Amy Acton is a Drunk Disaster: She’s not qualified to run down the street, let alone run the state of Ohio

I’ve never been a fan of Amy Acton during COVID. Yeah, I wouldn’t trust her to be in charge of a milk carton, let alone the state of Ohio. What she did during COVID was disastrous. Mike DeWine can apologize all he wants—you know he picked her. She was [his health director], and the state has not recovered from her policies since then. She basically followed Dr. Fauci’s guidelines to a tee, along with the CDC.

There should have been a lot more questioning. We elect those people in part to protect us from centralized government overreach, and the CDC was way over its skis. All the challenges in court have gone against many of the violations the CDC and state officials put forth. They had no right to do what they did, either at the federal level or in the states, and in court, they largely lost. In 2020, they lost key cases.

Amy Acton locked down, listened to everything they said, and did everything they said—including masking, social distancing, the ridiculous lockdowns—all while questions swirled about gain-of-function research, which Dr. Fauci knew about, and the release from a Chinese lab. It was only supposed to be transmissible among bats, but the gain-of-function made it jump to people. There was a lot of manipulation, a lot of bad stuff with COVID-19. And it killed people. She played her role in it. She wrecked the state. She harmed people in the process. And she was horrendous in all facets. I’ll never forgive her for what she did.

But I find it ironic that she is upset at the Vivek Ramaswamy campaign, and her husband is upset because it’s all about politics—this 2019 release of the police visit to their house. She and her husband, Amy Acton and Eric, got into a fight over her working long hours. They had been drinking. She pulled a mirror off the wall and shattered the glass. Then she wanted to leave the house. He talked her out of it because she was going to drive drunk. Someone in the house called the police. Police arrived and defused the situation. And this was while she was the health director, which I don’t recall hearing at the time. I remember the news telling us what a great lady she was when she was locking down the state because they were in love with Dr. Fauci and centralized authority. She played it to a tee, and no one talked about this police report.

Now it’s out because she’s running for governor. I don’t know why—she doesn’t have a good track record on anything. And yet she seems to be the best option Democrats have. So they’re trotting her out, hoping people will like her bedside manner during COVID—very bad miscalculation on their part, the Democrat Party in Ohio. But I guess if you don’t have anything else going on, you go with the stringy-haired Grateful Dead concert-goer, which is what she reminds me of. Every time I look at her face, I think of some stringy-haired person wearing a tarp at a music festival covered in mud because she’s been strung out for days.

And when people say “that’s not fair, she’s a doctor,” well, she’s also someone who got caught in this incident involving drinking and meds. A very stable person? I’ve been married for closer to 40 years—39 years now. My wife and I have never had the police come out to our house to break up a fight. It never happened. Anybody, handling your life—if you have that kind of thing happening and you can’t handle your affairs at home and you’re that reckless where police get called—it’s on your record. You’re not qualified to be governor. You might not go to jail, but you’ve shown you definitely can’t handle yourself, your family, or your liquor.

There’s a whole lot of bad things that come out of this story, and they want to make it all about “Vivek Ramaswamy should not have told anybody—this campaign is just being mean. It’s all about politics. We’re just trying to tear her down.” She gave him ammunition. She’s the one who did it. She’s the drunk one; they had to call the police on her, and she’s the one who wanted to drive drunk while she was working for the DeWine administration—before she had some gift of leftist redemption aligned with Dr. Fauci. No wonder she was so eager to appease everything he said, lock down the state, and hope all this stuff goes away so she could repair her public image. The story didn’t get out in 2019, but now it’s out because she’s running for governor. What do you expect? It’s gonna happen.

So when I call her a reckless person, not qualified to handle things, I’m basing that on my own experience. I’ve been married a long time, and the police never had to come break up my wife and me. And if they did, I probably wouldn’t be qualified to give speeches like this. You can’t manage your life like this.

This wasn’t 30 years ago—it was 2019. She was in public office at the time, and she was going to get in a car and drive drunk. Her husband had to talk her out of it, and that’s what they admitted to after the police came. That’s the kind of person who wants to be governor of Ohio. She can’t run her family, and she certainly can’t run a state. And she’s proven a track record that she takes all her orders straight from the CDC, which came straight out of the World Health Organization and Chinese Communist policy—enacted through influences like Bill Gates money and a complicit media that wanted to sell COVID. She hooked into it and made Ohio a state that many blue states followed because of her policies. She started the initiative.

Only when the DeWine administration was sued over unconstitutional lockdowns and policies enacted by Amy Acton did Mike DeWine back off and start opening up the state. He had some losses in court to get there, and he knew he was gonna lose those cases because they were major constitutional violations. The Supreme Court had to kick in. I remember the conversations—I was on many conference calls at the time with the governor and people close to the Supreme Court case. So I know exactly what went on behind the scenes. That was a disaster. Amy Acton had major egg on her face at the end of that whole escapade. People were mad at her. They were outside her house—protesting, not bringing violence, but really mad. She had to resign in disgrace, hide, and lick her wounds.

Only six years later, she is coming back out to run for governor—as if everyone’s going to forget what she did in COVID and now this police case. When you bring it up, she wants to say maybe you’re just being political. Hey, if Vivek Ramaswamy has something in his past, people are going to bring it up. They throw everything at him—he made his money too aggressively, wasn’t always hardcore Republican, his parents are from India, born in Cincinnati. But he’s a good guy, likable, qualified. His wife is super nice. He’s a good family person. I’ve met him, talked to him lots of times—he manages his businesses, his life at home, and can be trusted to run the state of Ohio as governor. He’ll play well with the legislature and get a lot done. There’s a lot to be excited about.

Amy Acton? Not even remotely close. She can’t run down her sidewalk, let alone a state. I was joking a little when I said a milk carton. I don’t think she can run anything. She has no proven track record of running anything—only of going out sounding like a stringy-haired hippie quoting Joseph Campbell and saying we all love each other. Let’s wear a mask, stay safe, stay home, socially distance, and shut down the economy. We have to “drive down the curve.” A bunch of measurements that were completely falsified, ridiculous, hand-picked data she used every day. It was embarrassing to Mike DeWine. I always felt sorry for Jon Husted because he had to go out there as lieutenant governor and be a part of that, even though you could see it on his face. It’s something he would love to have not been a part of. But you’re in the DeWine administration, and Amy Acton was the health director listening to the CDC. Nobody knew at the time how crooked it was—although I said so. It was unconstitutional; they had no right to do it. I said so when everybody else was saying otherwise. Guess who was right in the opening hours of all those mandates? Everyone eventually caught on. The Supreme Court did exactly what I said it would do. Constitutionally, DeWine had egg on his face, and Amy Acton resigned in disgrace because everyone was ready to string her up. She ruined their lives.

And now you find out she has problems at home. She drinks, can’t hold her liquor, and had the police called on her in 2019. That’s the kind of person she is. Is it fair to judge somebody like that? You bet it is. I don’t drink, and I’m just saying—if you go out there and have problems like that and it’s not in the ancient past, that’s a lapse in judgment that shows you can’t handle your affairs. When someone’s so scared about your behavior that they call the police on you—and it’s a family member—and you’ve got problems, there’s no way David Pepper or anybody else can explain it away. She brought it on herself. She’s the one who made it all happen, and she can only blame herself.

When you’re in a hard campaign, of course, it’s gonna come out. She’s crazy to think it won’t—and I’m sure there’s more. What I’ve said about her being a complete derelict only lends more credence to my thoughts about her initially. Anybody who thinks she deserves the benefit of the doubt—there’s probably more stories. If you show lapses in judgment once, you’re probably going to do it twice. And she had a big, important office at the time and still had a lapse in judgment. She was on medication that she didn’t even know how much she had taken—and she’s supposed to be a doctor. How is she equipped to advise about anything?

Yeah, it’s a big deal. She’s not qualified again—she’s not qualified for anything. Should she be thrown in jail? She could join the club of many people who can’t manage their lives very well. But you certainly don’t elect them to run the state. You certainly don’t make them governor. She’s a disaster. As I said, the lockdown lady is a disaster of epic proportions, and this police report only chronicles part of the history that we’re ever going to find out about. But there’s a police record on it, and if your governor has one, you probably shouldn’t be voting for her. She’s a disaster.

Definitely don’t vote for her. Vote for Vivek Ramaswamy. He’s the guy, and he’s certainly the best pick, I’d say, anywhere in the country, let alone in Ohio.

Bibliography

1. NBC News. “Police responded to a report of ‘domestic dispute’ at Ohio gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton’s home.” April 11, 2026. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/amy-acton-police-domestic-dispute-ohio-governor-candidate-home-rcna269188

2. Ohio Capital Journal. “Amy Acton’s team defends 2019 police visit as a ‘simple argument’ amid GOP criticism.” April 15, 2026. https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2026/04/15/amy-actons-team-defends-2019-police-visit-as-a-simple-argument-amid-gop-criticism/

3. Reason. “Ohio Judge Deems the State’s COVID-19 Lockdown Arbitrary, Unreasonable, and Oppressive.” May 20, 2020. https://reason.com/2020/05/20/ohio-judge-deems-the-states-covid-19-lockdown-arbitrary-unreasonable-and-oppressive/

4. Reason. “Another Judge Rules That Ohio’s COVID-19 Lockdown Is Illegal.” June 12, 2020. https://reason.com/2020/06/12/another-judge-rules-that-ohios-covid-19-lockdown-is-illegal/

5. The Guardian. “Dr. Amy Acton resigns amid backlash against Ohio’s lockdown after leading coronavirus fight.” June 12, 2020. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/12/dr-amy-acton-resigns-after-helping-lead-ohio-aggressive-fight-against-coronavirus

6. State News. “Lawyer Who Challenged Health Orders Says He’s OK Playing Role in Acton’s Departure.” August 14, 2020. https://www.statenews.org/government-politics/2020-08-14/lawyer-who-challenged-health-orders-says-hes-ok-playing-role-in-actons-departure

7. Bricker & Eckler LLP. “Governor DeWine and Ohio Department of Health Director Dr. Amy Acton Issue ‘Stay at Home’ Order.” March 23, 2020. https://www.bricker.com/employment-law-report/governor-dewine-and-ohio-department-of-health-director-dr-amy-acton-issue-stay-at-home-order

8. Wikipedia. “2026 Ohio gubernatorial election.” (Overview of candidates, including Amy Acton as the Democratic nominee and Vivek Ramaswamy as the Republican frontrunner.) Accessed April 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Ohio_gubernatorial_election

9. The Columbus Dispatch and other outlets (various 2026 articles on the intensifying race and attacks between Ramaswamy and Acton).

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

Rich Hoffman is an aerospace executive, political strategist, systems thinker, and independent researcher of ancient history, the paranormal, and the Dead Sea Scrolls tradition. His life in high‑stakes manufacturing, high‑level politics, and cross‑functional crisis management gives him a field‑tested understanding of power — both human and unseen.

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

Hoffman writes with the credibility of a problem-solver, the curiosity of an archaeologist, and the courage of a frontline witness who has gone to very scary places and reported what lurked there. Hoffman has authored books including The Symposium of Justice, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business, and Tail of the Dragon, often exploring themes of freedom, individual will, and societal structures through a lens influenced by philosophy (e.g., Nietzschean overman concepts) and current events.

The White House is Too Small: It must have the Big, Beautiful, Ballroom

It was during the height of cherry blossom season in Washington, D.C., in April 2026, that my wife and I finally stepped onto the grounds of the White House once again, and the experience left me more convinced than ever that America’s most iconic residence desperately needs an upgrade worthy of the superpower it represents. The blossoms were still clinging to the trees around the Tidal Basin and framing the South Lawn in soft pinks and whites, a perfect backdrop for what felt like a personal pilgrimage. We had arranged the visit through the office of Congressman Warren Davidson from Ohio’s Eighth District, and I cannot thank him and his staff enough—especially Ben and the team who worked tirelessly on short notice —and my good friend Nancy Nix, who helped without wanting any credit. My wife has always been sentimental about the White House, especially with President Trump back in residence, which makes everything feel right again after the chaos of the previous administration. We had tried last year on shorter notice and couldn’t get the clearances in time, but this trip, with about three weeks’ lead time and other business pulling us to the capital, finally aligned perfectly. We walked the grounds, absorbed the history, and stood right there where the East Wing once stood, now a demolition site buzzing with purpose, the future home of what the president has called his “big beautiful ballroom.” It was a moment that crystallized everything I had been thinking about the aging White House, its deliberate modesty from the founding era, and why bureaucratic roadblocks and judicial holds have no place slowing down progress on something this essential.

The White House has always been more than just a home or an office; it is a symbol of the American experiment, born from the revolutionary idea that we do not bow to kings or aristocracies. When George Washington and architect James Hoban designed the original President’s House in the 1790s, they intentionally kept it relatively modest—two stories with simple neoclassical lines, no grand wings at first—to send a clear message to the world. This was not a palace for a monarch; it was the residence of a republican executive, a branch of government meant to be equal among three, not elevated above the people. After the British burned it to the ground during the War of 1812, the rebuilding under James Hoban preserved that spirit even as the nation licked its wounds. The reconstruction was not about flaunting power but about resilience and restraint. Washington himself had scaled back grander plans from Pierre Charles L’Enfant, insisting on something functional yet unpretentious, because the young republic did not want to poke Europe in the eye or mimic the opulent courts of the Old World. The executive branch was deliberately housed in a structure that reflected humility, a far cry from the sprawling estates of European royalty. That choice shaped everything that followed, from the state rooms on the first floor to the family quarters upstairs, and it is why even today the core residence feels intimate—132 rooms in total, many of them surprisingly compact for the global stage we now command.

Yet over the centuries, as the United States grew from a fledgling nation into the world’s sole remaining superpower, the demands on that modest house have exploded. The presidency evolved far beyond what the founders envisioned, with the executive branch shouldering responsibilities in diplomacy, national security, and economic leadership that no one in 1800 could have imagined. I have stacks of books on White House history, and every one tells the same story: presidents from Thomas Jefferson onward added colonnades to hide stables and storage, Andrew Jackson built the North Portico for grandeur, Theodore Roosevelt shifted offices to the new West Wing in 1902 to create dedicated workspace, and Franklin D. Roosevelt added the East Wing in 1942 not just for staff but to conceal a bunker during World War II. Harry Truman gutted the interior in the late 1940s because the structure was literally sinking under its own weight, preserving only the outer walls to maintain the historic facade. Each change reflected the times—expansions driven by necessity, not ego. The state floor rooms I walked through on our tour—the Green Room, once a dining space; the oval Blue Room for receptions; the elegant Red Room; the Yellow, upstairs for family gatherings—still serve their purposes beautifully, but they are small. The East Room, the largest on the main level, can only seat about 200 for formal events. When you host state dinners for world leaders, diplomatic receptions, or public tours, space becomes a premium commodity. Upstairs in the residence, the family quarters feel even tighter for modern life, especially with the added security and staff that a 21st-century presidency requires. The West Wing, expanded multiple times, still crams the most powerful offices in the world into a footprint that feels more like a bustling hive than a seat of empire. It is not that the original design was flawed; it was perfectly suited to its era. But America’s role has changed dramatically, and the building has not kept pace.

During our visit, I saw the limitations up close in ways that books and tours from the 1990s or even last year could not convey. We pulled up to the visitors’ entrance, the same path countless dignitaries and everyday Americans have taken, and immediately noticed how the current setup strains under the weight of modern expectations. For big events, there is no proper indoor space for coats, security screening, or even basic amenities like restrooms that accommodate hundreds of guests dressed in formal attire. Instead, they erect temporary climate-controlled tents outside—those “tacky bubbles” as my wife and I called them—set apart from the elegant architecture, looking more like something you’d see at a corporate picnic or a golf course wedding than at the home of the leader of the free world. Porta-potties tucked away for overflow crowds? That is not the image of America we should project. Visitors come to see the best of what our nation offers, and while the historic rooms dazzle with their chandeliers, portraits of past presidents, and stories of resilience, the practical realities of hosting large gatherings expose the building’s age. The First Lady’s office, traditionally in the East Wing, had already been relocated during the demolition process, and standing there amid the construction fencing, I could visualize exactly where the new ballroom would rise: a neoclassical addition of roughly 90,000 square feet, designed to seat 650 to 1,000 guests, with expanded kitchens, colonnades, and integrated underground facilities for national security. It is not some vanity project; it is a functional necessity. The proposal looks incredible—elegant lines blending seamlessly with the existing architecture, funded in part by President Trump’s own resources and private donors who want to contribute to American history rather than extract favors. Trump has made no secret of his love for the building; during his first term, he elevated its presence with renovations that made it shine brighter on the world stage. Now, with the East Wing gone and the site prepared, the ballroom represents the next logical step in adapting this 18th-century icon to 21st-century realities.

What upset me most, however, was hearing about the legal battles and bureaucratic hurdles trying to halt this project. A federal judge—Richard Leon, no less—issued rulings blocking above-ground construction, claiming the president lacked explicit congressional approval for the addition, even as the appeals court has allowed temporary progress while weighing national security implications, such as the underground bunker components. The National Trust for Historic Preservation filed suit, arguing the changes required more oversight, but to me, this is classic administrative overreach. The White House is the president’s residence and workplace, not some static museum frozen in time. Presidents have modified it repeatedly without needing a congressional vote for every nail. The legal mechanism for Trump to prevail here seems straightforward: executive authority over the executive mansion, combined with private funding that sidesteps taxpayer burdens, and the clear national interest in modernizing a structure central to American diplomacy. Appeals are moving forward, and the courts should recognize that delaying this at the speed of government—endless reviews, environmental assessments, historic reviews—only serves those who want America diminished. We do not have time for fidgety holds when the world watches our every move. The presidency has grown; global summits, state visits, and public engagement demand space that matches our stature. Tents and temporary fixes are undignified. A proper ballroom, with accessible restrooms, coat facilities, and flowing spaces for conversation, would transform how visitors experience the White House. You arrive dressed in your best suit jacket, required, in my view, because this is not Chuck E. Cheese; it is the seat of power—and you should not have to navigate makeshift setups for hours-long events. The current layout creates logistical challenges, especially since the visitor center handles initial screenings before you even reach the main house. Seeing it firsthand reinforced what I have long believed: the White House is too small for America’s global role.

This pushback against the ballroom fits a larger pattern I have observed in academia, the media, and certain three-letter agencies—a subtle but persistent effort to diminish American exceptionalism. Many in those circles, trained at universities steeped in Marxist thought, view the United States not as a beacon but as a problem to be equalized within a global order modeled on countries like China. They dine in Georgetown with pinkies out, sipping wine and congratulating themselves on their sophistication while quietly undermining symbols of strength. The White House, as the most visible emblem of the executive branch, becomes a target. Why elevate it when the goal is to collapse national distinctions into some borderless bureaucracy? Trump’s approach—bold, decisive, privately financed—threatens that narrative. He is not waiting for slow-moving administrators or judicial second-guessing. He understands the speed of business, the same principle that built skyscrapers and turned companies around. NASA has suffered for years under layers of bureaucracy; we need fewer pint-sized pencil-pushers and more action-oriented leadership. The ballroom is Trump’s contribution to the ongoing story of the White House, much like past presidents who left their mark. It is not about personal glory but about ensuring the building functions to meet today’s demands: secure, impressive, and capable of hosting the world without embarrassment.

Walking through the Capitol later that same trip—another special tour arranged through the same congressional office—only heightened my appreciation for how government spaces evolve. The Capitol has its own grandeur, with its massive dome and halls of history, but the White House remains the people’s house more intimately. Yet intimacy cannot come at the expense of capability. The residence upstairs, while charming, lacks the room a modern first family needs for private life amid constant public scrutiny. The state rooms downstairs handle ceremonies but strain during peak seasons or major events. Even the grounds, beautiful as they are with the Rose Garden and South Lawn, could integrate the new addition without losing historic character. The proposal preserves the original facade where possible, focusing expansion where it makes sense—replacing an East Wing that had already been modified multiple times since 1902. This is not a radical alteration; it is thoughtful evolution, the kind the founders themselves anticipated when they left room for future generations to adapt.

Critics will claim the project is extravagant, but context matters. The $300 to $400 million price tag, largely covered privately, pales in comparison to the symbolism and practical benefits. Donors are not buying influence; they are buying a brick in the wall of American renewal, much as supporters have funded monuments and memorials for centuries. Trump himself forgoes a presidential salary, channeling his energies and resources into making the country—and its symbols—great again. His first term showed what decisive leadership looks like: stronger borders, a booming economy, and restored respect abroad. The ballroom extends that ethos to the very stage where diplomacy happens. Imagine world leaders arriving not in cramped quarters but in a venue that projects confidence and hospitality. No more tents flapping in the wind or lines for inadequate facilities. Bathrooms that are accessible and dignified. Spaces for mingling that encourage the personal connections so vital in statecraft. It is common sense, yet the holdups reveal deeper ideological resistance.

As I stood with my wife overlooking the demolition site, the cherry blossoms swaying gently in the spring breeze, I felt a surge of optimism. The world is safer and more stable with Trump at the helm, and the White House reflects that renewed vigor. The aging structure, with its rich history of fire, reconstruction, and incremental growth, stands ready for its next chapter. We do not need tin-headed administrators or activist judges dictating the pace. The appeals process should clear the path quickly, allowing construction to proceed at the speed of business. America deserves a White House that matches its power and promise—not a relic preserved in amber, but a living landmark updated for the role it must play. The ballroom is not a luxury; it is a necessity. Visitors, dignitaries, and future generations will thank us for it. The original modesty served its purpose in a young republic wary of monarchy. Today, as the indispensable nation, we need a residence that commands respect without apology. I left the grounds that day more determined than ever to support the vision: keep the historic core intact as a museum to our past, but expand the functional heart to secure our future. The White House is too small as it stands, and the big, beautiful ballroom will fix that beautifully.

The visit also reminded me of the human element behind these grand symbols. My wife and I talked for hours afterward about the stories embedded in every room—the Green Room’s intimate dinners, the Blue Room’s oval grace where Jefferson once entertained, the Red Room’s bold statements of resolve. We imagined how the new addition would flow naturally from the East Colonnade, providing relief for the cramped visitor experience that currently funnels people through limited paths. Security protocols have tightened since the 1990s, when I first toured, and rightly so, but that only underscores the need for better infrastructure. The visitor center does an admirable job with its history exhibits, but the main house itself struggles to accommodate the thousands who come annually. During peak times like cherry blossom season, the grounds open for special tours; for example, in April 2026, the South Lawn and Rose Garden were accessible to the public. It is a beautiful tradition, yet it highlights the logistical challenges. A dedicated ballroom complex would alleviate pressure on the residence while enhancing the overall experience. No more makeshift solutions that detract from the majesty.

Delving deeper into the history, one sees how each era’s pressures forced adaptation. Jefferson added the colonnades not for show but for practicality. Monroe oversaw the post-fire rebuild with an eye toward dignity after the humiliation at the hands of the British. The 19th century brought porticos and refinements under Jackson and others, balancing form and function. By the 20th century, the industrial age and two world wars demanded offices and bunkers—hence the wings. Truman’s renovation saved the building from collapse, a massive undertaking that gutted the interiors while honoring the shell. Every change sparked debate, much like today’s ballroom controversy. Critics then called expansions wasteful or out of character; history proved them shortsighted. The same will hold here. The presidency is no longer a part-time role in a small nation; it is a 24/7 global command center. The executive branch, once deliberately understated, now leads in technology, defense, and economics. Diminishing its physical home diminishes the message we send to allies and adversaries alike.

Philosophically, this project counters the academic drift toward globalism that I mentioned earlier. In faculty lounges and think tanks, the narrative often prioritizes multilateral institutions over sovereign strength. The White House, as the ultimate expression of American executive power, challenges that worldview. Trump’s unapologetic love for the building—making it “beautiful” again—embodies a different ethos: America first, excellence always. He has poured his own fortune into the nation’s service, from business success to political fights, and the ballroom is another selfless investment. Donors who contribute do so out of patriotism, not quid pro quo. They understand that icons matter. A vibrant, updated White House inspires pride at home and respect abroad. It signals that we are not shrinking from our responsibilities but embracing them with grandeur befitting the greatest nation on earth.

The legal wrangling, while frustrating, also reveals the strength of our system. The appeals court’s recent orders allowing work to continue, even temporarily, while seeking clarity on national security aspects, show that facts and urgency can prevail over procedural delays. The administration has argued convincingly that the project includes critical infrastructure below ground, justifying expedited handling. Ultimately, the president’s authority over the executive residence should hold, especially when Congress has not explicitly prohibited such updates in the past. Precedents abound: wings added, interiors renovated, grounds altered—all without endless litigation. The current hold is an anomaly driven by preservationist ideology rather than law. Trump should win on the merits, and the ballroom should rise swiftly.

Reflecting on our Capitol tour that week, I saw parallels. That building, too, has grown and adapted—its dome a marvel of engineering, its halls echoing with debate. Government evolves, and so must its symbols. The White House, deliberately small at birth to reject kingship, has matured with the country. Now it needs to fully reflect our superpower status. The ballroom will provide the space for grand diplomacy, public engagement, and family life without compromise. Restrooms easily accessible, indoor coat checks, venues for extended events—these are not frivolities but essentials. Guests dressed formally deserve comfort, not inconvenience. The tacky tents of today will give way to timeless elegance tomorrow.

In the end, my visit was more than sightseeing; it was affirmation. The White House is a living entity, shaped by those who serve within it. Trump’s vision honors the past while preparing for the future. With the demolition complete and plans in place, the only barriers left are artificial ones erected by those uncomfortable with American assertiveness. The appeals process offers a clear path forward. Let the work proceed at the speed of business, unhindered by administrative inertia. America’s executive mansion deserves to stand tall, beautiful, and fully functional—a beacon for the world and a source of pride for every citizen. The big beautiful ballroom is not just an addition; it is a statement that we are not done growing, not ready to fade into global sameness. We are the United States, and our home should reflect that eternal truth. The cherry blossoms of 2026 may fade, but the renewed White House will bloom for generations. Thank you to all who made our visit possible, and here’s to the bold future awaiting 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Footnotes

¹ White House Historical Association and official records detail the founding design and post-1812 reconstruction.

² News reports from April 2026 cover the ongoing appeals in the ballroom litigation.

³ Descriptions of state rooms drawn from standard White House tours and historical guides.

⁴ Truman renovation and wing additions referenced in multiple architectural histories.

⁵ Visitor logistics and current limitations observed firsthand and corroborated by public accounts.

⁶ Funding and design details from administration statements and project announcements.

Bibliography

• White House Historical Association. The White House: An Historic Guide. Washington, D.C.: White House Historical Association, various editions.

• Seale, William. The White House: The History of an American Idea. Washington, D.C.: White House Historical Association, 1992.

• West, J.B. Upstairs at the White House: My Life with the First Ladies. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1973.

• Klara, Robert. The Hidden White House: Harry Truman and the Reconstruction of America’s Most Famous Residence. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2015.

• Associated Press. “Judge Says White House Ballroom Construction Can’t Begin.” April 2026.

• CNN. “Appeals Court Says Trump White House Ballroom Can Continue.” April 11, 2026.

• NPR. “White House Ballroom Construction Can Continue for Now.” April 2026.

• WhiteHouse.gov. “The White House Building” and East Wing expansion pages, accessed 2026.

• History.com. Articles on White House renovations and the War of 1812.

• Fox News. Coverage of ballroom appeals and project details, 2025–2026.

• Davidson.house.gov. Congressional tour information and district resources.

• National Cherry Blossom Festival official guides, 2026.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

Getting ‘The Right Stuff’ Again in American Manufacturing: NASA needs a lot more than bold talk to beat China to the Moon

The recent interview between Fox News host Jesse Watters and NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, which aired amid the high-stakes momentum of the Artemis program, captured more than just technical difficulties with an earpiece that briefly cut out audio during a live segment. It encapsulated a deeper tension roiling American aerospace ambitions: the urgent race to establish a permanent lunar presence before China, set against decades of bureaucratic drift, cultural shifts in the workforce, and policy choices that prioritized social engineering over raw engineering excellence. Isaacman, the billionaire entrepreneur and commercial astronaut who assumed the role of NASA’s 15th administrator in December 2025 after President Trump’s nomination and swift Senate confirmation, has injected a dose of private-sector urgency into the agency. Yet the exchange with Watters—where questions about beating China to a sustained moon base prompted the glitch—sparked immediate online speculation about whether it was a genuine malfunction or narrative control. Those who follow space policy closely understand the subtext: the United States holds a lead today, but sustaining it demands confronting uncomfortable truths about how DEI-driven mandates, union-influenced work cultures, and regulatory bloat have eroded the very foundations that once propelled America to the moon in under a decade during the Apollo era.

To appreciate the stakes, one must revisit NASA’s trajectory since the glory days of Apollo 11 in 1969. That achievement, born of Cold War necessity and a national commitment to excellence under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, saw the agency operate with a singular focus: land humans on the moon and return them safely. The program succeeded through relentless innovation, round-the-clock engineering, and a workforce ethos that tolerated risk in pursuit of national objectives. By contrast, the post-Apollo decades brought complacency, budget constraints, and the rise of the Space Shuttle and International Space Station as routine operations rather than frontier-pushing endeavors. Human spaceflight stagnated, with the shuttle program ending in 2011 after the Columbia and Challenger tragedies highlighted safety concerns but also exposed layers of bureaucracy. Enter the Obama administration in 2009, which inherited a Constellation program already strained but pivoted sharply. In a 2010 Al Jazeera interview, then-NASA Administrator Charles Bolden articulated what he described as one of President Obama’s top priorities for the agency: reaching out to the Muslim world to highlight historic contributions to science, math, and engineering. The White House quickly clarified that this was not NASA’s foremost mission—emphasizing inspiration for children and international partnerships instead—but the remark crystallized a broader reorientation. Funding for human exploration was curtailed in favor of commercial partnerships and Earth science, while SLS (Space Launch System) development, mandated by Congress as a jobs program across multiple states, ballooned in cost and timeline. By 2012-2013, as the administration emphasized diversity and inclusion initiatives across federal agencies, NASA and its contractors began integrating DEI frameworks into hiring, training, and performance evaluations. Executive performance plans incorporated DEI metrics, and contractors faced pressure to align with equity action plans that emphasized demographic targets over merit-based selection.

These policies did not emerge in isolation. Across aerospace and manufacturing sectors, similar mandates proliferated, often tied to federal contracts worth billions. NASA’s 2022 Equity Action Plan, for instance, embedded DEIA (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility) requirements into mission leadership selection, mentorship programs, and supplier diversity goals. While proponents argued that diverse teams foster innovation—as evidenced by claims about the Mars Curiosity rover mission, where varied perspectives allegedly enhanced problem-solving—critics pointed to measurable performance drag. OpenTheBooks analyses from the period revealed NASA allocating tens of millions to DEI-specific contracts and training between fiscal years 2021 and 2024, even as core programs like Artemis faced delays. Boeing and SpaceX, major NASA partners, navigated these pressures amid their own unionized workforces and supplier chains, where compliance sometimes trumped speed. The result? Extended timelines and cost overruns that dwarfed Apollo’s efficiency. Artemis I, the uncrewed SLS test flight, finally launched in 2022 after years of slippage; Artemis II, the crewed lunar flyby, occurred in early 2026 following further postponements linked to technical issues, hydrogen leaks, and integration challenges. Cumulative costs for the program through 2025 exceeded $93 billion according to NASA’s Office of Inspector General, with SLS launches now priced at around $4 billion each—far beyond initial projections of $500 million. These figures reflect not just inflation or complexity but systemic inefficiencies: multilayered oversight, “safety-first” cultures that sometimes masked risk aversion, and a workforce environment where political correctness and work-from-home mandates during COVID exacerbated disconnects between salaried administrators and shop-floor technicians.

From an insider’s perspective in aerospace manufacturing—where physical hardware must meet unforgiving tolerances for flight—the cultural erosion becomes glaring. Large primes and their tiered suppliers adopted elements of the Toyota Production System (TPS) in the 1980s and 1990s, inspired by Japan’s post-war industrial miracle. Taiichi Ohno’s lean principles emphasized waste elimination, just-in-time inventory, and the Andon cord: a mechanism empowering any line worker to halt production upon spotting a defect, triggering immediate problem-solving by cross-functional teams. In Japanese facilities, this system thrived on a cultural bedrock of exceptional work ethic—deep bows at convenience stores, meticulous attention to detail in every task, and a societal emphasis on collective diligence rooted in post-war reconstruction values. Workers viewed line stops as a matter of quality and the customer, not as excuses for downtime. NUMMI, the 1984 Toyota-GM joint venture in Fremont, California, demonstrated that these principles could be transplanted to American soil, transforming a dysfunctional GM plant into a high-performing operation through rigorous training, respect for workers, and a kaizen (continuous improvement) mindset. Yet scaling this across U.S. aerospace proved elusive, largely due to entrenched differences in labor culture.

American manufacturing, particularly in union-heavy sectors like aerospace and autos, evolved differently. Labor unions, while securing wages and protections, often fostered adversarial dynamics that prioritized job security and grievance processes over rapid resolution. The United Auto Workers (UAW), for example, navigated the bankruptcies of GM and Chrysler in 2009, yet patterns persisted: when issues arose—defective parts, process deviations—responses frequently involved slowdowns, Netflix viewing on phones during waits, or leveraging downtime for personal pursuits rather than pursuing aggressive root-cause fixes. This contrasts sharply with TPS’s “stop to fix” ethos, where Japanese teams swarm problems relentlessly. In aerospace, where suppliers cascade behaviors from primes like Boeing or Lockheed, the ripple effects compound. During the COVID-era mandates, remote work for administrators clashed with the impossibility of “building stuff” from home, revealing the fragility of cultures detached from physical production. Safety protocols, essential after historical tragedies, sometimes became pretexts for caution that bordered on paralysis, inflating costs and timelines. A recent tour of NASA facilities underscored this: late on a Saturday night, parking lots sat half-empty, with activity levels insufficient for the compressed schedules needed to outpace rivals. Contrast this with SpaceX’s Hawthorne and Boca Chica operations, where engineers and technicians work extended shifts, holidays included, driven by founder Elon Musk’s “hardcore” ethos of iteration and urgency. The Falcon and Starship programs demonstrate that meritocratic, high-engagement cultures can deliver reusable hardware at a fraction of traditional costs, pressuring NASA and legacy contractors to adapt.

The geopolitical dimension amplifies these internal frailties. China’s lunar ambitions are no secret and proceed with authoritarian efficiency. Having landed robotic missions on the far side of the moon and established the Tiangong space station, Beijing aims to achieve a crewed landing by 2030 using the Long March 10 rocket, Mengzhou spacecraft, and Lanyue lander. Follow-on plans include an International Lunar Research Station (with Russia) by 2035, featuring habitats, resource utilization, and sustained presence near the south pole. Wu Weiren, chief designer of China’s lunar program, has outlined aggressive resource-development goals, unhindered by the democratic debates or union negotiations that constrain the U.S. As of April 2026, NASA’s Artemis architecture—post-Isaacman’s overhaul—targets crewed landings in 2028 via Artemis III or IV, pivoting from the canceled Lunar Gateway to direct south pole infrastructure: habitats, pressurized rovers, nuclear power, and ISRU (in-situ resource utilization) for oxygen and construction. NASA’s Ignition event in March 2026 laid out a $20-30 billion, multi-phase plan over seven to ten years for a base that supports month-long crew stays, leveraging commercial partners like SpaceX and Blue Origin. Yet without cultural acceleration, China’s state-directed workforce—operating under conditions that Americans might deem “unhealthy” but that yield results—could close the gap. The lead is “too great” only if maintained; hesitation invites reversal.

Isaacman’s leadership signals a potential inflection. A veteran of the Inspiration4 and Polaris Dawn missions, he brings entrepreneurial grit, having overseen infrastructure demolitions at the Marshall Space Flight Center to modernize for Trump-era goals. The Watters interview, despite the glitch (deemed technical by most accounts, not evasion), highlighted Artemis II’s successes and Mars-forward experiments. But sustaining momentum requires a broader resurrection of the American manufacturing base. This means rejecting leniency toward policies that dilute merit—hiring, promotions, and evaluations rooted in competence rather than quotas. It demands seven-day operations, holiday shifts without complaint, and full parking lots at 3 a.m. Safety must remain paramount, but not as a shield for disengagement; engaged teams, as SpaceX proves, reduce errors through vigilance rather than bureaucracy. Unions supporting political shifts (many backed Trump in recent cycles) face a reckoning: adapt to competitive realities or risk irrelevance as smaller, agile players—Firefly, Blue Origin, and commercial upstarts—overtake sluggish giants. Suppliers must follow suit, cascading urgency downward rather than mirroring top-down complacency.

Historical parallels abound. The original space race demanded Apollo-era grit: engineers sleeping under desks, welders iterating prototypes until flawless, a nation unified against Soviet threats. Today’s competition, while economic and scientific rather than purely military, carries strategic weight. Lunar resources—helium-3 for fusion, water ice for propellant, regolith for construction—could dictate cislunar dominance, influencing satellite networks, planetary defense, and future Mars missions. An American flag on the first sustained base is not symbolism but necessity, setting norms for celestial governance amid rising multipolarity. Sacrificing lives recklessly is unacceptable, yet charging forward with calculated risk mirrors historical precedents: D-Day assaults or Pacific island-hopping campaigns where objectives justified intensity. NASA’s suppliers, from avionics to propulsion, must internalize this; half-asleep workers awaiting problem resolution or LinkedIn job-hunting administrators undermine the mission.

My book, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business (2021), anticipated these manufacturing and cultural crossroads. Hard-learned truths from COVID—when intent behind policies crystallized as micromanagement and reduced output—demand a return to basics: merit over mandates, engagement over entitlement, innovation over regulation. Trump’s second term, with Isaacman at the helm, has already accelerated Artemis restructuring, but longevity matters. Republican continuity post-2028 ensures that policies endure beyond a single administration, preventing a reversion to pre-2025 drift. This is not partisan rhetoric but pragmatic necessity for a workforce revival that dusts off “the right stuff”—the toughness, curiosity, and dedication that defined mid-20th-century America.

In aerospace, where atmospheric or orbital flight shares the same adventurous DNA, success hinges on compressing timelines rather than extending them. Japan’s lean techniques succeeded not through rote imitation but cultural alignment; America must forge its hybrid, leveraging individual initiative within disciplined systems. Parasite-like drags—DEI overhead, union-enabled slowdowns, safety-as-excuse—must yield to vitality. Recent conferences with major manufacturers reveal lingering Toyota envy without the execution; presentations touting incremental lean gains ignore root cultural mismatches. Smaller innovators will force adaptation, as they already do via commercial crew and cargo.

Ultimately, the moon base vision—sustainable habitats and a continuous presence akin to the ISS but extraterrestrial—demands more than hardware. It requires human capital aligned with purpose: passionate, grid-tough teams working around the clock because the frontier calls. China pushes aggressively, accepting trade-offs for primacy; the U.S. can lead by reclaiming its edge without mirroring authoritarianism, simply by unleashing latent American ingenuity. The Watters-Isaacman moment, glitch and all, reminds us that the stakes are real. With policies favoring merit, excellence, and intelligence (MEI) supplanting prior frameworks, and commercial pressure from SpaceX et al., NASA can reclaim leadership. The American manufacturing base, long crippled by self-inflicted wounds, stands poised for resurrection—if leaders and workers alike embrace the grind. This is the undercurrent of the current space drama: not mere technical hurdles, but a call to cultural renewal. Sustaining it ensures not just lunar victory but a broader renaissance, where adventure, innovation, and unapologetic excellence propel humanity outward. The 2030 deadline looms; meeting it—and beyond—restores what decades of deviation nearly forfeited. The right stuff awaits rediscovery, and the time is now.

Bibliography and Footnotes for Further Reading

1. NASA Office of Inspector General. Artemis Program Cost and Schedule Overruns. 2025-2026 reports detailing $93 billion+ expenditures through FY2025.

2. Bolden, Charles. Al Jazeera Interview (July 2010), as documented in Reuters and CBS News archives on NASA outreach priorities.

3. Isaacman, Jared. NASA Official Biography and Confirmation Records (December 2025). NASA.gov.

4. Planetary Society. Cost Analysis of SLS/Orion Programs. Updated 2026.

5. Ohno, Taiichi. Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-Scale Production. Productivity Press, 1988 (foundational TPS text, including Andon system).

6. Adler, Paul S. “Cultural Transformation at NUMMI.” MIT Sloan Management Review, 1994.

7. OpenTheBooks. “NASA’s One Giant Leap Toward DEI.” Substack analysis of FY2021-2024 spending.

8. Reuters. “China’s Crewed Lunar Program Eyes Astronaut Landing by 2030.” April 2026.

9. NASA. Artemis Ignition Event and Moon Base Plan. March 2026 announcements.

10. Hoffman, Rich. Gunfight Guide to Business (2021). Self-published insights on manufacturing resilience and cultural factors in industry.

11. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Advancing DEIA in Competed Space Missions. 2022 report (context for pre-2025 policies).

12. U.S. Government Accountability Office. Audits on NASA project overruns, 2025.

13. JETRO Surveys on U.S.-Japan manufacturing challenges (labor and workforce data).

14. Nature. “China Planning Lunar Landing and Base.” April 2026.

15. Fox News Archives. Watters-Isaacman Interview Transcripts and Clips (April 2026).

16. Lean Blog. Analyses of Andon cord and Japanese vs. Western implementation.

17. CSIS. Reports on U.S.-Japan economic ties and workforce development (2026).

18. Additional historical: Logsdon, John. John F. Kennedy and the Race to the Moon. Palgrave Macmillan, 2010 (Apollo context).

19. Musk, Elon, and SpaceX public updates on operational culture (various 2020s interviews).

20. Trump Administration Executive Orders on Ending DEI Programs (January 2025 onward).

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

‘Taxes Have Consequences’: The path forward in Ohio regarding property tax destruction

I’ve been thinking a lot about the upcoming 2026 Ohio gubernatorial race, and there are always a certain number of suckers who are going to fall for the polished narratives coming from the other side. They won’t remember yesterday, let alone six years ago, when the lockdowns crushed Ohio’s economy in ways we’re still feeling today. Amy Acton, the former health director who became the face of those restrictive policies during the COVID era, is running for governor as a Democrat. She’s going to go out there and talk nice, sounding reasonable and compassionate, and a chunk of voters—especially those who don’t follow politics closely or have short memories—are going to buy it. That’s the danger. The meat and potatoes of any campaign are the economy, taxes, jobs, and everyday affordability, but the left has its playbook: when policies fail, they pivot to personal attacks, calling opponents Nazis or extremists because they have little else substantive to offer. Timing matters too. Vivek Ramaswamy is a wealthy, successful entrepreneur with a background in business and biotech that many admire, but some voters struggle to relate to that level of achievement. Others might get bored during the long campaign stretch from now in April 2026 through the November election. Months of stops repeating the same policy points can wear thin without something to keep people engaged.

That’s where I see a real opportunity for Vivek to stand out. Republicans have historically been uncomfortable with topics outside strict policy—paranormal stuff, cryptozoology, disclosure on unexplained phenomena. By default, those areas get ceded to liberals who love to explore the mysterious. But Trump showed how to fluff up speeches with entertaining content: the snake metaphor, stories about men’s and women’s sports, even dancing to YMCA to get the crowd laughing and connected. There’s plenty in Ohio to do the same. We’ve had a surge of Bigfoot sightings recently, especially in the northeast around Youngstown, Portage County, and areas between Akron and there. People are reporting large, hairy figures—eight to ten feet tall—moving through the woods, accompanied by grunts, musty odors, footprints, and even pets shaking in fear. It started clustering in early March 2026, with multiple reports in just a few days near Mantua Center and Garrettsville. These aren’t fringe stories; they’ve made local news, gone viral on social media, and drawn attention from Bigfoot enthusiasts across the state. Ohio already has a reputation for this kind of activity—Hocking Hills calls itself the Bigfoot capital with festivals, and the state ranks high in sightings historically. Vivek should talk to the people who experienced these encounters. Listen to their stories without mocking them. It would make fantastic clips for TikTok and YouTube—human, relatable, showing a candidate who engages real Ohioans on what’s on their minds, even the unusual. You don’t have to believe in Bigfoot to show attention to folks who feel traumatized or excited by what they saw. Those rural and small-town areas near Youngstown include voters who might otherwise lean toward Acton’s camp. Meeting them where they are and hearing them out could freshly capture the narrative and beat Democrats to the punch on engaging the paranormal, just as JD Vance or others could on UFO disclosure. Spielberg-style wonder isn’t owned by one side; Republicans should run with it and make it part of showing government can connect with everyday wonder and curiosity again.

The serious policy side can’t be ignored, of course. Property taxes have become a flashpoint in Ohio, and Vivek has talked about rollbacks or even bolder moves toward zero income taxes. Some critics accuse him of flip-flopping or softening his stance, but that’s not accurate from what I’ve seen and heard. He’s building support with legislators who understand the real-world constraints. My good friend Senator George Lang, the majority whip at the Ohio Statehouse, handed me a powerful book that puts all this in perspective: Taxes Have Consequences: An Income Tax History of the United States by Arthur B. Laffer, Brian Domitrovic, and Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield, with a foreword by Donald Trump. It’s essentially a roadmap for the tax policies we need moving forward, especially as we navigate the next few years under a Trump-influenced administration where Vivek could play a key role in Ohio. The book traces the devastating experiment of the federal income tax since the 16th Amendment in 1913. What started as a small levy on the wealthy quickly became a tool for social engineering and revenue extraction with Marxist and socialist fingerprints all over it. High tax rates have repeatedly stifled growth, innovation, and prosperity, while cuts—like those under Kennedy, Reagan, and Trump—unleashed economic booms that lifted average incomes and helped lower earners the most. The Laffer Curve, which Art Laffer famously illustrated, shows that beyond a certain point, higher rates actually reduce revenue because they discourage work, investment, and risk-taking. The book details how the top marginal rate has dictated America’s economic fate for over a century: sky-high rates in the 1930s contributed to the prolongation of the Great Depression, while post-war cuts and the 1980s reforms correlated with surges in GDP, jobs, and opportunity.

Trump’s foreword ties it directly to his own policies, emphasizing how lowering rates and simplifying the code boosted the economy before external shocks hit. This isn’t abstract theory—it’s history with data. The authors show how taxes harm not just the economy but the social atmosphere: they distort behavior, punish success, and create dependency. For Christians or anyone with a moral framework, it’s a reminder that stewardship and honest labor thrive under systems that reward productivity rather than penalize it. Ohio sits right in the thick of similar challenges at the state and local levels with property taxes. People are fed up. They’ve watched home values compound for decades through a kind of pyramid scheme fueled by easy money, Federal Reserve policies since 1913, and development that turned farmland into subdivisions. Twenty years ago, a house might sell for $100,000; through repeated appreciation—$150k, $200k, $300k or more—owners felt wealthy on paper. They passed school, fire, and police levies, and senior services, without much pain because equity gains masked the bite. But that runway has ended. Homes built with cheaper materials and packed closer together have topped out in what buyers are willing to pay, especially with dual-income families stretched thin by inflation that has eroded the dollar’s value. Young people look at half-million-dollar mortgages and say, “No thanks.” They’re opting out—less drinking, less reckless behavior, rejecting the lifestyles they saw drain their parents. Beer sales are down among the young; the new rebellion is living cleaner, smaller, and smarter.

The result is a brick wall. Property tax revenue, which funds over 60% of local school budgets in Ohio (billions annually), faces revolt. Voters reject new levies because they can’t afford the inflated bills anymore. Developers and builders know the game: buy cheap farmland, subdivide, sell high, watch values rise on cheap credit and inflation. But when appreciation stalls and inflation erodes real wages, the tax burden feels like robbery without corresponding services. Schools built assumptions around perpetual growth that never materialized in the long term. Fire departments, roads, and senior programs—all tied to this model—are vulnerable if the faucet turns off abruptly. That’s why a sudden, total rollback or constitutional abolition of property taxes sounds appealing to the 7-8% who want to burn it all down, but it’s not practical for winning elections or governing. A full cutoff would cause chaos: mass layoffs in education, larger classes, program cuts, potential school closures in some districts, and pressure to spike income or sales taxes elsewhere to backfill—sometimes dramatically. Legislators know this. Republicans in the House and Senate, including those Vivek would work with, recognize you can’t just flip a switch without grinding infrastructure to a halt. The state isn’t ready for an all-out divorce from local funding mechanisms that maintain roads, schools, and services.

Instead, the smart path is a deliberate wind-down: roll back rates gradually, reform assessment practices, cap growth tied to inflation rather than unchecked reappraisals, diversify with income taxes or other sources where feasible, and pair it with broader economic growth that puts more money in people’s pockets. Vivek’s background in wealth management and business creation, along with a high-level understanding of capital flows, uniquely equips him for this. He gets how taxes have consequences—not just revenue numbers but behavioral shifts, investment decisions, and social health. Critics framing his Indian immigrant parents as somehow disqualifying are drifting into nonsense that has no place in conservatism. That racial or ethnic attack echoes left-wing identity politics or worse—Hitler’s socialist Nazi tactics of division, not American conservatism rooted in individual merit, opportunity, and e pluribus unum. Nick Fuentes-style shock jockery or drifting toward Tucker Carlson’s more isolationist edges risks alienating the broader MAGA coalition that values wins over purity spirals. Real conservatism builds coalitions around shared principles: lower taxes, strong borders, economic freedom, and cultural sanity. Vivek embodies success through innovation and hard work; attacking that because of heritage is lunacy and plays into the left’s divide-and-conquer game. He’s not flipping on taxes—he’s being pragmatic, courting legislators who see the addiction to government programs built up over decades. Schools, in particular, expanded on the assumption of endless property tax growth from rising values. Abrupt cuts without transition would hurt the very families we want to help.

The book Taxes Have Consequences articulates this history brilliantly. It shows how the income tax, sold as temporary and fair in 1913, ballooned into a tool that funded expansive government and distorted the economy. Periods of low rates saw flourishing: the Roaring Twenties, post-WWII boom, Reagan era, and Trump’s pre-COVID surge. High rates correlated with stagnation or decline. Socially, it fostered resentment, underground economies, and a pyramid-like reliance on growth that eventually hits limits—just like Ohio’s property tax model. Inflation from fiat money printing since the Fed’s creation compounds it, making each dollar buy less while nominal home values create illusory wealth that taxes then erode. To fix it long-term, we need more than tweaks: sound money policies (gold-standard elements or currency competition), wealth creation through energy independence, fossil fuels, a manufacturing resurgence, and, yes, emerging sectors like the space economy that could infuse real value. Young people turning away from vice and toward responsibility is a positive cultural shift; they won’t sustain the old tax-and-spend model. Parents cashing out to condos leave fewer buyers for inflated homes. The market will constrain until costs come down or real incomes rise.

Vivek Ramaswamy has the best tax policy vision and rollback ability in the conversation right now because he understands these dynamics at scale. He’ll need guts, debate, and collaboration with the legislature—including voices like Senator Lang—to implement gradual relief without collapse. Sprinkling in fun engagements like visiting Bigfoot witnesses in the Youngstown area would lighten the heavy load. People are sick of government size and intrusion; they haven’t gotten value for their taxes and are ready for change. But winning popular support means meeting voters where they are—on pocketbook pain and on the human stories that make life interesting. Amy Acton will try to memory-hole her role in economic destruction and paint herself as the caring alternative, relying on short attention spans and Nazi-style smears when pressed on substance. A certain number will fall for it. But Vivek can counter by staying substantive on taxes while adding entertainment and genuine curiosity that Trump mastered. Go to those rural spots, listen to the sighting stories, and turn them into engaging content. It captures attention in a media-saturated world and shows Republicans aren’t stuffy on everything.

This race is about more than one election. It’s a microcosm of the national struggle: can we unwind the tax addiction built since 1913 without chaos, restore economic vitality, and reconnect with the American spirit that includes wonder, hard work, and skepticism of overreach? Ohio’s brick wall on property values and taxes reflects the national pyramid scheme hitting limits. Vivek, with his policy depth and ability to engage broadly, is positioned to lead that grind-it-down process—month by month, bill by bill, with the courage to debate and the wisdom to avoid abrupt pain that loses voters. Critics who want instant demolition ignore how representative government works: you persuade the majority who still want some services but resent the cost and inefficiency. The book from Laffer and team provides the intellectual ammunition, showing tax cuts as the proven path to prosperity rather than punishment.

As we head through these months of campaigning, the contrast will sharpen. Acton’s side will offer more government band-aids—tax credits, debt relief—without addressing root causes like inflation and dependency. Vivek can offer a real rollback grounded in history, paired with cultural engagement that makes politics fun again. Bigfoot might seem trivial next to billion-dollar budgets, but ignoring what captures people’s imagination cedes ground. Trump proved metaphors, stories, and showmanship win hearts while policy wins minds. Ohio has the ingredients: frustrated taxpayers tired of the endless levy cycle, a new generation rejecting decline, and pockets of genuine mystery that remind us life holds more than spreadsheets. Listening to those Bigfoot witnesses in the northeast wouldn’t cost anything but time and respect—it could humanize the campaign and pull in independents who see a candidate willing to engage their world.

Ultimately, taxes do have consequences, as the book details across a century of evidence. They shape economies, families, and societies. Ohio’s reliance on property taxes, tied to the same inflationary home-value game that national policy enabled, has reached its limit. People aren’t supporting endless spending anymore; they’re tapped out. Gradual reform, economic growth to create real wealth, and cultural reconnection are the way forward. Vivek understands this at a level that pure politicians often don’t, thanks to his private-sector success. Paired with pragmatic legislators who know you can’t flip the switch overnight without pain, he can deliver relief that sticks. The suckers who forget Acton’s past or fall for nice talk will always exist, but a campaign that mixes meat-and-potatoes tax reform with engaging, memorable moments can reach the rest. It’s going to take hard work, but it’s doable. Ohio’s best days can still lie ahead if we learn from tax history since 1913 and apply those lessons boldly but wisely.

Footnotes

1. Details on Amy Acton’s 2026 gubernatorial campaign, including her background as Ohio’s former health director during COVID lockdowns and current platform on affordability, drawn from campaign announcements and coverage in early 2026.

2. Reports of the March 2026 Bigfoot “flap” in northeast Ohio, with multiple sightings in Portage County near Mantua, Garrettsville, and extending toward Youngstown/Trumbull areas, including descriptions of 8-10 foot figures, footprints, and pet reactions; see local news and Bigfoot Society accounts.

3. Vivek Ramaswamy’s positions on property tax rollbacks, zero income tax ambitions, and campaign strategy in the 2026 Ohio race, including primary dynamics and legislative pragmatism.

4. Analysis of Ohio property tax funding for schools (over 60% of local revenue in many districts) and risks of abrupt repeal, including potential service cuts or alternative tax spikes.

5. Historical context from Taxes Have Consequences on U.S. income tax since 1913, Laffer Curve effects, and correlations between tax rates and economic outcomes across administrations.

6. Ohio-specific property tax reforms in 2025-2026 legislation (e.g., HB 186 capping growth) and ongoing levy struggles amid voter resistance.

Bibliography

• Laffer, Arthur B., Brian Domitrovic, and Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield. Taxes Have Consequences: An Income Tax History of the United States. Post Hill Press, 2022. (With foreword by Donald J. Trump.)

• Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business: A Skeleton Key to Western Civilization. Self-published, 2021 (expanded editions via Overmanwarrior.com).

• Council on Foreign Relations or Tax Foundation reports on state property tax structures (general reference for the Ohio context).

• Local coverage: Cleveland19, WKBN, New York Post, Fox News, in March 2026, Ohio Bigfoot sightings.

• Ohio Capital Journal, Signal Ohio, Columbus Dispatch, and AP News for 2026 gubernatorial race updates on Ramaswamy, Acton, and tax issues.

• Policy Matters Ohio and Tax Foundation analyses on property tax repeal impacts on schools and local services (2025-2026).

• Further reading: Laffer Center materials on supply-side economics; historical works on the 16th Amendment and Federal Reserve; Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (BFRO), Ohio reports for cryptid context.

These provide solid entry points for exploring the tax history, campaign dynamics, and cultural elements discussed. Dig in, think critically, and let’s continue pushing for better policy and engagement in Ohio and beyond.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

Where Evil Lives in Butler County: Grooming of children happening at 8870 Cincinnati Dayton Road in Olde West Chester, Ohio April 16th

I’ve been warning people for years about what’s creeping into our communities, especially here in Butler County, Ohio, and the Lakota school district that serves so many families in Liberty Township and West Chester. I didn’t want to believe it at first when I started hearing the stories—drag queen story hours, pride displays in hallways, and all the rest of it being pushed on kids right after school lets out. But here we are, and it’s happening in my own backyard, down the road from where I live. On Thursday, April 16, 2026, right at 3:30 to 5 p.m., there’s going to be a Drag Queen Story Hour featuring Roxie D. Mocracy at the Coterie Lounge & Café—better known to a lot of locals as Mommy Needs Coffee or Mama Needs Coffee—at 8870 Cincinnati Dayton Road in Olde West Chester. It’s timed perfectly for right after school, turning what’s normally a progressive little café into a “storybook stage” for this event. The promotional language is all sparkle and sass: “Roxie brings the sparkle, the sass, and a stack of colorful books for a joyful reading time that celebrates imagination, kindness, and being exactly who you are. Gather for stories, laughs, and a little bit of glittery magic while parents sip their coffee and soak in the fun.” Sounds harmless enough if you’re not paying attention, but I see it for what it is—a calculated effort to normalize something that has no business being sold to children as family-friendly entertainment.

I care about this because it’s my community. Butler County isn’t some obscure corner of the country where these trends might slip under the radar; it’s a place full of hardworking families who expect their schools and local businesses to reflect traditional values, not some progressive experiment in social engineering. This café has a reputation for being on the cutting edge of that progressive crowd, and now they’re openly advertising this during their regular mommy-and-kids coffee time. Tickets sold out fast—adults snapped them up, marketing it heavily, and from what I’ve heard through my network, they’re using it to draw crowds and make a statement in what they see as conservative territory. I found out about it because my friend Darbi Boddy has been out there fighting these battles for years, and she got pulled into interviews by gay rights advocate magazines that tried to paint her as the villain while using her name as clickbait to boost attendance. That’s how these things work: they target the fighters, twist the narrative, and keep pushing until resistance fades.

Let me back up a bit and give this the full context it deserves, because this isn’t an isolated event. It’s part of a pattern I’ve watched unfold in Lakota schools and across Butler County. Darbi Boddy was elected to the Lakota Board of Education back in 2021 with strong community support—over 8,000 votes in her favor—because parents were fed up with the direction things were heading. She came in swinging against what she saw as sexual grooming in the curriculum, pride flags and stickers everywhere, and policies that seemed more interested in ideology than education. Within months, the radicals were after her, just like they went after others who dared speak up. She exposed things that most people didn’t want to acknowledge: materials in libraries and classrooms that blurred lines between adult lifestyles and childhood innocence. The school board, the administration, and even some so-called Republicans turned on her. By March 2024, they removed her with a 3-0 vote after legal battles, absences tied to protection orders, and endless lawfare. She was censured, stalked with court orders from fellow board members like Isaac Adi, and basically run off for doing what the voters elected her to do: fight the cultural rot. I supported Darbi then, and I support her now. She’s still out there helping parents across southern Ohio, speaking at events, even making trips to Mar-a-Lago to connect with like-minded fighters. She represents the kind of no-nonsense resistance we need more of, not the diplomatic hand-wringing that lets this stuff fester.

This drag event isn’t happening in a vacuum. It’s the same crowd that wanted rainbows on every wall in Lakota hallways, “safe spaces” that doubled as indoctrination zones, and policies that prioritized feelings over facts when it came to gender and sexuality. Darbi pointed it out repeatedly in board meetings—viciously, unapologetically—and they hated her for it. Meanwhile, the board played teacup games with lawyers and administrators running the show instead of the elected officials. Lynda O’Connor, who served as board president for a long time, was more the administrative type—diplomatic, listening to counsel, trying to keep things smooth. I’ve always liked Lynda personally; we’ve had long conversations, hours upon hours, about getting the board back on track. We had a solid conservative majority at one point with Republican-endorsed candidates, but cracks formed when some folks started blending lines to look “accommodating.” I told her straight up during one of our talks that we needed fighters like Darbi, not just managers. She aired her frustrations with me recently at an event, and I listened—didn’t push back much because we’ve known each other for years and will cross paths again. But here’s the deal: when the school board started muzzling public comment and letting bureaucracy override parental rights, that’s when I pulled my support for some of those directions. Lynda got caught in the legalism, and it cost us. Mark Welch didn’t win his race partly because of that infighting, and now we’ve got moderates and Democrats sliding things under the door while everyone gives group hugs.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: this is how evil migrates into a community. It doesn’t announce itself with horns and pitchforks; it shows up wrapped in glitter and “kindness,” sold as imagination and acceptance. Roxie D. Mocracy is a local figure—Hamilton’s “premiere celebrity housewife and public nuisance,” vice chair of Hamilton, Ohio Pride, activist with a big social media presence. He’s got videos out there of him singing in cafés just like this one, turning adult performance art into something marketed to kids. I watched one from about a year ago where the vibe was all sass and sparkle in a setting not unlike this event. Don’t get me wrong—adults can do what they want in their own spaces. I probably won’t like it, but be whatever, live your life. But when you solicit children, time it for after-school pickup, and frame it as “family-friendly” story time, that crosses the line. It’s not about judging lifestyles; it’s about protecting innocence. Psychological issues, boundary problems, the whole cultural push to make kids question their bodies and identities at younger and younger ages—this is grooming dressed up as fun. And the evidence is out there: past drag queen story hours have featured performers later convicted of child sex offenses in places like Houston. Here in Lakota, Darbi was the one shining a light on it, and they ran her off for it, using lawfare to do it, Butler County judges and school board members that opened the door wide for this kind of thing to happen.

The bigger issue is what this does to the community. Butler County is supposed to be solid—conservative, family-oriented, the kind of place where people value hard work and traditional raising of kids. Yet here we have a progressive café sticking it in our face, right in West Chester, targeting Lakota families. They’re bold because the fighters have been sidelined. Darbi’s removal was a victory for the progressives and the RINOs who played nice to avoid being called names. Republicans got behind the lawfare in some cases because they didn’t have the guts to go Old Testament on the threats. I’ve always been more diplomatic in my own way, but I respect Darbi’s willingness to call evil what it is. We need more like her on school boards, not people who tie everything up in bureaucracy and popularity contests. The election process is supposed to bring in warriors to fight this exact stuff, not administrators who become part of the problem. When Darbi brought up the grooming and the explicit influences, the board looked for legal mechanisms to shut her down instead of backing her. That’s why this event feels so brazen—it’s sold out, they’re over capacity probably, and nobody with authority is stepping in to enforce rules or push back. If there was any justice, the fire code violation would send a good message to these anti-family schemers of doom and treachery, and shut it down.

Think about the timing: 3:30 to 5 p.m., kids fresh out of school, parents sipping coffee while Roxie reads stories that celebrate “being exactly who you are.” It’s the same playbook used nationwide. Drag Queen Story Hour started years ago as a niche library program and has since exploded into schools and cafés, always framed as diversity and inclusion. But critics—and there are plenty with data—point to the sexualized nature of drag performance bleeding into kid spaces. Performers in full adult regalia, songs, and dances that belong in bars are now aimed at little ones. It normalizes confusion, plants seeds of doubt about biology and family, and parents who object get labeled bigots. I don’t buy the “it’s just reading” defense. If it were a cowboy story hour or a Bible story hour with similar flair, the same crowd would cry foul. This is targeted cultural change, and it’s working because too many good Christians and conservatives don’t know how to fight back without being called terrible people.

I’ve written about this extensively over the years, connecting the dots from local school fights to national trends. In my book, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business, I lay out the philosophy: you don’t appease evil when it shows up at your door. You meet it head-on with truth, strategy, and unapologetic action. The same principles that save a company or build wealth apply to saving your community and your kids. Reject the lawyers’ games, the group hugs, the moderate blending. Fly the flag of resistance. Darbi embodied that—still does, even off the board. She’s helping parents get fighters elected elsewhere in southern Ohio. Meanwhile, the school board that ousted her has let the rainbow stuff slide under the door, and events like this thrive in the vacuum. If your kids aren’t going, they want to make it uncool to object. That’s the real goal: not just one event, but shifting the Overton window so that questioning it makes you the outlier.

That’s a very small place for a lot of people. If you sell two tickets, it’s sold out. better check with the fire Marshall for any more.

Some will say this is overblown, that it’s harmless fun, and parents can choose. But when it’s marketed directly to after-school crowds in a café known for progressive moms, and the district has a history of similar pushes, it’s not neutral. Capacity violations are likely since it sold out quickly—maybe someone with guts shows up to document it. The business has a right to host it, sure. But we have a right to call it what it is and resist the normalization. I’ve talked to enough parents in Lakota who are stunned that this is happening here. They thought Butler County was immune. It’s not. Evil doesn’t stay in blue cities; it migrates to places like ours because resistance weakens when fighters get ostracized.

Looking back at the school board saga, it’s a microcosm. Darbi tried to ban transgender participation in girls’ sports, called out inappropriate materials, and photographed pride stickers in classrooms to expose the agenda. The board struck down her motions fast. Lynda and others voted to censure her early on. Public comment got shut down amid superintendent controversies. It was all about control, not education. I left one of my conversations with Lynda feeling like she needed space to vent, but the facts remain: without people willing to dig deep and fight, the slide continues. Republicans who backed the ousting of Darbi to “keep the peace” handed the progressives a win. Now we see the result—a drag queen event targeting our kids, bold as brass.

This isn’t about hate; it’s about protection. Children deserve to be kids, not props in adult identity explorations. The psychological toll on young minds from early sexualization is real—higher rates of confusion, regret, and mental health crises down the line. Studies like the Cass Review in the UK have dismantled the weak evidence behind gender-affirming care for minors, showing it’s experimental at best. Yet here we push the sparkle version to preschoolers. Roxie and the café call it joy; I call it a disgrace. And the fact that gay advocate outlets used Darbi as a foil to promote it shows their strategy: make opposition look extreme so the event looks mainstream.

I’ve been busy fighting these battles myself through writing, speaking, and supporting candidates who won’t cave. My book The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business isn’t just for CEOs—it’s for anyone facing down threats, whether corporate or cultural. It teaches you to see the manipulators, reject victimhood, and build strength. If you haven’t read it, grab a copy; it’ll arm you for exactly this kind of fight. Subscribe to my updates too, because tomorrow’s a better day only if we make it so. This event on April 16 is a symptom. The disease is deeper: a culture that perverts childhood to advance an agenda, enabled by weak institutions and timid leaders.

We need school board members who are fighters, not diplomats. We need parents showing up, documenting overcapacity, speaking truth, even when it’s uncomfortable. The Republicans who played politics with Darbi’s seat handed us this. The victory of pushing her out let the door crack open wider. Evil doesn’t knock politely; it glitters and sasses its way in. Call it out. Resist it. Support the Darbi Boddy types who won’t back down. Our kids’ futures depend on it. This is happening in broad daylight in West Chester, and if we don’t push back here, it spreads everywhere.

Footnotes

¹ Eventbrite listing for Drag Queen Story Hour at Coterie Lounge & Café, April 16, 2026.

² WVXU report on Lakota School Board striking down Darbi Boddy’s anti-trans motion, January 29, 2024.

³ Overmanwarrior.wordpress.com post: “Darbi Boddy is Exposing Sexual Grooming at Lakota Schools,” May 10, 2022.

⁴ Cincinnati.com coverage of Darbi Boddy’s removal from the Lakota board, March 2024.

⁵ Cass Review final report on gender identity services for children and young people, 2024 (independent review commissioned by NHS England).

⁶ FOX19 and local reports on Lakota board controversies involving public comment shutdown and superintendent issues, 2022.

⁷ The Buckeye Flame article on “anti-woke” Ohio school board member removed, March 26, 2024.

⁸ Roxie D. Mocracy Facebook promotion of the event at Coterie Lounge & Café.

⁹ Overmanwarrior.wordpress.com author bio and references to The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business.

¹⁰ Additional context from Cincinnati Enquirer and Journal-News archives on Lakota CRT and pride policy battles, 2022–2024.

Bibliography

• Eventbrite. “Drag Queen Story Hour.” Accessed April 2026. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/drag-queen-story-hour-tickets-1984561449719

• Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business. Self-published, available via gunfighterguide. shop.

• “Lakota School Board Strikes Down Darbi Boddy’s Anti-Transgender Motion.” WVXU, January 29, 2024.

• “Anti-Woke Ohio School Board Member Removed.” The Buckeye Flame, March 26, 2024.

• Overmanwarrior.wordpress.com. Various posts on Lakota schools and Darbi Boddy, 2022–2025.

• Cass, Hilary. Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People: Final Report. NHS England, 2024.

• Local news archives: Cincinnati.com, FOX19, Journal-News (Butler County) on school board actions, 2022–2024.

• Roxie D. Mocracy social media (Facebook/Instagram), event promotions, 2026.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

The No Kings Sedition: Its all paid for by those trying to overthrow America

Democrats have been lying low in the shadows, licking their wounds after the last election cycle, and waiting for the perfect moment to strike back with all their usual finagling. They’ve been pounding away with constant pushback on everything from the economy to foreign policy, but the Iranian situation right now—this whole mess with the Strait of Hormuz and the threats of escalation—is where they’re making their big, calculated move. It’s not random; it’s orchestrated. They’ve been taking it on the chin for a while, staying quiet while the country started to feel the momentum of real leadership again, and now they’re emerging with their germs of dissent and their coordinated push because they see an opening. But here’s the thing I keep telling everyone who tunes in: there’s always a counter to their moves, and President Trump is the master of reading the room and delivering it. This Iranian thing couldn’t have come at a better time, even if it looks threatening and bad on the surface. If you’re going to confront it, do it decisively, get it out of the way before summer fully hits, and watch the gas prices snap back under control—which is exactly what’s going to happen. I told everybody weeks ago that the Iranians are not going to be allowed to clog up that vital waterway. It’s just not going to work out the way they ever wanted or planned. Their little game of running speedboats and firing rockets at tankers might make headlines for a day or two, but it’ll be dealt with pretty quickly. In the grand scheme of things, it’s not the insurmountable problem they’re hyping it up to be.

To really understand why this moment feels so pivotal, you have to go back into the background of U.S.-Iran relations, something I’ve unpacked in detail because it’s not just current events—it’s decades of bad policy piling up. The story starts in the 1950s with the CIA-backed coup against Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, which put the Shah back in power and set the stage for resentment that boiled over in the 1979 Islamic Revolution. That revolution wasn’t some organic people’s uprising in the way the left likes to romanticize it; it was a theocratic takeover that replaced a flawed but modernizing monarchy with a brutal mullah regime that has oppressed its own citizens ever since. The embassy hostage crisis, the Iran-Iraq War, where they used human waves and chemical weapons, the tanker wars in the Strait of Hormuz back in the 1980s—including the U.S. Navy’s Operation Earnest Will and the downing of Iran Air Flight 655 by the USS Vincennes—all of that set patterns we’re still living with. Iran has threatened to close the Strait dozens of times over the years because they know it carries about 20 percent of the world’s oil supply. A blockade spikes global prices overnight, which is exactly what we’ve seen in the last few weeks with gas creeping toward five dollars a gallon in some spots before the latest pause kicked in. Trump pulled us out of Obama’s JCPOA nuclear deal in 2018 for good reason—it was a giveaway that funneled cash to the regime while they kept enriching uranium and funding proxies like Hezbollah and the Houthis. His “maximum pressure” campaign starved them of revenue, and now, in 2026, we’re seeing the regime double down because they’re cornered. I believe Trump was counting on the Iranian people themselves to take back their country eventually. They’ve been beaten down by decades of oppression—the morality police, the executions, the economic misery—but recent protests like the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom movement after Mahsa Amini’s death showed flashes of resistance. Hundreds killed, thousands arrested, yet it fizzled because the regime’s Revolutionary Guard and Basij thugs are a mismatched bunch of enforcers, not a unified military facing a real, organized opposition. The people run around in rubber boats trying to clog up the Strait with rockets and mines, but that’ll be handled fast—not a big problem when you have real naval power and allies who understand the stakes.

Democrats, on the other hand, have always had a soft spot for Iran and other authoritarian governments. They loved the JCPOA because it let them pretend diplomacy was working while the mullahs built their bomb and spread terror. They cozy up to China’s Communist Party, overlook Venezuela’s socialist collapse under Maduro, and cheer whenever a strongman sticks it to the West. It’s all about it for them now—power centralized, control over the masses, the illusion of equity through force. That’s why this rash of protests we’ve been watching—the so-called “No Kings” movement—isn’t just a spontaneous reaction to the Iranian standoff. They attempt to manufacture chaos and shift the narrative back in their direction. And I think it’s a great thing in the long run. All this stuff forces the opposition to show their true colors. Elections, at their core, are negotiations over positions and power. Republicans have historically read the room wrong because so many of us are good Christian people raised to turn the other cheek. We forgive our neighbor even when that neighbor wants to cut our heads off and crucify us on live television. We look for ways to have lunch and find common ground, which is noble but leaves us on the wrong side of hard negotiations. That’s exactly why so many of us gravitated to Trump—he’s not the typical Republican who folds for the sake of decorum. Trump is about wins, plain and simple. He’s Republican in name but results-oriented in action, and that’s why people keep supporting him even through the noise. He gets things done. Just to let everybody know, Trump’s going to be back on the road this summer doing all that good stuff—rallies, appearances, the full campaign energy even though he’s already in office. It’s like he’s running for president all over again because momentum never stops. The best way to start getting everything moving in the right direction when you’re in a fight is to bring your past along—bring Speaker Johnson and the whole unified team, just like he did before. Get everybody together, have some fun, and show the country that government can be energetic and effective again instead of this dour, bureaucratic slog we endured for years.

I would also say to everybody paying attention that disclosure is a smart play here. Releasing more on the UFO/UAP files takes away a huge media headline that the Democrats and their allies have been salivating over. They love that stuff because it feeds into narratives of government secrecy and elite control, something very close to their hearts. Trump could snatch that away from them entirely, and he’s already signaling he’s willing to do a lot of good things in that space. It gives him leeway on the Iranian deal, too—he has to give a little on the political theater side to break something loose that’s been a problem forever. Ultimately, it will bring gas prices down to a great level and solve many downstream issues. There are plenty of speculators out there right now profiting off the manufactured crisis; media reports are spiking prices for the moment, but they’ll get back under control pretty fast once the Strait reopens and the visits from U.S. assets make their point. Let’s talk more about the “No Kings” movement because calling Trump a king or an authoritarian is the height of projection. He certainly isn’t one, but I think all this noise is good because it forces the opposition to reveal who they really are. I’ve seen these movements pop up in England, all over Europe, Washington D.C., and right here at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus—not far from my home in Middletown. They look the same everywhere: not organic grassroots uprisings driven by free speech or genuine voter frustration. This is a coordinated effort involving roughly 500 organizations—radical liberal, socialist, and even radical Islamic elements—all tied together by the Soros network. George Soros and his son Alex have poured billions—estimates put the Open Society Foundations and related groups at over three billion dollars funneled through these channels—buying influence, printing signs, busing people in, and funding media amplification. If not for the money, a lot of these folks wouldn’t show up at all. They’re franchise Democrats who turn out for a free lunch, a free T-shirt, or a pallet of pre-printed rocks and signs ready to throw. That’s the kind of organization we’re dealing with—hostile to the American experiment, cheerleading from corporate media outlets that pretend it’s all spontaneous outrage against the Trump White House.

In my view, and I’ve said this locally in Ohio and at the federal level, this “No Kings” push is no organic movement. It’s a paid-for infomercial produced by the radical left to try to destroy the United States from within. They used to hide behind other liberal causes—racism narratives, minority crisis issues—but now the mask is off with a bunch of crazy radicals who look and sound like people you wouldn’t want to sit next to on a bus. Those are the faces on TV advocating for the movement, and it’s pushing independents straight into the arms of Republicans. If only the GOP would dare wrap its arms around those voters, it couldn’t be easier. Trump has a clear strategy to steer things back on track, playing the Iran game in a way no previous president has dared. That’s why these problems festered in the background for so long—the left’s weapons of radical Islam, radical Marxism, and communism are being taken away one by one. So, of course, the money flows: three billion dollars into five hundred organizations, protests erupting like clockwork the moment Trump takes a hard line. But here’s the reality check: locally in Ohio, where I live, and certainly at the national level, Democrats have scored a few little pickup victories only when Republicans got asleep at the wheel or too cocky riding the Trump wave without defending turf properly. Some in the party got their hearts out of it because they secretly expected Democrats to retake power and didn’t want the responsibility that comes with winning. It’s hard when you’re in charge—you have no one to complain about except yourself. There’s a fair number of Republicans who want Democrats back in so they can stay in the comfortable role of opposition. This movement gives them an off-ramp from behaving like actual Republicans. But it’s going to blow up in everybody’s face because it’s not organic. It’s a funded operation by radicals who’ve been trying to undermine the country for decades. What they don’t have anymore is the polite illusion. People watching these idiots on TV are saying, “I don’t want that. I don’t want to be associated with that. I can’t vote for that.” It’s pushing the country the other way.

Just look at the contrast: Trump supporters stand in line for eight, twelve, twenty-four hours to get a seat ten rows back at a rally because they’re excited about real change. These protest crowds don’t have that energy. They’ve got franchise lunatics trading time for cash, drugs, or free swag. They’re not high-quality people showing up on camera, and it’s kind of humorous how badly it makes their side look. As far as worrying about it goes, only Republicans who don’t understand how to read the leaves are sweating this. They need more confidence in themselves because the victory is clear if you’re actually listening beyond the nightly news spin. Where do you think all that three billion dollars is coming from, and who’s receiving it? The media will say anything for a few bucks or a free steak dinner, but that money buys influence and it shows in the quality of the foot soldiers—radical losers who look horrible on screen and remind everyday Americans exactly why they voted for Trump in the first place. The most likely consequence as we head into June and July—especially if Trump keeps the pressure on without letting the Democrats steal the narrative—is that gas prices recover rapidly. This isn’t something that lingers for years or even months once the Strait issue is settled. Real victories are there for the taking, and it really comes down to having the courage to stay in power whether some in the party want the responsibility or not. Democrats don’t have much gas left in their tank; it takes three billion dollars just to get their people to show up and look stupid on camera. That’s not a winning position. You might as well be a Republican right now, and that’s how the ball is going to bounce when the dust settles. Don’t worry about it. It’s going to come out just the way logic and history say it will. In the meantime, they’re being exposed as the crazy lunatics they always were, and we know exactly how much they were paid to act that way. Good things come to those who wait, especially those who hate what we’ve picked for representative government and are trying to flatten the tires to push toward the midterms. They’re acting desperate, and desperate doesn’t photograph well. Looking good for Republicans overall.

If you ever want to dig deeper into the philosophy that underpins all this—how to navigate chaos, win negotiations, and build something lasting instead of tearing down—I’d point you toward my book, The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business: A Skeleton Key to Western Civilization. It lays out the mindset that treats life and politics like the Old West: know your terrain, carry the right tools, and don’t apologize for defending what’s yours. Trump embodies a lot of that frontier spirit, which is why the radical left hates it so much. They prefer managed decline and dependency. We prefer wins, clarity, and a government that gets out of the way so people can thrive.

Looking ahead, Trump’s going to keep leveraging this Iran situation for broader gains—getting the Russia-Ukraine conflict out of the headlines where it’s been conveniently ignored, pushing for better negotiating positions on everything from rare earth metals to energy independence. A lot is going on behind the scenes that’s headed toward proper closure, and the Democrats know it. That’s why the protests are ramping up—to try and bring people to their cause. But again, their whole side is paid for. It’s not organic. It’s not the kind of passion that fills arenas or lines up for hours. It’s manufactured, and the country is seeing through it. The bad guys are desperate, and that desperation is their undoing. Republicans need to keep reading the room correctly, stay unified, and remember that we win when we stop turning the other cheek and start delivering results. I’m confident it’s all going to balance out in our favor by the time summer rolls around, and the American people will be reminded once again why they put their trust in leadership that actually fights for them.

Footnotes

1. Recent reporting on the April 2026 U.S.-Iran ceasefire negotiations and Strait of Hormuz reopening conditional on infrastructure threats; see coverage from Reuters and Al Jazeera on Trump’s deadlines and conditional pause.

2. Background on U.S.-Iran history drawn from Council on Foreign Relations timelines, including JCPOA withdrawal (2018), maximum pressure campaign, and 2022-2023 Woman, Life, Freedom protests (BBC, Human Rights Watch reports on regime crackdowns).

3. Trump’s 2026 public schedule and rally-style events referenced in White House releases and conservative outlets, noting continued campaign-style travel.

4. “No Kings” protest network details, including Indivisible’s Soros/Open Society Foundations grants (~$3M direct) and broader ecosystem of 500+ progressive groups with combined revenues exceeding $3 billion; Fox News investigations and Capital Research Center analyses of funding flows.

5. Ohio-specific protest activity at Statehouse and local coverage in Columbus Dispatch/Middletown outlets; national patterns documented in New York Post and Washington Examiner reporting on astroturf elements.

Bibliography

• Council on Foreign Relations. “U.S.-Iran Relations: A Timeline.” CFR.org (updated 2026).

• Open Society Foundations annual reports and grant databases (public filings via InfluenceWatch/Capital Research Center).

• Human Rights Watch. “Iran: Crackdown on Woman, Life, Freedom Protests” (2022-2025 updates).

• Hoffman, Rich. The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business: A Skeleton Key to Western Civilization. Self-published, 2021 (expanded editions available via Overmanwarrior.com).

• Reuters. “Trump Announces Conditional Ceasefire in Iran Standoff” (April 2026).

• Fox News. “Soros Network Funds ‘No Kings’ Protests: Inside the $3B Progressive Machine” (2026 investigative series).

• BBC Persian Service archives on Iranian internal dissent and Strait of Hormuz incidents.

• U.S. Energy Information Administration. “Strait of Hormuz Oil Transit Chokepoint” (fact sheets, 2026).

• Additional further reading: George Soros’s Open Society writings for a primary source on his philanthropy philosophy; compare with critiques in David Horowitz’s The Shadow Party (updated editions) and recent think-tank papers from Heritage Foundation on foreign policy leverage strategies.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

The Smoking Gun of Windover: What NAGPRA was meant to conceal

I have been reflecting deeply on this as April 9th rolls around—my birthday—and I decided this year I would give myself something truly personal, something that excites me at the core of my being and ties together years of my own research, political observations, and that relentless drive to uncover truths that the system tries to bury. It is not some flashy gift or a day off from the work I do for everyone else; instead, it is this deep dive into what I consider one of the most important archaeological revelations of our lifetime, a site that serves as a smoking gun for so many historical narratives that have been twisted, politicized, and deliberately constrained. I am talking about the Windover archaeological site in Central Florida, that extraordinary bog cemetery near Titusville, just up the road from the Kennedy Space Center, where an accidental discovery in the mid-1980s peeled back layers of prehistory in ways that challenge everything we have been taught about the peopling of North America, the sophistication of ancient cultures, and the very foundations of modern political narratives about land, history, and who truly belongs here. I have poured over the rare academic book that documented it all—Windover: Multidisciplinary Investigations of an Early Archaic Florida Cemetery, edited by Glen H. Doran and published by the University Press of Florida in 2002—and it has become my birthday present to myself because it represents a narrow window into truth before the doors slammed shut with laws like NAGPRA. I invite everyone who reads this to share in that excitement with me, because this is not just dusty bones in a pond; it is evidence of a sophisticated society that predates the standard Beringia migration story by thousands of years in meaningful ways, and it exposes how politics, not science, has been driving the suppression of our deep past.

I first came across references to this site years ago in my own independent studies of ancient American history, the kind of reading I do late at night after dealing with local politics here in Butler County, Ohio, or after watching the national scene unfold with all its layers of deception. Back then, I was already skeptical of the official timelines pushed in academia—the neat little story that indigenous peoples crossed the Bering land bridge around 15,000 to 20,000 years ago, spread south as hunter-gatherers, and that everything before European contact fits neatly into that box with tribes like the Iroquois, Lakota, or Sioux representing the “original” inhabitants. But Windover blew that open for me in a way nothing else had. Discovered accidentally in 1982 or early 1984 when a backhoe operator for a housing development called Windover Farms scooped up a human skull while digging in a small peat bog pond, it quickly became clear this was no recent crime scene. County medical examiners dated the remains as ancient, and that led to Florida State University anthropologist Glen Doran stepping in as principal investigator. From 1984 through about 1987, his team excavated roughly half of this half-acre pond cemetery under challenging wet-site conditions, uncovering the remains of at least 168 individuals—men, women, and children, from infants to elders around 60—buried in a deliberate, logical manner that suggested a thoughtful, organized society. What made it extraordinary was the preservation: the acidic yet neutral-pH peat bog acted like a natural time capsule, keeping not just bones but also soft tissue intact. We are talking brain tissue still present in 91 skulls, some with cellular structure preserved enough for DNA extraction; skin on the bodies; even the last meals still identifiable in their stomachs. They had clothing woven from plant fibers—some of the oldest and most complex textiles ever found in the New World, requiring looms or advanced weaving techniques that nobody expected for an “Archaic” period people 7,000 to 8,000 years ago. Wooden artifacts, bone and antler tools, a bottle gourd—evidence of a culture far more advanced than the simple hunter-gatherer label academia slaps on prehistory.

I have that Doran book—it is a thick, technical volume, the kind produced in limited academic runs, probably only a few thousand copies worldwide, and I feel fortunate to have one because it captures every multidisciplinary angle: environmental analysis, radiocarbon dating pinning the site firmly to around 6000-5000 BC, mortuary patterns showing bodies often placed with poles or stakes to keep them submerged, facing north with heads turned west in what looks like a deliberate ritual orientation toward the setting sun and perhaps some spiritual reverence. The people themselves were robust; average adult males stood about five feet nine inches, taller and healthier than many later prehistoric groups, with some individuals pushing six feet or more based on femur lengths and bone density—enough to fuel those early newspaper reports of “giants” in North America before institutionalized science dismissed them as hoaxes or exaggerations. There is no wild conspiracy in Doran’s work; it is straight, careful archaeology by scientists who genuinely loved the field and rushed to document everything because they sensed the political tides turning. Half the cemetery was left untouched, and today the site sits under a plaque in a wooded subdivision, a National Historic Landmark with no further major digs. That is the tragedy I keep coming back to, and it is why Windover feels like the smoking gun for me.

What hit me hardest when I dug into the details—and this is where my own political experience from years fighting school levies, local corruption, and national narratives in Ohio gives me a unique lens—is how perfectly timed this discovery was before the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) slammed the brakes on American archaeology. NAGPRA passed Congress on November 16, 1990, right after the Windover excavations wrapped up and right around the cultural frenzy sparked by Dances with Wolves, that Hollywood epic romanticizing the Sioux and framing Western expansion as pure theft of indigenous land. I have studied how bills get written, who lobbies them, and the closed-door intentions behind them, and NAGPRA was loaded with progressive language designed to solidify a specific narrative: America as stolen property from “Native Americans” defined by a very shallow historical scope. It required consultation with tribes for any remains or cultural items, mandated repatriation, and effectively shut down large-scale digs because developers and archaeologists alike knew that uncovering bones could halt projects, tie up land in legal battles, and invite tribal claims. Developers started burying finds quietly rather than reporting them, and grant money in academia dried up unless you played along with the official story. Windover happened in that narrow window before the law fully kicked in—Doran and his team worked fast, funded in part by the curious developers themselves, who paused their subdivision to allow proper science—and the result was this irreplaceable snapshot of an 8,000-year-old culture that does not neatly fit the Beringia-to-modern-tribes pipeline.

The DNA analysis of the preserved brain tissue is what really undermines the premises on which NAGPRA was built. Studies showed genetic markers linking these Windover people to ancient Asian populations via the Beringia route, as expected—haplogroups like A, C, D, and even the rare X that pops up in some Native contexts—but crucially, they do not align closely with any living Native American tribes or even many known prehistoric groups. It suggests either their lineage died out, experienced a severe bottleneck, or represents a distinct early population that predates or diverged from the groups we retroactively label as “indigenous.” I am not here to take anything away from what we have been calling Native American communities or their cultural heritage; I respect the reverence for ancestors. But when you have remains this old—older than the pyramids, older than Mesopotamian civilizations in some contexts—and DNA that does not match the shallow 300-400-year tribal samples used to justify repatriation claims, who exactly do you hand them back to? The law assumes a direct, unbroken chain to contemporary tribes, but Windover proves the timeline, and the populations were far more complex. These were not simple hunter-gatherers; they had advanced textile production, implying looms; thoughtful burial rituals suggesting religion or cosmology; trade networks possibly reaching far beyond the region (given certain materials); and a settled community life in a resource-rich Florida environment when sea levels were lower and the coastline extended miles outward. Villages and mounds now submerged offshore hint at even broader Archaic networks. This site forces a reevaluation: the “Native American” designation under NAGPRA was built on politically convenient assumptions that ignored deeper prehistory, and that ignorance was weaponized to challenge the legitimacy of Western expansion and the founding of the United States itself.

I see this as part of a larger pattern I have observed in my own work on politics and history—the way organized systems, often with roots in spiritual battles that play out in the terrestrial realm, rewrite narratives to maintain power. My upcoming book, The Politics of Heaven, dives straight into this because sites like Windover provide the hard evidence that legends, mythology, and even biblical accounts of ancient sophistication are not fairy tales. Think about it: these people knew how to weave delicate fabrics thousands of years before we associate such technology with the Indus Valley, Mesopotamia, or Egypt. They cared for their sick and dead in a mass cemetery with ritual precision. Their stature and health suggest a robust population living in a stable society. And all of this at a time when the Ice Age was ending, sea levels were rising, and cultures we now call “Atlantis” in Platonic accounts or other global flood myths were supposedly migrating and seeding knowledge worldwide. Plato described Atlantis as an advanced civilization destroyed by catastrophe, with survivors spreading to Egypt, Britain, the Americas—places where we find sudden leaps in sophistication that do not fit the slow Beringia crawl. Windover fits as one piece of that puzzle: evidence of pre-Mesopotamian complexity right here in North America, with possible ties to shamanic or spiritual practices seen in even older Near Eastern sites. Take Qesem Cave near Tel Aviv in Israel, for example—an ancient site showing early humans (or pre-modern hominins) with innovative tool use, controlled fire, and communal activities dating back hundreds of thousands of years, far predating the standard timelines and hinting at organized, intelligent societies communicating with or revering something beyond the material world. Similar patterns appear in Natufian or shamanic contexts in the Levant around 13,000-10,000 BC, with ritual fires and early communal structures. These are not isolated; they point to a deep, sophisticated human history that institutional science, constrained by funding and politics, has been reluctant to explore fully.

Here in North America, we have the same suppression at work, only dressed up as “reverence for indigenous rights.” Cahokia Mounds near St. Louis is another example I have studied closely—a massive Mississippian city around 1000-1400 AD with more people than London at the time, featuring the famous Birdman tablet and legends of Thunderbirds that echo across Native oral histories. Yet St. Louis was literally built on top of it, and we still vaguely associate it with later tribes despite clear discontinuities. Mound builders, Adena, Hopewell—earlier cultures with advanced earthworks and trade—get shoehorned into the same narrative, ignoring how each generation builds over the previous one, claiming territory like animals marking trees. Human nature drives this, but laws like NAGPRA freeze it artificially at a politically useful point: 1492 onward, with Europeans as the sole thieves. The reality, as Windover shows, is layered theft and migration going back millennia—groups taking from older groups, sophisticated societies rising and falling. If we had unrestricted digs, we could map this properly, learn from mistakes, and avoid repeating cycles of conquest and cultural erasure. Instead, the law—passed in that post-Dances with Wolves glow of guilt—created incentives to hide discoveries, starved archaeology of funding for controversial sites, and prioritized a narrative that undermines the Christian-influenced Western foundation of America. I know how these bills are crafted from my own experiences fighting local and state politics; the closed-door intentions are rarely about dead ancestors and always about power, land claims, and reshaping history to favor certain ideologies.

Glen Doran himself, who passed away in 2021, and his colleagues captured their frustration between the lines in that book. They knew NAGPRA was coming; they rushed the work because they understood the profession was about to be handcuffed. The peat chemistry, the pollen, the paleoethnobotany, the DNA—all of it documented before the repatriation machine could intervene. Yet even today, the remaining half of the pond sits largely untouched, and broader Florida bog sites or offshore mounds from lower sea-level eras go unexplored because developers fear land seizures and archaeologists fear grant denials or tribal vetoes. This is not reverence; it is concealment. I love true archaeology—the kind done in England on shows like Time Team, where they dig openly, analyze bones without mandatory handover, and let evidence speak. Here, the human need to know has been subordinated to politics, which is why Windover feels like such a miracle: it slipped through just before the gates closed. It validates folklore, Plato’s hints at Atlantis, global trade networks in deep antiquity, and even the idea that our origin stories—whether biblical, mythological, or shamanic—involve advanced pre-flood or pre-catastrophe civilizations that revered higher powers, appeased spirits, and built societies with ritual purpose. The Windover dead faced north, heads west toward the sunset—symbolism that screams cosmology, not random burial. They were not “cavemen”; they were part of something older and wiser than we have only breadcrumbs of now.

This all ties directly into the spiritual warfare I explore in my work—the fallen entities at war with creation itself, imprinting their influence on earthly power structures to erase God’s narrative and replace it with controlled ignorance. Laws like NAGPRA are not neutral; they serve to keep humanity deficient in knowledge, allowing modern political orders to maintain authority built on false premises. Western expansion brought a Christian viewpoint and free civilization that disrupted older pagan or shamanic systems, but if deeper evidence shows sophisticated pre-Columbian (and pre-Beringia in practice) cultures with their own complexities, the “stolen land” story loses its moral absolutism. Everyone stole from someone; history is layered conquest. The real crime is preventing inquiry that could reveal this, because it threatens the power base. Windover proves it in my eyes: 8,000-year-old brains yielding DNA that does not fit the 1990 legal template, textiles requiring technology we associate with much later eras, and a cemetery showing care and ritual in a society predating known tribes. It is the perfect example for my book because it shows how politics cascades from heavenly rebellion into terrestrial control—concealing evidence so the deficient knowledge keeps people dependent on the current narrative.

I have met enough people in politics over the years, from Tea Party rallies to local commissioners, to recognize when good intentions get co-opted by larger agendas. Archaeologists like Doran wanted knowledge; the system wanted control. That is why I judge these things rigorously in my own life and work—if you cannot manage truth at the foundational level, you cannot lead effectively elsewhere. Windover demands we repeal or heavily reform NAGPRA, not to disrespect anyone but to prioritize the human need to know over artificial constraints. We need more digs, more funding for wet sites in Florida and beyond, and more open analysis of offshore mounds from Ice Age coastlines. Only then can we bridge the gap between legend and evidence, avoid repeating past mistakes, and understand our true place in the deep timeline. This site, with its preserved last meals, woven fabrics, and unclaimed DNA, hints at Atlantis-like migrations, shamanic connections to the spirit world (echoing Qesem Cave’s early innovations or Cahokia’s Birdman symbolism), and a history far richer than the shallow one politicized in 1990.

As I celebrate another year on this earth, I find real joy in holding this truth close. It reinforces why I fight the battles I do—not just local levies or national elections, but the deeper war for accurate history. The Windover people were real, sophisticated, and part of something vast. Their story survived by accident in the bog, preserved long enough for us to glimpse it before the political machine intervened. That is my birthday gift: the excitement of knowing more is out there if we demand the freedom to look. I will keep pushing in my writings, my podcast, and my life because evidence like this changes everything. Share it, study it, and let it provoke the larger discussion it deserves. The republic, and humanity’s understanding of itself, depends on refusing to let politics bury the past any longer.

Footnotes

1. Primary source details on discovery, excavation, and findings from Glen H. Doran’s edited volume and supporting analyses.

2. DNA results and non-alignment with modern tribes were summarized from peer-reviewed studies referenced in site reports.

3. NAGPRA legislative history and timing relative to Windover drawn from official records and archaeological critiques.

4. Stature and artifact sophistication (textiles, rituals) from bioarchaeological chapters in the Windover investigations.

5. Broader connections to global prehistory (Qesem Cave, Cahokia) informed by my independent cross-referencing of Paleolithic and Mississippian sites.

6. Political motivations behind NAGPRA are tied to the cultural context of 1990 (Dances with Wolves) and observed patterns in bill-making from my experience.

Bibliography for Continued Reading

• Doran, Glen H., ed. Windover: Multidisciplinary Investigations of an Early Archaic Florida Cemetery. University Press of Florida, 2002.

• Wentz, Rachel K. Life and Death at Windover: Excavations of a 7,000-Year-Old Pond Cemetery. Florida Historical Society Press, 2012.

• National Park Service. “Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.” Official NPS overview and regulations.

• Plato. Timaeus and Critias (translations discussing Atlantis).

• Various reports on Qesem Cave: Barkai et al., publications on Lower Paleolithic innovation in Israel.

• Pauketat, Timothy R. Cahokia: Ancient America’s Great City on the Mississippi. Penguin, 2010 (for Birdman and mound-builder context).

• Biblical Archaeology Review and related journals on Near Eastern shamanic/ritual sites predating Mesopotamia.

• My own forthcoming The Politics of Heaven for expanded spiritual-political synthesis.

• National Geographic and Florida Museum archives on Windover preservation and public exhibits.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

The Sex Cults of Artemis: We need to choose a name that sustains not just the body of exploration, but the soul of civilization itself.

Artemis is going back to the moon, and I’m really not crazy about the name. I didn’t like it when they first came up with it, and I still don’t. It feels like one more concession to a secular worldview that pretends ancient pagan deities are just harmless branding exercises—cool-sounding relics from a long-dead culture that “everybody can agree on.” But history doesn’t work that way. Names carry weight. They carry spiritual baggage. And when NASA reached for a name to replace the glory days of Apollo and send us back to the lunar surface, they chose Artemis, the Greek moon goddess and twin sister of Apollo. On the surface, it sounds clever, a neat mythological bookend. But dig even a little deeper, and you’re wading into the same fertility cults, temple rituals, and appeasement of dark forces that early Christian writers confronted head-on in the Mediterranean world two thousand years ago. I’ve spent years studying this pattern, and it’s the backbone of a book I’m finishing called The Politics of Heaven. What we’re seeing with the Artemis program isn’t just branding. It’s a symptom of a much older struggle between the human spirit and the principalities that have always hungered for our attention, our bodies, and our collective sanity.

Let me start with the obvious. The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, a massive marble edifice that dominated the city and the entire region. Built and rebuilt over centuries, it was more than a tourist attraction or a bank (which it also was—temples doubled as secure depositories). It was the epicenter of a cult that blended Greek mythology with older Near Eastern fertility worship. Artemis herself, in her Ephesian form, was often depicted with dozens of breasts or egg-like ornaments, symbols that modern scholars sometimes try to downplay as “not really about sex or fertility.” Yet the ancient world understood her differently. She was the goddess of the hunt and the wilderness, of chastity in some tellings, yet deeply entangled with the cycles of birth and reproduction, and the raw forces of nature. Her temple drew pilgrims, merchants, and locals who participated in festivals filled with processions, music, dancing, and—according to multiple ancient reports—rituals that involved the offering of human vitality, including sexual acts, to appease the divine.

Christian writers of the period didn’t shy away from describing what they saw. In Acts 19, the apostle Paul’s ministry in Ephesus sparks a riot among the silversmiths who made shrines to “the great goddess Diana” (the Roman name for Artemis). The city clerk calms the crowd by reminding them that Ephesus is the “temple keeper of the great Artemis, and of the image which fell from Jupiter.” That “image” was likely a meteorite revered as a divine gift, tying the cult directly to celestial forces. But Paul and the early Christians saw something far darker at work. They weren’t just opposing statues or tourism revenue. They were confronting a system of spiritual appeasement that had roots stretching back thousands of years to the fertility cults of Mesopotamia—Inanna, Ishtar, Astarte, and their Greek and Roman counterparts. These goddesses demanded sacrifice, often in the form of sexual union performed in or near the temple precincts. Women—sometimes all women in certain cultures—were expected to spend time as temple prostitutes, offering their bodies to strangers for money that went to the temple treasury. It wasn’t “empowerment” or personal choice in our modern sense. It was a collective duty to the gods, a way to ensure fertility for the land, prosperity for the city, and protection from whatever malevolent forces lurked in the spirit realm if the rituals were neglected.

Secular historians and archaeologists today often dismiss these accounts as Christian propaganda or exaggeration. They point out that direct physical evidence—carved reliefs, unambiguous inscriptions—is scarce at Ephesus because the temple was largely destroyed, its stones carted off for other buildings after Christianity became the dominant faith of the empire. Digging seasons in Turkey are short; the site has been layered over by centuries of occupation, and hostile conditions (political, environmental) have limited excavation. But absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence, especially when you’re dealing with practices that were deliberately secretive or oral in nature. We have reports from Herodotus, Strabo, and other classical writers describing sacred prostitution in temples dedicated to similar goddesses across the region. In Babylon, for instance, every woman was reportedly required once in her life to sit in the temple of Ishtar (or Mylitta) and have intercourse with a stranger for a fee. Similar customs are attested in Cyprus, Phoenicia, and parts of Asia Minor. The early Church fathers didn’t invent these stories out of thin air; they were reacting to what they witnessed firsthand on the frontiers of the Roman East.

I believe we can trust those Christian reports precisely because the behavior they condemned persists. It just wears different clothes. Look at modern nightclub culture—the so-called “meat markets” that young people, especially women aged eighteen to twenty-four, are actively encouraged to frequent before “settling down.” Bachelorette parties where sexual impropriety is not only tolerated but celebrated. The progressive push for “sexual liberation” and “women’s rights” frames any restraint as patriarchal oppression. We send our daughters—girls who were playing with Legos and dolls just a few years earlier—into environments of throbbing music, flashing lights, alcohol, and physical grinding that would have been right at home in an ancient fertility festival. They dress in scandalously revealing outfits, present their bodies for public consumption, and are told it’s all harmless fun, a phase to “get out of their system.” The money doesn’t go to a temple treasury anymore, but the spiritual transaction is eerily parallel: the sacrifice of personal sanctity, the abandonment of the body to collective debauchery, the implicit agreement that youth and vitality must be offered up so the rest of society can enjoy peace from whatever unseen forces demand their due.

This isn’t hyperbole. It’s pattern recognition. Ephesians 6:12 puts it plainly: “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.” The apostle Paul, writing to the very church in Ephesus that had just emerged from the shadow of Artemis worship, understood that these weren’t abstract metaphors. The spirit world is real, and it competes for control of human bodies and minds. The body is the vehicle for the soul, but it’s a vulnerable one. When people impair their consciousness—through drunkenness, drugs, or ritual frenzy—they loosen the tether that keeps the conscious self in the driver’s seat. Competing spirits rush in. Personalities split, behaviors turn erratic, sanity fluctuates. Ancient temple prostitutes weren’t just performing an economic or social function; they were opening doorways. The same doorways we open every weekend in clubs across America and Europe. The music changes, the lighting gets fancier, but the appeasement of disembodied entities hungry for human essence remains constant.

My own explorations into these dynamics—through reading, observation, and reflection on how evil operates in human societies—have convinced me that we cannot separate the material world from the spiritual one. We are entangled. Secularism’s great lie is that we can neuter history, strip away the sacred (or the diabolical), and treat ancient gods as cartoon characters for mission patches and rocket fairings. NASA did exactly that with Artemis. After the Obama-era push to highlight “Islamic contributions to science” and diversify the agency with voices from every culture, the name was pitched as inclusive, neutral, non-offensive. Why pick something biblical when you could pick a “cool” pagan goddess that “everybody can agree on”? It’s the same impulse that led the agency’s early rocketry pioneers into occult territory. Jack Parsons, one of the founders of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), was a brilliant chemist and engineer by day and a devoted Thelemite occultist by night. A disciple of Aleister Crowley, Parsons performed the Babalon Working in 1946 with L. Ron Hubbard—sex magic rituals involving masturbation onto magical tablets, invocations of the goddess Babalon (a Thelemic stand-in for the Scarlet Woman of Revelation), and attempts to incarnate demonic forces into the material plane. He saw no contradiction between rocket science and summoning ancient entities. In fact, he believed his rituals fueled his breakthroughs. NASA loves to celebrate the Apollo era’s clean, heroic image while quietly glossing over the fact that the foundational rocketry work at JPL had deep roots in Parsons’ dual obsessions. The cult origins of NASA aren’t a conspiracy theory; they’re documented in biographies like George Pendle’s Strange Angel. Parsons literally signed letters as “The Antichrist” and conducted black masses in his Pasadena home.

This brings me back to why naming the lunar return program after Artemis bothers me so much. It’s not just semantics. It’s a continuation of the same appeasement strategy humanity has employed for millennia. In ancient times, societies sacrificed their youth—virginity, vitality, individual dignity—to fertility goddesses in hopes that the “hungry gods” would leave the collective alone. Today we do it with our entertainment, our dating apps, our “hook-up culture,” and our refusal to draw moral lines. We tell young women that their bodies are theirs to offer freely in the nightclub meat market, that restraint is repression, and that any talk of spiritual consequences is outdated superstition. Meanwhile, the principalities and powers—those same competing souls and disembodied spirits that haunted the temples of Artemis, Ishtar, and Astarte—continue their work. They don’t need marble altars anymore; smartphones, social media, and Saturday-night fever vibes do the job just fine. The result is the same: fractured personalities, generational trauma, and a culture that robs itself of sanity in exchange for momentary collective highs.

I’m not suggesting NASA should abandon space exploration—quite the opposite. I love NASA. I want it to succeed. I want humanity to expand beyond Earth, to sustain life across the solar system, perhaps even outlive our home planet. But if we’re going to do that with any long-term credibility and moral foundation, we should draw from the best of our cultural inheritance—not the pagan underbelly that early Christians rightly rebelled against. Western civilization, for all its flaws, is rooted in biblical ideology. Why not name a program after a figure from Scripture that embodies vision, endurance, or divine favor? Something that signals we’ve learned from history rather than repeating its mistakes. The Artemis choice feels like a deliberate step away from that heritage, a nod to the “neutral” secular narrative that pretends spirit doesn’t matter. But spirit does matter. The body is the vehicle for the soul’s journey, and there are always entities eager to hijack the wheel when we let our guard down.

Archaeology may not have uncovered every detail of those ancient sex rituals—not yet, anyway—but the Christian eyewitness accounts from the period fill the gap. Paul’s letters to the Ephesians, the riot in Acts 19, and the writings of the early Church fathers all paint a consistent picture of cultures steeped in fertility worship that demanded human essence as payment. The temples are mostly gone now, reduced to a few pillars and scattered stones at Ephesus, but the underlying spiritual dynamic hasn’t vanished. It’s migrated into our secular rituals: the nightclub as temple, the DJ as high priest, the dance floor as altar. Young women (and men, though the pressure on females has always been more pronounced in these cults) are still expected to “do their tour of duty,” to offer themselves to the collective before committing to marriage and family. We call it empowerment. The ancients called it piety. Both are forms of appeasement.

In The Politics of Heaven, I unpack this at much greater length—how evil works through human institutions, how spirit and matter are inseparable, how competing souls vie for control of our bodies, and why yielding to animalistic impulses under the guise of “freedom” always leads to cultural decline. The book has taken years of research, reflection, and editorial effort, but the core argument is simple: we cannot outrun the spiritual realm by renaming it or pretending it’s mythology. NASA’s decision to invoke Artemis is a small but telling example of a larger societal failure to learn from history. We keep making the same stupid mistakes because we’re afraid of being called intolerant by the secular crowd. We’d rather appease the principalities than confront them.

If we truly want a sustainable future—one that includes permanent human presence on the Moon and beyond—we need to stop revering the old gods, even in name only. The cults of fertility and debauchery didn’t produce enduring civilizations; they produced cycles of excess, collapse, and moral exhaustion. Christianity’s radical break from those practices—its insistence on individual sanctity, monogamous marriage, and spiritual warfare against the powers of darkness—gave the West the moral framework that eventually launched the scientific revolution and the space age itself. Let’s honor that trajectory instead of reaching backward for pagan branding that sounds “cool” to focus groups.

I’ve seen too much evidence, both ancient and contemporary, to believe otherwise. The spirits that demanded appeasement in the temples of Ephesus and Babylon are the same ones whispering through our modern meat markets and cultural expectations. They thrive on impaired minds, abandoned bodies, and the sacrifice of youth. We don’t defeat them by pretending they don’t exist or by giving their old names new rocket programs. We defeat them by calling them what they are, drawing lines in the sand, and choosing names—and behaviors—that reflect the better angels of our nature rather than the demons we’ve never truly escaped. The Moon awaits, but the path we take to get there matters. Artemis might get us there faster on paper, but at what spiritual cost? I’d rather we choose a name that sustains not just the body of exploration, but the soul of civilization itself.

Footnotes

1. NASA official statements on the Artemis program naming, 2019 announcement by Administrator Jim Bridenstine.

2. George Pendle, Strange Angel: The Otherworldly Life of Rocket Scientist John Whiteside Parsons (2005).

3. Ephesians 6:12 (KJV).

4. Acts 19:23-41, especially v. 35.

5. Herodotus, Histories (on Babylonian customs of Ishtar/Mylitta); Strabo, Geography (references to temple practices in Asia Minor and Corinth).

6. S.M. Baugh, “Cult Prostitution in New Testament Ephesus,” JETS 42/3 (1999), though I disagree with his dismissal of the broader pattern reported by early Christians.

7. Stephanie Lynn Budin, The Myth of Sacred Prostitution in Antiquity (2008)—a secular counter-view that I believe underestimates eyewitness testimony from the period.

8. Richard Metzger’s accounts of Parsons’ Babalon Working rituals.

9. N.T. Wright, lectures on Ephesus and the Artemis cult background.

10. My ongoing research for The Politics of Heaven (forthcoming).

Bibliography for Further Reading

• Bible (King James Version), especially Acts 19, Ephesians 6, and 1 Timothy 2.

• Pendle, George. Strange Angel: The Otherworldly Life of Rocket Scientist John Whiteside Parsons. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005.

• Herodotus. The Histories. Translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt. Penguin Classics.

• Strabo. Geography. Loeb Classical Library.

• Baugh, S.M. “Cult Prostitution in New Testament Ephesus.” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 42, no. 3 (1999).

• Budin, Stephanie Lynn. The Myth of Sacred Prostitution in Antiquity. Cambridge University Press, 2008.

• Kramer, Samuel Noah. The Sacred Marriage Rite. Indiana University Press, 1969 (for the Mesopotamian context).

• NASA historical documents on Project Apollo and Artemis program origins.

• Wright, N.T. Paul and the Faithfulness of God (relevant sections on pagan cults in Asia Minor).

• Additional archaeological reports on Ephesus from the Austrian Archaeological Institute and related publications on the Artemision.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

Unlocking Human Potential: The benefits of fossil fuel energy

The essence of being human lies not in the fragile physical form that houses us, but in the boundless drive of imagination—the spark that turns thought into creation, invention into progress, and survival into flourishing. This creative nature sets humanity apart from every other species on Earth. While animals adapt to their environment through instinct and biological necessity, humans reshape it. We envision possibilities beyond the immediate, craft tools to extend our reach, and build systems that multiply our efforts across generations. This is the image of the Creator reflected in us: not a static likeness, but a dynamic capacity to imagine, design, and realize a better world. Discussions of souls and bodies as vehicles often touch on this everlasting essence. The body is temporary, a biological carrier, but the imaginative drive—the soul’s expression—transcends it, propelling humanity toward ever-greater achievements. In an age of rapid technological change, including the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), some fear a “post-human apocalypse” that disrupts the natural order. Yet this view misses the deeper truth: tools like AI represent the next logical extension of human creativity, not its replacement. They amplify the very qualities that define us, freeing time and energy for more profound acts of creation.

Alex Epstein’s Fossil Future: Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas—Not Less (2022) provides a powerful framework for understanding this. Epstein argues that cost-effective, reliable energy is the foundation of human flourishing. Fossil fuels deliver this energy at unmatched scale: low-cost, on-demand, versatile, and capable of powering billions. They enable “machine labor” that replaces backbreaking human toil, producing food, shelter, medicine, and comfort in abundance. Without them, billions would still suffer and die from lack of energy for basic needs—like refrigeration to preserve food and medicine, or electricity for incubators saving premature babies. Epstein highlights how the “knowledge system”—experts, media, and policymakers—often ignores these massive benefits while catastrophizing side effects. He flips the script: more fossil fuel use, combined with climate mastery through technology and adaptation, will make the world far better, not worse.

Consider the historical trajectory. For most of human existence—roughly 95% of our species’ time on Earth—survival consumed nearly every waking hour. Hunter-gatherer societies, as studied among groups like the Ju/’hoansi, spent about 15 hours per week acquiring food and necessities, with the rest devoted to rest, social bonds, and basic leisure. Yet life was precarious: short lifespans, vulnerability to famine, disease, and predators. Agriculture brought some stability but increased labor demands. Pre-industrial workers often toiled 60-70 hours per week or more during peak seasons, with annual hours exceeding 3,000 in many places by the late 19th century. Medieval artisans might average 8-9 hours of work daily, but the year included long stretches of seasonal labor without modern safety nets. Life expectancy hovered around 30-40 years in many eras, limited by malnutrition, infection, and physical exhaustion.

The fossil fuel revolution changed everything. Beginning in earnest in the late 18th and 19th centuries with coal, then oil and natural gas, energy abundance powered the Industrial Revolution and beyond. Graphs of global life expectancy, population, and GDP per capita show “hockey stick” growth mirroring rising CO₂ emissions from fossil fuels since the late 1800s. Extreme poverty plummeted from about 35% of the world population in 1990 to under 10% today, driven largely by energy-enabled growth in places like China and India, where coal and hydrocarbons fueled industrialization. Life expectancy worldwide rose from around 35 years in ancient times to nearly 72-73 years today. Access to electricity correlates strongly with these gains: it powers clean water pumps, refrigeration, lighting, and medical devices, reducing deaths from indoor air pollution (which still claim millions annually from traditional biomass cooking) and enabling education and economic opportunity.

Drive through any community at 2 a.m. today, and the evidence surrounds us. Porch lights glow, air conditioners or heaters keep temperatures comfortable, and refrigerators hum with fresh food and cold drinks. A simple flip of a switch banishes darkness; a tap delivers clean water without trekking to a river or well. Sewer systems pump waste away efficiently—these conveniences, all energy-dependent, free humans from the drudgery that defined most of history. Before widespread electricity, fetching water, cooking over open fires, hand-washing clothes, and manual farming consumed vast portions of the day. Fossil fuels (and the electricity they predominantly generate—about 80% of global energy still comes from hydrocarbons) multiplied human productivity exponentially. One barrel of oil contains energy equivalent to roughly 25,000 hours of human labor. Modern societies harness this to produce food surpluses feeding 8 billion people, build durable homes, manufacture medicines, and transport goods globally via Walmart-like supply chains that make essentials affordable.

Epstein emphasizes that these benefits extend far beyond comfort. Energy access enables “upper mobility”—the chance for individuals to rise through effort and ingenuity. It powers tools: power drills, pumps, computers, and factories. Time once spent on mere survival now goes to innovation, family, art, science, and enterprise. This is not mere leisure for idleness; it is liberated human potential. Even if many spend extra time on video games, social media scrolling, or boredom-induced snacking (a real phenomenon in affluent societies where a theoretical 40-hour workweek often compresses into far less productive time), the outliers—the creators, inventors, and entrepreneurs—flourish. A small percentage of highly driven individuals, empowered by abundant energy, produce inventions that benefit billions: vaccines, smartphones, efficient agriculture, and now AI. The cascade effect across generations compounds this: books preserve knowledge, inventions build on prior ones, and energy multiplies output. Humanity’s trajectory—from wheel and spear to calculus and computers—shows this pattern. Fossil fuels, formed from ancient sunlight stored over millions of years, unlocked that stored energy for modern use, bridging primitive existence to an era of unprecedented possibility.

Critics of fossil fuels often frame nature as a sacred, living essence demanding protection at all costs—an “Earth worshiper” perspective that prioritizes untouched wilderness over human life. This inverts priorities. The environment has always been dynamic; humans have “impacted” it since the use of fire and tools. The real moral standard is human flourishing: longer, healthier, opportunity-rich lives. Fossil fuels have made Earth more livable by enabling climate mastery—better buildings, irrigation, disaster response, and crop yields that reduce weather-related deaths (which have plummeted dramatically). Side effects like emissions are real but “masterable” through technology, adaptation, and continued energy innovation. Opposing abundant energy in the name of nature condemns billions to energy poverty: over 600-700 million still lack electricity access, and 2+ billion rely on polluting cooking fuels, causing millions of premature deaths yearly from indoor smoke. In sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia, women and children spend up to 40 hours weekly gathering firewood—time stolen from education, work, and family. Energy abundance lifts all, including ecosystems, which are managed more effectively with technology.

AI emerges as the natural offspring of this energy-driven progress. Computing power, itself born from electricity and fossil-enabled infrastructure, now mimics and multiplies aspects of human thinking. Data centers, increasingly powered by reliable sources (with fossil fuels still critical for baseload), consume growing amounts of electricity—global data center use is projected to double or more by 2030, reaching around 945 TWh, with AI driving much of the surge via accelerated server use. AI processes vast datasets, optimizes designs, accelerates drug discovery, and automates routine tasks in ways no prior tool could. It does not “think” with a soul or original imagination; it pattern-matches at superhuman speed and scale. Yet this serves human creators: an engineer using AI can iterate on prototypes faster, a scientist can model complex systems overnight, and a writer can explore ideas with computational assistance. The soul—the imaginative drive—remains uniquely human. AI lacks consciousness, genuine emotion, moral intuition, or the spark of original vision rooted in lived experience and transcendence. It is a tool, like the abacus, calculator, or computer before it, extending biological limitations without replacing the essence that wields it.

Fears of a “post-human apocalypse” echo ancient anxieties, like the Tower of Babel—human hubris punished for overreaching. Some posthumanist thinkers speculate that AI could blur boundaries, creating hybrid or superior intelligences that diminish traditional humanity. Yet this misunderstands our nature. Humanity’s purpose, if one draws from the perspective of being made in the divine image, is creative stewardship: to untangle the universe’s potential, spread across it, and perpetuate life through innovation. The universe itself seems tuned for discovery—physical laws allowing complexity, energy gradients enabling work, minds capable of comprehension. Tools cascade: the wheel eased transport, agriculture amplified food, fossil fuels powered industry, computers accelerated calculation, and AI now multiplies cognitive labor. Each step frees time and resources for higher pursuits. Even if 95% of people “waste” liberated time on trivialities, the 5% (or fewer) who channel it into breakthroughs—new medicines, sustainable tech, space exploration, artistic masterpieces—lift everyone. Historical inventions from tiny creative minorities have done exactly that.

The work-leisure duality taught in modern culture is often artificial. Life is an integrated “happy bowl of soup”: family, labor, rest, creation, and reflection blend in a meaningful whole. Energy abundance allows this integration without the constant threat of starvation or exposure. A 40-hour theoretical workweek in energy-rich societies often yields far more output per hour than centuries of toil, yet many feel time-poor due to choices, not necessity. AI promises further compression of drudgery—handling data analysis, logistics, or routine creativity—freeing even more bandwidth for the imaginative core. Faster is frequently better when it means compressing processes without sacrificing quality, enabling broader access and compounding innovation. Energy for AI is substantial, but so was energy for early factories or electrification; the returns in human capability justify it as part of the same virtuous cycle.

Skeptics might ask: Is the purpose of existence endless toil around a campfire, hunting daily for short lives and basic reproduction? Or is it the exercise of imagination to spread life, knowledge, and beauty on a cosmic scale? The latter aligns with humanity’s unique endowment. We walked over fossil fuels for millennia before recognizing their potential—ancient sunlight captured in decayed life, now powering our ascent. That recognition itself was an act of imagination. AI, requiring enormous computing power (with projections showing AI-related electricity demand growing rapidly, potentially accounting for a significant share of data center growth), continues this: it processes while humans dream, experiments tirelessly, and supports creators who still must “prove stuff in life”—build, test, refine, and give meaning through purpose.

Environmental concerns deserve to be addressed, but not through energy denial. Nature worship that seeks to eradicate human impact or pedestalize a static “life force” ignores that humans are part of nature’s creative unfolding. Tools exist to be used responsibly: innovation in cleaner combustion, nuclear (often sidelined in debates), advanced renewables where practical, and adaptation. Epstein’s call for an “energy philosophy” prioritizing human flourishing over anti-impact frameworks remains sound. Fossil fuels launched us; they need not be eternal, but replacing them prematurely with unreliable alternatives risks reversing gains. Sustainable abundance—whatever form it takes—must deliver the same or better reliability and scalability.

This era brims with adventure. The “good old days” of simplicity, wild expansion, and quiet reverence hold romantic appeal, evoking self-reliance and direct connection to the land. Yet humanity was not built solely for that. We adapt biologically and culturally, using the environment as raw material for higher causes. Low-vision challenges or daily rituals pale against the broader canvas: imagination as the daily ritual expanding possibility. Fossil fuels bridged the gap from primitive survival to this magnificent period. AI, as its intellectual extension, accelerates the cascade. The few who seize leisure for creation—whether in business, art, science, or family—perpetuate the chain. Even “wasted” time by the majority indirectly supports the system, enabling outliers.

In the end, defining a human by physical form alone reduces us to biology; the drive to imagine, create, and improve defines the everlasting essence. Souls occupy bodies as vehicles for this purpose. AI augments without supplanting it. Energy abundance, exemplified by fossil fuels’ proven track record, makes the discussion possible. As Epstein demonstrates with data on poverty reduction, health gains, and productivity, more cost-effective energy correlates with flourishing. Billions still need it; denying that in favor of abstract natural orders harms the vulnerable most.

The trajectory inspires optimism. Human history is one of cascading intelligence: from oral traditions to written books, mechanical calculators to digital computers, biological labor to AI-assisted thought. Each generation multiplies prior efforts. Curiosity and imagination, fueled by freed time and power, drive us to untangle universal usefulness—perhaps to spread life beyond Earth. God’s purpose, interpreted through this lens, aligns with creators’ flourishing, even if imperfectly realized by most. The 1-5% producing magnificent inventions offset the expense many times over, benefiting all lifeforms through better management, reduced scarcity, and expanded opportunity.

Embrace this future with the philosophy of past wisdom: reverence for simplicity, where it teaches resilience, but forward momentum where imagination calls. A personal energy policy—understanding benefits, trade-offs, and the moral primacy of human life—equips everyone. Innovation is inherent; free time, energy, and tools amplify it. The near future holds profound positive change: compressed processes, broader abilities, and a more creative existence. Reverence for the wild West or campfire eras coexists with excitement for what lies ahead. Tools like AI, powered ultimately by the same energy principles, serve the soul’s drive. This is no apocalypse threatening order—it is the order unfolding as intended: humans as co-creators, using imagination to make, give, and perpetuate life on scales only dimly foreseen.

The point of existence emerges clearly—not mere survival like other animals, but purposeful expansion of potential. Even in Middletown, Ohio, or anywhere, late-night refrigerator raids or porch lights symbolize victory over drudgery. AI will compound that victory, calculating tirelessly so humans can imagine boldly. The adventure continues. Those choosing to wield leisure imaginatively will shape it. History’s fossils fuel the launch; human essence steers the course. It is a wonderful time to be alive, full of discovery for those who engage it.

Bibliography / Suggested Further Reading:

• Epstein, Alex. Fossil Future: Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas—Not Less. Portfolio, 2022.

• Our World in Data reports on energy access, life expectancy, poverty, and time use (ourworldindata.org).

• International Energy Agency (IEA) reports on energy and AI, data centers, and access statistics.

• Historical analyses of work hours: e.g., studies on hunter-gatherer societies by anthropologists like James Suzman; pre-industrial labor data from economic historians.

• Philosophical works on creativity, soul, and human nature: classical texts on imago Dei; modern discussions in posthumanism critiques (for contrast).

• Additional context from energy innovation reports and productivity studies.

These sources provide empirical grounding and inspire deeper exploration of energy philosophy, human potential, and technological progress.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

Ascending from Plato’s Cave: Don’t suffer from second husband syndrome

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about where humanity stands at this pivotal moment. As of late March 2026, NASA is days away from launching Artemis II—the first crewed mission to the Moon since Apollo, targeted for no earlier than April 1, 2026, with astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen aboard Orion for a ten-day lunar flyby. This isn’t just another flight; it’s NASA finally getting aggressive, the way it always should have been. I support the Artemis program with my whole heart. I want to see timelines compressed, second and third shifts running around the clock, Saturdays and Sundays included—full throttle output. We’ve talked for decades about whether we ever really went to the Moon. I respect people who doubt it; many have been lied to by institutions they once trusted. But I’ve traveled the world, seen the curvature of the Earth with my own eyes, understood time zones through lived experience, and studied how ancient mathematicians calculated that curvature to plot constellations and voyages. Those advances in human culture demand we go to space—not just with drones or robots, but with people living sustainably off-world. That’s the only way we climb out of Plato’s cave, stop staring at shadows, and see reality for what it is.

My perspective is rooted in a deep love for knowledge, ancient history, and the biblical call to dominion. I don’t dismiss fears about transhumanism or the occult origins some attribute to NASA. I get the Tower of Babel parallels—humanity trying to replace God. But I also believe God gave us intellect and drive precisely for exploration. Leaving Earth isn’t rebellion; it’s fulfillment of the creation mandate. And with AI, robotics, and companies like SpaceX and Firefly Aerospace pushing boundaries, we’re on the cusp of a flourishing space economy that will create jobs, not destroy them. I’ll explain all of this below, drawing on the examples and reasoning I’ve shared in conversations, while adding substantial background, historical context, scientific details, and references for further study. This is my view, expressed in the first person because these convictions are personal—forged from years of study, travel, and reflection on what makes civilizations thrive or collapse.

Let’s start with the skepticism that still lingers. I’ve met kind, thoughtful people who defend Flat Earth theory aggressively. I feel for them. Decades of institutional deception—from governments to media—have left many clinging to simplicity as a shield against complexity. Yet the evidence against a flat Earth is overwhelming and ancient. Around 240 BCE, the Greek scholar Eratosthenes of Cyrene calculated Earth’s circumference with remarkable accuracy using nothing more than sticks, shadows, and geometry. At noon on the summer solstice in Syene (modern Aswan), the Sun shone directly down a well with no shadow. In Alexandria, 5000 stadia north, a stick cast a 7.2-degree shadow—exactly 1/50th of a circle. Multiplying the distance by 50 gave him roughly 250,000 stadia, or about 40,000 kilometers—within 1% of the modern equatorial value of 40,075 km. Ancient cultures used this spherical understanding to navigate oceans and align monuments with constellations. Time zones, the Coriolis effect on weather, and lunar eclipses (where Earth’s round shadow falls on the Moon) all confirm it. I’ve seen the horizon curve from high altitudes and across oceans. We don’t need to argue endlessly; we need to move forward.

The same institutional distrust fuels Moon-landing conspiracies. Yet commercial progress is demolishing doubt. In March 2025, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander achieved the first fully successful commercial Moon landing in Mare Crisium, near Mons Latreille. It operated for over 14 days on the surface—346 hours of daylight plus lunar night—delivering NASA payloads and proving robotic precision. This wasn’t government theater; it was private industry landing hardware right near prior Apollo sites. The best proof, though, will be routine human traffic: Starship ferrying thousands to lunar bases and back. When people vacation on the Moon like they do in Hawaii, the shadows-on-the-wall debate ends.

This brings me to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, which I invoke often because it perfectly captures our situation. In Book VII of The Republic, Socrates describes prisoners chained since birth in an underground cavern, facing a blank wall. Behind them burns a fire; between fire and prisoners, puppeteers carry objects whose shadows dance on the wall. The prisoners believe these shadows are ultimate reality; they compete to predict the next shadow, mistaking illusion for truth. One prisoner breaks free. Dragged upward into sunlight, he suffers pain but gradually sees real objects, then the Sun itself—the Form of the Good. Returning to the cave to free others, he is mocked as blind. Plato uses this to illustrate education’s purpose: turning the soul from illusion toward truth.

I see modern humanity in that cave. We’ve been fed institutional shadows—media narratives, bureaucratic lies, power-maintaining myths. Space exploration is the ascent. Drones and rovers have sent back data, but they’re still shadows. Humans must go—live, work, have children off-world—to grasp the fire and the Sun beyond. Only then do we understand what cast those flickering images on Earth’s wall. My entire worldview, from business to culture to faith, rests on this quest for unfiltered knowledge. I refuse to remain chained, interpreting shadows while interpreters with agendas lie about what they see.

Ancient history reinforces this urgency. I study civilizations full-time because they reveal what builds success: boldness, truth-seeking, and expansion. Many past cultures achieved greatness then lost momentum—collapsed under internal rot or external conquest. I call this “second husband syndrome.” Imagine a second husband tormented by thoughts of his wife’s first husband, especially if children from that marriage remain. Jealousy poisons the new relationship. Likewise, modern elites suppress or dismiss prior cultures’ achievements to claim sole glory. They rewrite history so previous “husbands” (Atlantis legends, megalithic engineering, advanced astronomy) never existed or were primitive. This intellectual jealousy stifles progress. Studying the Sumerians, Egyptians, Greeks, or Maya shows they grasped Earth’s sphericity, built with precision, and reached for the stars. To build successful cultures today, we must leave the mother’s womb—Earth—and psychologically inhabit other worlds. Labor shortages on Earth are irrelevant; AI and robotics multiply our hours exponentially.

Biblically, this expansion aligns with God’s design, not against it. Genesis 1:28 commands: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” Theologians call this the creation or cultural mandate—image-bearers exercising responsible stewardship and creativity across creation. Some interpret it Earth-only, warning against “playing God.” I counter: God gave intellect, curiosity, and the stars themselves. Exploration within biblical rules—humility before the Creator, ethical stewardship—strengthens faith. Western civilization’s prosperity flows from this worldview: truth-seeking fused with moral order. Space doesn’t dismiss Scripture; it illuminates it. Ancient myths and biblical echoes (Ezekiel’s wheels, chariots of fire) hint at cosmic realities. When we settle the Moon and Mars, we’ll confront those stories with fresh eyes, not fear.

Transhumanism and AI raise valid anxieties. I sympathize with those guarding the “temple of the human body” against occult-tinged experiments that seek to dethrone God. Yet I support robotics and AI enthusiastically. They’re tools, not replacements. Elon Musk’s Optimus robots—demonstrated in recent high-profile events—represent progress, not erasure. The robot Melania Trump walked onstage symbolized partnership: machines handling hostile environments so humans thrive. Blue-collar fears about job loss in trucking or fast food miss the bigger picture. Space will explode opportunities. Lunar mining, orbital manufacturing, tourism, and research will demand millions of roles Earthside and off-world. NASA studies project Artemis driving economic growth through commercial partnerships and a burgeoning lunar marketplace. PwC forecasts a $127 billion Moon economy by 2050, fueled by energy infrastructure, resources, and services. I think it will be a lot higher than that. Far from regression, we gain jobs by the mass. I’m bullish because history shows technology expands human potential when paired with moral vision.

Look at the hardware already proving the path. SpaceX’s Starship must fly aggressively; routine, reusable flights are non-negotiable. Firefly’s success shows commercial lunar access is here. Artemis II tests Orion and SLS for crewed lunar operations, paving the way for Artemis III’s landing (targeted 2027–2028 under current plans) and eventual bases. I want Americans—led by visionaries like President Trump—first on the Moon again, first with permanent colonies (dozens, then hundreds, then thousands). A 10,000-person lunar hub by 2050 isn’t fantasy; it’s engineering plus will. People will live there comfortably: internet, power, hotels. I’ll be among the first tourists with my wife—enthusiastically. Imagine vacationing on the Moon, then returning transformed.

Mars follows. Elon Musk has highlighted the Fermi Paradox’s scariest resolution: we might be alone, or nearly so, in the observable universe—a tiny candle of consciousness in darkness. That rarity demands we multiply life outward. Different gravities will reshape humanity—taller or shorter frames, new adaptations—yet our core experience evolves. Space archaeology will resolve earthly mythologies: Was Mars once lush? Did prior intelligences leave traces? We boldly go, not in fear, but in faith.

Opposition comes from anti-human forces—regressive ideologies that prefer controlled scarcity on Earth over expansive freedom. Democrats and globalist mindsets sabotage by slowing timelines, inflating costs, or prioritizing Earthbound politics. They fear off-world colonies because independent humans are harder to dominate. I reject that. Human destiny is multi-planetary; it guarantees species survival against asteroids, climate shifts, or self-inflicted woes.

I want answers. I want the space economy flourishing, exploration routine, and humanity confronting the fire behind the shadows. My book The Gunfighter’s Guide to Business outlines principles of decisive action and moral clarity I apply here. Subscribe, engage, study ancient history, support aggressive NASA and SpaceX timelines. Let’s compress Artemis, land Starships weekly, and build hotels on the Moon. The cave is behind us. The stars await. Godspeed.

Footnotes and Further Reference Material

1. Plato. The Republic, Book VII (514a–520a). Standard translation by Benjamin Jowett or Allan Bloom recommended. For modern analysis: SparkNotes or MasterClass summaries align with my interpretation of enlightenment through ascent.

2. Eratosthenes’ method detailed in Cleomedes’ On the Circular Motions of the Heavens and modern reconstructions. See APS News (2006) or Khan Academy for accessible explanations.

3. NASA Artemis Program: Official site (nasa.gov/artemis) for timelines; Wikipedia for historical delays. Economic report: “Economic Growth and National Competitiveness Impacts of the Artemis Program” (NASA, 2022).

4. Firefly Blue Ghost Mission 1: Firefly Aerospace press releases and end-of-mission summary. Confirms March 2, 2025 landing.

5. Biblical Creation Mandate: Genesis 1:26–28; extended discussion in Answers in Genesis or Focus on the Family resources.

6. Space economy projections: PwC Lunar Market Assessment (2026); NASA’s commercial lunar payload services page.

7. Elon Musk on Fermi Paradox and solitude in cosmos: Public statements 2018–2026, including Davos remarks and X posts.

Additional reading: The Republic (Plato); Pale Blue Dot (Carl Sagan) for perspective (though I differ on some philosophical points); NASA’s Artemis economic studies; The Case for Mars (Robert Zubrin); ancient astronomy texts like Ptolemy or modern histories of Eratosthenes. For AI/robotics ethics: Musk’s own writings and Tesla Optimus updates. Study these, visit NASA facilities as I have with my wife, and join the ascent. The future is ours to seize.

Rich Hoffman

More about me

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

About the Author: Rich Hoffman

He has advised candidates, executives, and public leaders, while conducting deep, hands‑on exploration of archaeological and supernatural hotspots across the world.

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