As we go about celebrating 250 years, I think about how our world has turned upside down and inside out. Has anyone seen the movie Idiocracy (2006)? We are about to send off fireworks as if nothing has happened, just for the sake of having this mind numbing experience. People will have cookouts, drink beer, families will gather together but no one will be conscious of what is happening in our world right now. The end of civilization, the end of human connection, the end of empathy, and valuing humanity. I don’t need to “try” to be negative here, the facts of our present and future are so obvious. Our founding fathers were focused on providing us life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. All of this declaration was to make us free from the crown, so that we might establish our own country and have an ability to create our own rules and decide on our welfare. What cost is this taking from us, as the crown is now Corporate America who could care less about our individual rights, our well-being and our livelihood.

I was around for the bicentennial in 1976. At that time, I was a teenager, dependent on my parents. I worked of course, but this went to my parents. We didn’t go to any major celebrations, which made me sad as I felt I was missing out on something. Back then, not everyone was keen on shooting off fireworks every single day for weeks before and after the 4th. If we went to a fireworks event, there were no food trucks, no bands playing horribly loud music during the fireworks and certainly not trash everywhere left in its wake. We were simple folk that depended on our way of life and our hopes for the future. Our hopes that we could have a job, a family, friends, that our life, as we knew it, would not be diminished and destructed for the sake of some billionaires happiness. This is what we are reduced to in 2026. It didn’t just start, it has been going on since the advent of the Internet, and even before this.

For me, the first sign of destruction was dialing “0” for the operator, which went to 411 and an AI voice that said “What city and state,” or something along these lines. You also did not have to pay for it. This was during the days of “Ma Bell.” For example, here in Ohio, it was called Ohio Bell, not AT&T. In California, it was Pacific Bell. I wonder how many jobs were eliminated from changing to AI?

Once the internet began and began to monetize and everyone who had a business went to a website, we began to see the elimination of receptionists. A receptionist, a job or role I took on many times in my 20’s, was a professional man or woman (generally a woman) who would answer the company phone, listen to your needs and direct you to the right person. This person had to be extremely knowledgeable about the company as they were the first point of contact for the firm. It was always important to be professional as well, if you wanted to get to the person you needed to speak to. Countless jobs being replaced by AI, FAQs, and at first there was an email, but this has been eliminated all together.

Tech jobs for computers are all but replaced by AI. I just had a printer problem this morning with HP. I have cartridges through their Instant Ink and for some reason my printer had a ghost this morning that was printing endless supplies of a form I kept cancelling as I didn’t ask for it. AI gave me all kinds of “support” that I didn’t need because I had already completed those OBVIOUS tasks. I was finally able to find a chat line with a real person and it was handled within seconds. This is the point of a real person. They have a brain and understand what is wrong.

I am struck by how many people are chomping at the bit for us to get on board with AI. It is amazing how quickly groupthink works when Corporate America wants to dumb us down and not think about the amount of jobs that are being replace by a robot. Just as I was about to write this article, I read a blog post by a psychiatrist in Los Angeles, who writes for Dissident MD. Today’s article was called “The Elimination of the Human,” and was written by Dr. Mark McDonald. He was reporting on a robot at a hotel in the San Francisco Bay Area community – Half Moon Bay. He arrived to find NO front desk staff, only a robot and a code that was texted to him. I generally do not do hotels anymore, as I prefer B&Bs or if I must a Vrbo or AirB&B. However, my fiancé and I needed a one night placement in Dayton for the USAF museum this weekend, and I didn’t like the local choices. It was one night. I will update you here to tell you what happened at the Marriott (if need be).

We already saw the end of skilled laborers in factories, thanks to President Clinton who wouldn’t sign anything that would cause him to loose sleep over it (paraphrased) – China. I think this discussion has disappeared for the most part as most of us have given up on pleading to bring our jobs back to the U.S. The only clothing companies that are made here, stick to t-shirts and baseball caps, which is hardly the type of clothing I would wear. Not knocking them, I appreciate their efforts but this is not fashion. And, what has happened to all these factory towns? Well, try reading the book “Hillbilly Elegy,” by J.D. Vance. Forget about his politics, focus on the intent. I have been in those factory towns which I now call “meth labs.”

Amazon has replaced Ike’s General Store that we saw on “The Waltons.” They sell anything and everything and it is nothing but junk from China (80% at least) and at the same time depleted all the amazing bookstores that were small and large. Now, Barnes and Noble is the last remaining large bookseller which has been laying off and closing stores in the last 16 years, trying desperately to stay relevant. Amazon forced people to read from a tablet years ago, so most of us afficionado’s are nothing more than a minority of real book readers. And customer service? That is a joke. They don’t have a telephone number either and you stand in line at Whole Foods or your nearest grocery store to “do-it-yourself” with a robot.

AI replacing therapy. What is the point of this? If you have a mental health condition, you should talk to a robot? I can’t believe I actually had someone arguing with me on Facebook today (I didn’t respond). I saw that the Wall Street Journal reported on a therapist – yes a real live therapist, who gave her client in Boone, North Carolina the suggestion to use AI in between sessions. For anyone who does not know, Boone is a university town, I have been there. Generally when there is a university in town, there is a plethora of psychological resources. Had it been me, I would have suggested a support group – in person, workshops, books, articles to read, and holistic treatment. My holistic go to is often meditation, walking, other forms of exercise, vitamins, and bodywork. Anything as an adjunct to get the person in touch with their inner self. AI is not real. It is FAQs for therapy. AI will isolate worse then COVID, keeping a person tucked away in their home, causing social anxiety as the next diagnosis. I have seen this fear of going out quite a bit since COVID, which destroyed the human connection from the workspace.

Do we really want to live our life like the movie Idiocracy? Is this what it boils down to? We become COVID on steroids, Dumb and Dumber, with no compassion for the average person at all? This is my thoughts on the loss of jobs that gave the average person the freedom to purchase and to raise a family and for some to even enter into entrepreneurship and become a minor capitalist. Not everyone can go to college. Not everyone is capable of running a business. When all the skilled laborer positions for entry level students or entry level factory men and women are gone, what happens to these people? Are we going to become a street society where only the strong survive?

I am retiring in two years with the man who will be my husband by then. We will be on social security until this is going to be ripped out from under us in 2030 and we may have to go to work again. I am unsure whether I can say I am lucky or not to be skilled when my profession is going to AI. I only work with older people anyway, so my population is not the gamer/computer raised set but the mature professional group. The “pull yourself up by your boot straps” group. I am saying all of this to say that what our elders before me have been saying for decades. Wake UP America! This is not the country I was raised in. The future looks horrible. We need to fight back now, just like we did in 1776, though I am unsure what that answer is. We are beyond having a Tea Party (as in Boston) and fighting Corporate America is not the same as donning our bows and arrows and riding our horses and yelling “The British Are Coming.” Jeff Bezos is here and is running the show. No one seems to be taking him to court for a monopoly. Nor did they win with Bill Gates and for that matter so far the Epstein files (unredacted) to stop these men from harming young girls.

I feel sorry for my grandchildren and my/their descendants. We are in a world that is focused on the billionaire and their luxury yachts which are the size of those found in a naval shipyard in Chula Vista. Capitalism has been replaced by Ecommerce dictators and we have out tails between our legs saying “It is what it is,” my least favorite comment as it sounds like what someone would say in a communist country. We are doomed and we have nothing to celebrate except to pay homage to a past that once was.