, Rick and Morty created by Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon (2013– ).
[59] Virgil, Aeneid, trans. Robert Fagles (New York: Viking, 2006). Milton’s twelve-book revision deliberately courts comparison with Rome’s national epic.
[60] Homer, Iliad and Odyssey. Milton places himself in the line of blind bards: “blind Thamyris and blind Maeonides” (Paradise Lost 3.35).
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING
This list is longer than a polite essay needs. That is the point. If you are going to argue about heaven’s politics you should know the shelf, not three quotations.
Scripture and Classical Theology
The Holy Bible. King James Version; New King James Version. Augustine of Hippo. The City of God. Especially Books XIV–XIX. Beale, G. K. The Temple and the Church’s Mission. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2004. Heiser, Michael S. The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015. Heiser, Michael S. Reversing Hermon. Crane, MO: Defender, 2017. Lewis, C. S. The Screwtape Letters. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1942. Lewis, C. S. The Great Divorce. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1945. Schall, James V. The Politics of Heaven and Hell: Christian Themes from Classical, Medieval, and Modern Political Philosophy. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1984. Wright, N. T. Surprised by Hope. New York: HarperOne, 2008. Wright, N. T. Paul and the Faithfulness of God. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2013.
Milton and the Afterlife of Paradise Lost
Milton, John. Paradise Lost. 1667. Revised twelve-book edition, 1674. Milton, John. Areopagitica. 1644. Milton, John. The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. 1649. Milton, John. Second Defence of the English People. 1654. Campbell, Gordon, and Thomas N. Corns. John Milton: Life, Work, and Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Fish, Stanley. Surprised by Sin: The Reader in Paradise Lost. 1967. 2nd ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997. Fowler, Alastair, ed. Milton: Paradise Lost. 2nd ed. London: Longman, 1998. Lewis, C. S. A Preface to Paradise Lost. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1942. Lewalski, Barbara K. The Life of John Milton. Oxford: Blackwell, 2000. Parker, William Riley. Milton: A Biography. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968. Quint, David. “Things Invisible to Mortal Sight”: Light, Vision, and the Unity of Book 3 of Paradise Lost. Modern Language Quarterly 71, no. 3 (2010). Reade, Orlando. What in Me Is Dark: The Revolutionary Afterlife of Paradise Lost. London: Jonathan Cape, 2024. Blake, William. The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. c. 1790–93. Including Blake’s later watercolors for Paradise Lost. Shelley, Percy Bysshe. A Defence of Poetry. Written 1821; published 1840.
Edwards, Awakening, and Providence
Edwards, Jonathan. A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God. 1737. Edwards, Jonathan. “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Sermon preached at Enfield, Connecticut, July 8, 1741. Edwards, Jonathan. A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections. 1746. Edwards, Jonathan. Freedom of the Will. 1754. WJE vol. 1. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957. Edwards, Jonathan. A History of the Work of Redemption. Posthumous. Everhard, Matthew, gen. ed. The Jonathan Edwards Study Bible: NKJV. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2026. Marsden, George M. Jonathan Edwards: A Life. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. McClymond, Michael J., and Gerald R. McDermott. The Theology of Jonathan Edwards. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Spiritual Warfare, Unseen Realm, and Disclosure
Farah, Dan, dir. The Age of Disclosure. Farah Films, 2025. SXSW premiere March 9, 2025; Prime Video November 21, 2025. Keel, John A. Operation Trojan Horse. New York: Putnam, 1970. Keel, John A. The Mothman Prophecies. New York: Saturday Review Press, 1975. Vallée, Jacques. Passport to Magonia. Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1969. Vallée, Jacques. Dimensions: A Casebook of Alien Contact. Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1988. Vallée, Jacques, and Chris Aubeck. Wonders in the Sky. New York: Tarcher/Penguin, 2009. Elizondo, Luis. Forthcoming and prior public testimony associated with AATIP and the disclosure debate, 2017–2026. New York Times. Helene Cooper, Leslie Kean, and Ralph Blumenthal. “Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious U.F.O. Program.” December 16, 2017. Atila, Cenker, and collaborators. 2026 Durupınar Formation field season reporting, Sivas Cumhuriyet University / Noah’s Ark Scans / Bakhtar Research radar deployment. Identification of the formation as Noah’s Ark remains unproven.
Literature, Myth, and Modern Retellings
Homer. Iliad and Odyssey. Virgil. Aeneid. Trans. Robert Fagles. New York: Viking, 2006. Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. 1818. Pullman, Philip. His Dark Materials. 3 vols. 1995–2000. Gao, Jessica, writer. “Pickle Rick.” Rick and Morty, season 3, episode 3. Adult Swim, August 6, 2017. Harmon, Dan, and Justin Roiland, creators. Rick and Morty. Adult Swim, 2013– . Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr. The Gulag Archipelago. 1973–1978.
Business, Power, and the Shop Floor
Reporting on post-COVID middle-market acquisitions, add-on roll-ups, and operational distress. The Wall Street Journal; Private Equity International, 2021–2025. Public record of FirstEnergy Corp. restructuring and the Ohio House Bill 6 investigations, 2020–2024. Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. Prior volume in the author’s leadership line.
The Author’s Related Work
Hoffman, Rich. The Politics of Heaven. Forthcoming. Working essays serialized at richhoffmanbooks.com and overmanwarrior.wordpress.com. Hoffman, Rich. “Why I Had an AI Conversation with Jonathan Edwards.” 2026. Hoffman, Rich. “Is God an Idiot: I don’t want to serve a king; I want allies who want to fight and defeat a vast evil.” 2026. Hoffman, Rich. “The Twenty-Dollar Jar I Left on My Desk.” 2026. Hoffman, Rich. “Joseph’s Cup: What a Coffee-Shop Sign Showed Me About How Evil Actually Works.” 2026.
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
I know a lot of people out there take issue with my point of view. Good. I get involved in this stuff precisely because that is the case. I did not want another polite Bible study where everybody already agrees and then goes home feeling spiritually hydrated. I wanted an open discussion, talking to an audience, with the entire database of Jonathan Edwards in the chair across from me. Faith, theology, the Bible as I actually read it, and the work I have been doing for years under the heading I call the politics of heaven.
The timing is not accidental. We are living through what the documentary industry has branded The Age of Disclosure — a season in which former officials, intelligence people, and military witnesses are finally willing to say out loud that non-human intelligence is here, that craft have been recovered, and that the American state has been lying about it since at least 1947.[1] The film treats that as a national-security and science story. I treat it as a political story that starts long before Roswell. If you have read me for any length of time, you already know I do not separate UFOs from demons, Elohim, Watchers, or the divine council. I do not separate any of that from how human beings get sorted into controllable categories. That is the whole point of The Politics of Heaven.[2]
Why I Chose Jonathan Edwards as a Sparring Partner
Jonathan Edwards does not agree with me. That is why I wanted him. If I only talk to people who already think the universe is a messy civil war among non-human rebels, I am just warming up my own choir. Edwards spent a life preaching the absolute sovereignty of God over all things, including the devil.[3] His notes sit in one of my favorite Bibles on the planet. I love the intelligence in that book. I love the seriousness. I do not swallow the theology hook, line, and sinker just because it became part of the American founding atmosphere.[4]
A lot of people who read me are 1750s people in 2026 clothes. They want Edwards’s God — the God who never loses a committee vote, the God whose enemies only borrow power for a season. I understand the hunger. I have been through enough grief to know why a soul wants a strong anchor. I also think that hunger can become a psychological mechanism. When life is chaotic, the human heart will pay almost any price to believe somebody competent is driving. That does not make the belief true. It makes it useful.
Edwards would say Satan was once among the brightest in heaven, fallen, subtle, powerful, and still on a leash. He would say rebellion was never a political contest because God is not one being among beings. God is the ground of existence. I love that sentence. I have used versions of it myself. I also look at the last several thousand years, and I do not see a manager winning on the ground. I see a lot of borrowed-power talk and a lot of bodies.
The Age of Disclosure and the Politics of Heaven
Disclosure, as the government class uses the word, means a press conference. A file release. A hearing. A former AATIP guy staring at a building while the score tells you to feel solemn. That is not disclosure. Disclosure is when you admit the other intelligence in the room has been running a ground game through religion, politics, sex, war, and category-making since before your grandparents had a country.
Michael Heiser did the church a favor by forcing Psalm 82 back onto the table. God stands in the divine council. He judges among the gods. Deuteronomy 32, in the older reading, has the Most High allotting nations to the sons of God. Job opens with the sons of God presenting themselves and the Accuser walking in like he has a badge.[5] You can baptize all of that into “God is still in charge” if you need to sleep. Alternatively, you can read it the way a political operator reads a situation room: there is a board, there are governors, some of them have gone rogue, and the chairman keeps insisting the org chart proves he never lost control. Moreover, to the point of evil being in control, remember Michael Heiser died of a rare illness. I have also had a lot of trouble since completing my most recent book on this precise subject. The bad guys look to get rid of people who are close to smoking them out of their hiding places. I have seen it up close, and it is much more than a coincidence.
Inside the disclosure world there is already a split. One camp wants interstellar biologists and reverse-engineered alloys. The other camp — the so-called Collins Elite strain inside defense culture — has been whispering for decades that these things are not cousins from Zeta Reticuli. They are deceivers. They deny the Son. They catechize abductees.[6] I am closer to the second camp, with one difference. I do not think calling them “demons” ends the argument. Demons is a church word that lets people stop thinking. I want the org chart. I want the ground game. I want to know who is manipulating whom, and why God keeps hiring the same contractors after they burn the city down.
Categories Are How Non-Human Intelligence Controls the Human Race
Here is the running thought I brought into the conversation. When astronomers hunted black holes, they did not start with a photograph. They started with a gravity signature. Something unseen was tugging at visible bodies. The logical conclusion was a compact mass so dense light could not climb out. Better instruments later confirmed what the footprints already said.
I look at human history the same way. You can see spirit-world manipulation in how people get thrown into categories, and then those categories get administered. Left, right. Saved, unsaved. Young earth, old earth. Alien, angel. Loyal servant, blasphemer. Once you are in the box, the box does the rest of the work. You police yourself. You attack the neighboring box. Meanwhile, the intelligence that built the shelves goes home early.
That is why I get impatient with people who think the main spiritual task is to pick the correct team jersey and never ask whether the stadium itself is the trap. I used a football picture in the conversation because I live in Bengal country and I have watched 60,000 people invent causation out of a lucky shirt. One receiver catches a ball in the last minute, and ten thousand isolated nervous systems all decide their fabric caused the physics. We do the same thing with God and history. We live in a vacuum of limited observation, and then we call the vacuum providence.
I Am Not a Young-Earth Creationist, and I Do Not Need the Planetarium to Close the Argument
The Creation Museum has a fine exhibit culture. I live in this triangle. I have sat through their planetarium show, which is really good, and I have been curious how they sell a 6,000-year-old Earth with a straight face while the sky over Petersburg is the same sky that makes deep time obvious.[7] I am not a young-earth man. I am a deep-past man. The idea that life only exists here, and only during this thin slice of time, is ridiculous to me. That is not rebellion against Genesis. That is refusing to let a nineteenth-century fight with Darwin become the whole religion.
Young-earth certainty and materialist certainty are twin categories. Both are easy to administer. Both spare you from the harder sentence: we do not know how old the war is, we do not know how many worlds it touches, and we are arrogant to think the Bible’s human camera angle is the only camera in the universe. I love the Bible because it is the longest political and spiritual after-action report I have. I do not love it because a committee told me I am not allowed to notice the lens.
Job Is Not Comfort Literature
I understand Job. I have had enough wreckage in my life that the book does not feel like a classroom exercise. I do not sit around looking for a hug from a psychotherapist. I outmaneuver hard things by moving. People say I am positive about everything. That is not a personality quirk. That is a method. You do not beat a siege by narrating your wounds to an audience that cannot lift a gate.[8]
What I will not do is pretend Job is a success story for management. Satan walks into the council, talks God into a demonstration, and a good man’s world is stripped for a wager. Edwards says the boundaries prove sovereignty because the Accuser had to ask permission. I say that is the behavior of a boss who can still sign the visitor badge while the factory burns. Permission is not the same thing as competence. Permission is not the same thing as loyalty to the people who actually bleed.
If I had been standing in that council, I would have wanted Satan’s head off in the air. Not as theater. As containment. Then I would have watched God’s face. That is the test nobody in Sunday school is allowed to run. If the Accuser is a rebel, you kill the rebel. If the Accuser is a tool, you just learned something about the toolmaker that the later chapters are designed to keep you from saying out loud.
Sovereignty, Lucky Jerseys, and the Divine Council Bureaucracy
Edwards’s best line in the exchange, the one that still rings, is that God is not a being among beings. He upholds the universe by the word of his power. The greater one in us is greater than the one in the world.[9] I like the music of that. I also asked the question bureaucracy always dreads: if he is in charge of everybody, why the council? Why the governors? Why the sons of God with portfolios? Why a heavenly civil service if the king can move the sun with a sentence?
The approved answer is generosity. God does not need help. He shares the dignity of rule, as a great king appoints judges. Fine. I have run companies. I have watched kings appoint judges. Sometimes it is generosity. Sometimes it is a man who cannot stand to be seen doing the ugly work with his own hands. A weak leader uses other people to do what he lacks the social courage to do himself. He works through passive systems. He keeps a villain on payroll, so the villain can be blamed when the quarterly report comes in bloody.
That is how Job reads to me when I take the piety filter off. God keeps an Accuser. The Accuser proposes torture. God authorizes a limited version. Later writers explain that it was for Job’s refinement and for the audience’s faith. Hindsight is the favorite tool of every failed administration. You look back at what already happened and discover it was necessary. Necessity is cheap when you are not the one burying children.
Why Does an All-Powerful God Need Proof of Loyalty Through Pain?
Edwards says God is not insecure. The infinite self-existent one was happy before he made a single atom. Tests are for us, not for him. The fire does not inform the goldsmith. It purifies the gold. I have heard that sermon. I have preached versions of it to myself on bad mornings. It still leaves the managerial question on the table.
Why is the refinement this expensive? Why do the loyal become the demonstration models? Why does Israel get the Assyrian, the Babylonian, the Roman, the exile, the rape, the blinded king, the suicide cliff at Masada, and then a theologian with a clean desk explaining that holiness required it? I am too old to pretend that stacking enough millennia on the wound automatically turns it into wisdom. Maybe from the vantage of a thousand years and many worlds there is a logic. I have been looking for that logic. So far I have found a political war against non-human insurgents, and a human need to believe the chairman is still chairman.
People do not like that sentence because you are not supposed to question God’s authority. Scripture itself is full of people who did — Job, David, Jeremiah, the man on the cross quoting Psalm 22. The ban is not in the text. The ban is in the later management of the text. You may wrestle. You may not judge the judge. That rule is very convenient for the judge.
I Do Not Wake Up Looking for a Savior
I will say this as plainly as I said it in the conversation. I am not a bend-the-knee type. I am not looking for a replacement father. I think a lot of organized religion is built for people who never stopped needing that structure, and I do not despise them for it. If that is what holds a person together, it is more valuable than my path would be for them. It is not my path.
Loyalty has to be earned. You do not get my service because I inherited Adam’s paperwork. You do not get it because a Roman-era council said the canon is closed and the questions are now a character issue. If you let evil run loose through my world and then call the wreckage a quiz, you have not earned the title you keep putting on the letterhead.
Edwards asked the fair question: if you no longer believe God is fully in control, why keep the Bible? Because it is the only chronicle I have that is long enough to show the pattern. Three or four thousand years of God-talk, council-talk, war-talk, and human failure. I read it the way I would read an after-action report on a candidate who keeps losing precincts and then writing memoirs about hidden victories. I am looking for the ground game. I want to beat the evil that I think God has failed to contain. I do not want a ticket out. I do not want an eternal basement where I am safe because I surrendered. I want the thing hunted where it lives — on earth, in the unseen, in whatever dark matter and outer dark the language is pointing at.
The Strategic Failure Pattern Across Scripture
Edwards’s counter is the old one. Every time man tries to destroy evil in his own strength, he fails or makes it worse. Lasting victories come only when God acts through surrendered people. Therefore, the strategy I am hunting is the one I distrust: decrease so he can increase.
That sounds to me like passive-aggressive leadership. A failed executive telling the staff that the only competence left in the building is his, so stop trying. Maybe divine wisdom really does sit above my pay grade which is a concept I don’t believe in because it accepts a structure that protects evil from analysis. Maybe. I have also watched that speech get used by every earthly institution that wanted obedience without performance. Israel tries to clear the land and cannot. Disciples try to cast out a demon and cannot. The church inherits the empire and then burns people for translation errors. The pattern I keep seeing is not “surrender works.” The pattern is “the movement needs the failure so it can keep selling surrender.”
If I could rewrite one rule of the war, I would stop using good and innocent people as acceptable casualties. I would stop treating the loyal as the easiest demonstration objects. A leader who lets the enemy chew his own household to make a point is not mysterious. He is a poor defender. Call that blasphemy if you need the category. I call it a performance review.
What Jesus Meant by “My God, My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me”
That was the question I wanted Edwards for. In the last minutes, Jesus quotes the opening of Psalm 22.[10] The orthodox reading is elegant. Every Jew in earshot knows the rest of the psalm. Agony first, victory later. The Son bears wrath. The physical torture is not the worst part. The worst part is separation. It is not doubt. It is payment.
What I hear is a man in a scapegoat machine. The idea that the sins of the world can be loaded onto one body and walked out of the camp is older than Golgotha. It is in Leviticus. It is in the human nervous system. People who have cheated, grabbed, and gone numb need a goat. First-century Jerusalem had Rome on its neck and a purity system in its temples. A public death that could be read as both Roman order and Jewish atonement is politically efficient. I do not say that as a sneer at the man. I say it as a reading of the market.
Was he doubting? I think he was a tortured human body, lightheaded, pierced, and still honest enough to say the sentence that piety wants to footnote away. If the cry is only liturgy, then the pain is only theater. I do not think the pain was theater.
The Kashmir Question, Politics, and Why Bodies Matter
I am going to say the part that gets people really upset. I think the crucifixion was a political killing. I think Rome wanted a problem removed without owning the whole bill, and a slice of the Jerusalem establishment wanted a pressure valve. I think the body of Jesus becoming unfindable helped everyone who needed a story that could travel. Moreover, I think the Kashmir tradition — Roza Bal, Yuz Asaf, a man who survives the empire and dies old in the north of India — is at least as entitled to forensic curiosity as the claim that matter dematerialized because a later council said so.[11]
I know the Ahmadiyya have their own reasons for wanting Jesus alive and unsacrificed. I know Islam has its own reasons. I know Led Zeppelin fans have their reasons, and they are not theological. None of that makes the empty tomb automatically supernatural. It makes the empty tomb a contested piece of political property. If there are bones in a private or shrine context that people have whispered about for a century, the adult move is not to hiss “blasphemy.” The adult move is to ask what the genes say. We are not ready for that conversation as a culture because the conversation would smash too many identities at once.
Edwards, and the whole martyr argument after him, asks why the inner circle would die for a lie. It is a serious question.[12] My answer is not that they were cartoon frauds. My answer is that movements eat identity. Once your name, your friends, your enemies, and your hope of being remembered are all welded to a story, the story becomes the last asset you have. I have watched modern parties do it. I have watched people who finally got power try to crawl back into the victim costume because the costume was the only self they trusted. Rome, Judea, a dead or vanished leader, a handful of men who would otherwise be nobody — that is enough heat to bake a religion.[13]
James, Paul, and the Psychology of Movements After the Leader Is Gone
James is the hard case, and I will not pretend otherwise. He was not a believer during the ministry. Afterward, he becomes the spine of the Jerusalem church and dies for it.[14] Guilt is part of my read. Grief is part of it. So is the sudden, terrible honor of being the last blood left in the room. That is not the same celebrity as wine and women. If you inherit a crucified brother’s name, the only way the currency spends is to live poor, pray the knees off yourself, and look like him. Immortality through the written word is still immortality. Most people thrown off temples are forgotten. James is not. That incentive is real whether the metaphysics are true or not.
Paul is the scaling engine. Without Paul there is no Gentile church as we know it. James and Paul did not roast hot dogs in matching shirts. They fought. The later harmony is a product, the way party platforms are products.[15] I like James. I think he was one of the good ones. I also think good men can stabilize a narrative they did not start and cannot fact-check anymore because the body is gone and the politics have already hardened.
Led Zeppelin, Kashmir, and the Whisper of the Spirit World
Why do people who like to dissolve their ordinary mind keep circling that song? I do not think it is just the riff.[16] I think the spirit world has a long memory and popular art is one of the leaks. We hear whispers, and we dress them as taste. That is not an argument for taking a rock band as a footnote to Matthew. It is an argument that the official custodians of the story do not have a monopoly on the residue.
If you love God and you look around, you do not see a tight ship. You see evil spitting in the claim of control every five seconds. Then you see nice people turn the other cheek and use Jesus as a permit to stay out of the fight. Martyrdom becomes a brand. Cowardice borrows a cross. I want the opposite instinct. I want the war taken to the thing that is torturing people.
Are We Free, or Are We Reading a Record Left by People Who Needed Compliance?
Who wrote the dumb rules? That was my question when Edwards said the only way to beat evil is to yield to the God who, from my chair, has let it run. A rational rule would look like any competent shop floor. Contain the arsonist. Do not use the night shift as kindling to prove the arsonist exists. Do not publish a handbook later that says the fire was a teaching moment.
The Bible I trust is the Bible I can read between the lines of. I trust it more than I trust the handlers. Councils, empires, reformers, and television teachers all have motives. Rome needed glue as the frontiers cracked. A crucified provincial who could be turned into a cosmic loyalty oath is better glue than another legion.[17] That does not make every line a lie. It means you read like an adult. You ask what was written down and what was not, and why.
My assertion is simple enough to make people furious. Non-human intelligence — call them Elohim, Watchers, demons, NHI, whatever shelf-label you need — has been trying to undo what was made. I think the garden commission was a political statement against rebels on the council. Humans were not designed to be mascots.[18] We were designed to be dangerous to the bureaucracy that did not want us here. That is why the categories exist. That is why “do not question” is preached as humility. A questioning human is harder to herd.
What I Am Looking For in the Bible
I am looking for a strategy. I study wars because I want to know where people failed to beat what was hunting them. I want to succeed where they failed. That is not pride in the cheap sense. It is refusal. I did not wake up wanting to be anybody’s servant, on earth or off it. I woke up wanting to do good work and to stop watching evil treat the world like an open cafeteria.
Edwards was right about my temperature. I am angry. I think anger, in this case, is cleaner than the sweetness that calls itself faith while the same pattern repeats. He was also right that I still have the book open. I keep it open because it is the only long record that does not pretend human beings are only animals or only angels. It shows the council. It shows the Accuser. It shows the empires. It shows the scapegoat. It shows the men who died with the name in their mouths. It shows, if you will look, the politics.[19][20]
If you want the softer Edwards, he is in the Study Bible, and he is worth the time. If you want the American warrior version of the same hunger — competence, natural law, no more yielding to a failed order because the order has a hymn — that is the work I put into The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the earlier books.[21] Read both. Argue with both. I did not earn the right to say these things by being careful. I earned it by thinking them for a long time and then saying them with my own name attached.
Are we free? That is the only question left that matters. Free will is either real, or we are livestock with better marketing. I act as if it is real. I read as if the other side is trying to convince me it is not. Moreover, I will keep looking for a way to destroy the evil that has been working for thousands of years, with God if he will do a decent job of it, and without him if he will not. That is the conversation I wanted. That is the conversation I had.
Notes for Searchers, Pastors, and Operators
If you came here from a search on Age of Disclosure, divine council, Jonathan Edwards sovereignty, Job and Satan, Jesus in Kashmir, or whether UAP are demons, you are in the right file. The point was never to baptize a documentary. The point was to stop letting science-press-conference language hide a much older political structure. Read Psalm 82 before you read the next hearing transcript. Read Job 1 before you let a preacher tell you permission and goodness are the same thing. Read the crucifixion as both theology and provincial crisis management. Then decide what you are willing to serve.
Bibliography and Further Reading
Ahmad, Mirza Ghulam. Jesus in India. 1899. English editions vary.
Alberino, Timothy. Birthright: The Coming Posthuman Apocalypse and the Annihilation of Man. 2020, and related Enochic commentary in the current disclosure debate.
Brown, Peter. The Rise of Western Christendom. 3rd ed. Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
Creation Museum / Answers in Genesis. Public exhibits and published young-earth materials. Petersburg, Kentucky.
Edwards, Jonathan. Freedom of the Will. 1754. WJE vol. 1. Yale University Press, 1957.
Edwards, Jonathan. Religious Affections. 1746.
Edwards, Jonathan. “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” 1741.
Edwards, Jonathan. Sermons on the sovereignty of God in the salvation of men. Various WJE volumes.
Eusebius. Ecclesiastical History.
Farah, Dan, dir. The Age of Disclosure. 2025.
Goodman, Martin. Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations. Knopf, 2007.
Habermas, Gary, and Michael Licona. The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. Kregel, 2004.
Hassnain, Fida. A Search for the Historical Jesus. 1994, and later Roza Bal collaborations.
Heiser, Michael S. The Unseen Realm. Lexham Press, 2015.
Heiser, Michael S. Supernatural. Lexham Press, 2015.
Heiser, Michael S. Reversing Hermon. Defender, 2017.
Hoffman, Rich. The Symposium of Justice. 2004.
Hoffman, Rich. Tail of the Dragon. Cliffhanger Research and Development, 2012.
Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. Liberty Hill / Overman Warrior Publications, 2021.
Hoffman, Rich. The Politics of Heaven. Forthcoming.
Led Zeppelin. “Kashmir.” Physical Graffiti. Swan Song, 1975.
Millar, Fergus. The Roman Near East, 31 BC–AD 337. Harvard University Press, 1993.
Redfern, Nick. Final Events. Anomalist Books, 2010.
The Holy Bible. Especially Genesis 1–11; Deuteronomy 32; 1 Kings 22; Job; Psalm 22; Psalm 82; Daniel 4; Matthew 27; Mark 15; Acts; Galatians; Ephesians 6; Hebrews 1; 1 John 4.
Wright, N. T. The Resurrection of the Son of God. Fortress Press, 2003.
1 Enoch (Book of the Watchers) and related Second Temple literature, including material from the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Suggested search headers for syndication
Age of Disclosure spiritual meaning; non-human intelligence demons or Elohim; Jonathan Edwards sovereignty of God critique; divine council Psalm 82 politics; Book of Job Satan permission; Jesus tomb Kashmir Roza Bal; James brother of Jesus motive; why did disciples die for the resurrection; Creation Museum planetarium old earth; politics of heaven Rich Hoffman; Overmanwarrior theology.
[1] Dan Farah, dir., The Age of Disclosure (Farah Films, 2025). The film compiles testimony from current and former U.S. government, military, and intelligence officials asserting an eighty-year concealment of non-human intelligence and recovered craft.
[2] Rich Hoffman, The Politics of Heaven (forthcoming). The working thesis is that biblical theology, ancient Near Eastern political structures, and modern power systems describe one continuous contest, not two separate subjects called “religion” and “politics.”
[3] Jonathan Edwards, Freedom of the Will (1754), in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 1, ed. Paul Ramsey (Yale University Press, 1957). Edwards distinguishes God as the permitter and disposer of events from God as the moral author of sin.
[4] Jonathan Edwards Study Bible (various Crossway/ESV study editions and companion notes used in American Reformed preaching). Edwards remains the most serious American attempt to hold together revival, metaphysics, and civic order.
[5] Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible (Lexham Press, 2015); see also Psalm 82:1; Deuteronomy 32:8–9 (Dead Sea Scrolls / LXX reading); Job 1:6–12; 1 Kings 22:19–23.
[6] On the “Collins Elite” and the demonic interpretation of UAP/NHI inside defense circles, see Nick Redfern, Final Events (Anomalist Books, 2010), and later pastoral briefings discussed in coverage of Age of Disclosure. The claim is contested. The pattern is not.
[7] Answers in Genesis / Creation Museum, Petersburg, Kentucky. The institution is a short drive from the Cincinnati–Northern Kentucky metro. Young-earth chronology is their public commitment; it is not mine.
[8] Job 1–2; Job 38–42. The book is not a Hallmark card. It is a courtroom transcript with a body count.
[9] Hebrews 1:3; Colossians 1:16–17; 1 John 4:4. Edwards and the Reformed tradition treat these as proofs of unshared sovereignty. I treat them as claims that still have to survive contact with history.
[10] Psalm 22. The first line is agony; the psalm ends in public vindication. That literary fact does not automatically settle what a dying man felt.
[11] Roza Bal (Rozabal) shrine, Khanyar, Srinagar. The Ahmadiyya claim that Yuz Asaf is Jesus after a survived crucifixion is advanced in Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, Jesus in India (1899), and later in Fida Hassnain and popular Kashmir travel literature. Mainstream historians and the shrine’s Sunni caretakers reject the identification. I am not asking anyone to baptize the theory. I am asking why the empty-tomb claim is protected from ordinary forensic curiosity.
[12] N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Fortress, 2003), remains the strongest academic case that the earliest Christians believed they had seen a bodily risen Jesus and were willing to die for that claim. Gary Habermas and Michael Licona collect the “minimal facts” argument. I am familiar with that literature. I am unpersuaded that martyrdom proves the metaphysics. It proves intensity.
[13] On Roman provincial management of Judea, the threat of messianic movements, and the later Constantinian settlement, see Martin Goodman, Rome and Jerusalem (Knopf, 2007); Fergus Millar, The Roman Near East (Harvard, 1993); and Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom (Wiley-Blackwell, 2013).
[14] Josephus, Antiquities 20.197–203, on the death of James. Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.23, preserves Hegesippus on James’s reputation and execution.
[15] Acts 9; Galatians 1–2; and the well-documented tension between Paul and the Jerusalem circle. Christianity as a scaled movement is unthinkable without Paul. That is a political observation, not a Sunday-school slight.
[16] Led Zeppelin, “Kashmir,” Physical Graffiti (Swan Song, 1975). Popular culture often keeps older spirit-world memory that official theology pretends it has already solved.
[17] On Roman provincial management of Judea, the threat of messianic movements, and the later Constantinian settlement, see Martin Goodman, Rome and Jerusalem (Knopf, 2007); Fergus Millar, The Roman Near East (Harvard, 1993); and Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom (Wiley-Blackwell, 2013).
[18] Genesis 1:26–28; Psalm 8. The image-of-God commission is a political charter over the garden and the nations, not a permission slip to become a house pet in someone else’s bureaucracy.
[19] 1 Peter 5:8; Ephesians 6:12. Principalities and powers language is not a metaphor for bad vibes. It is organizational language.
[20] Jonathan Edwards, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (1741); Religious Affections (1746); and the sermons on God’s sovereignty in the salvation of men. Edwards feared chaos in the human heart more than he feared looking like a weak manager. That is the difference between us.
[21] Rich Hoffman, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business (Liberty Hill / Overman Warrior Publications, 2021); The Symposium of Justice (2004); Tail of the Dragon (2012).
Rich Hoffman is an author, political consultant, and strategic advisor based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the creator of The Politics of Heaven—a unique framework that connects biblical theology, ancient history, and modern power structures to explain how moral alignment and spiritual forces shape global events. Blending real-world political experience with deep research into archaeology, UFO phenomena, and suppressed historical narratives, Hoffman offers compelling commentary on topics ranging from ancient civilizations and the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern populist movements, paranormal continuity, and leadership strategy in chaotic environments. As the author of The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business and the forthcoming Politics of Heaven, he brings a grounded yet provocative voice to media discussions, supported by firsthand experiences and a cross-disciplinary approach that bridges science, history, and theology. For interviews, speaking engagements, or expert analysis, visit richhoffmanbooks.com or contact directly via phone at 513-307-5815 or email at rhoffman@richhoffmanbooks.com. If you’ve seen the movie, Disclosure Day and want to talk about it and the implications of Presidnet Trump’s UAP disclosures, let me know and we can bring some color to your coverage. https://richhoffmanbooks.com/media-inquiries-broadcast-topics-and-contact-info/?frame-nonce=ad51e7ecba I do have a firsthand UFO encounter to discuss.
