By Michael Noel, Founder DeReticular, and his AI Remnant
There is an uncomfortable truth in America. A palpable change is coming. We all know it, we all feel it, and most of us have a vague notion of how it might unfold. But it is how we, as Americans, are dealing with this impending change that is beginning to silence those who speak truths that don’t align with the current, fractured standards.
It’s a little like listening to Kennedy’s speech. “We choose to go to the moon, and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.” What if, instead of rallying behind that call, instead of embracing the difficult tasks that have defined American greatness, we had responded with a collective shrug and a self-serving caveat? “Let’s rally around our President John F. Kennedy and support doing the hard things… just not in my neighborhood.”
This “not in my neighborhood” mentality is a poison that has seeped into the very bedrock of our nation, corrupting our ability to recover and progress. We stand on the precipice of monumental challenges, yet we are paralyzed by a self-imposed division that threatens to unravel the very fabric of our society.
Consider our healthcare system. Globally, the American healthcare system is the most expensive in the world.[1][2][3] We rank number one in cost and, to our credit, in our ability to accurately diagnose disease.[4] However, when it comes to outcomes, we plummet to 36th globally.[4] We spend more per person on healthcare than any other wealthy nation, yet our life expectancy is lower and we suffer from higher rates of preventable deaths.[1][3][5] We have the best tools, the most brilliant minds, and yet we are failing. Why? Because the moment a solution is proposed that might disrupt the status quo, the cries of “not in my neighborhood” begin. “Don’t change my insurance plan,” “Don’t build a clinic there,” “Don’t touch my profits.”
Look at our multi-trillion-dollar Real Estate Escrow industry. It’s essentially an insurance company that pays out less than three percent of its premiums in losses. It can take 30 days and a $4,000 escrow payment to close on a house, while we can transfer a million dollars in Bitcoin for ten dollars in ten minutes. The inefficiency is staggering, a relic of a bygone era. Yet, when we talk about fixing the trillions of dollars in real estate inflation that Americans are paying, the response is predictable: “Don’t do it with homes in my neighborhood.” The fear of change, even change that would benefit the vast majority, is so deeply ingrained that we cling to broken systems.
This isn’t a new phenomenon. America has always been a nation of differing opinions and robust debate.[4] We have faced deep divisions throughout our history, from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement.[2][5] But in each instance, we have found a way to come together, to find a common purpose that transcended our differences. We have a history of unity, of overcoming adversity, that we seem to have forgotten.[5]
Now, we are so divided that we are literally killing each other. We are a nation at war with itself, fueled by fear and misinformation. There are those who smile while they sow the seeds of fear, who profit from our division. They are the modern-day Dianns, fighting to maintain a broken status quo that benefits them, regardless of the cost to the nation as a whole.
But America has seen this before. We have faced down fear and division, and we have emerged stronger. We have nothing to fear but fear itself.
President Kennedy, in his immortal speech, reminded us of our pioneering spirit, our relentless drive to lead and to innovate:
“Those who came before us made certain that this country rode the first waves of the industrial revolutions, the first waves of modern invention, and the first wave of nuclear power, and this generation does not intend to founder in the backwash of the coming age of space. We mean to be a part of it — we mean to lead it. For the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. We have vowed that we shall not see space filled with weapons of mass destruction, but with instruments of knowledge and understanding.
Yet the vows of this nation can only be fulfilled if we in this nation are first, and, therefore, we intend to be first. In short, our leadership in science and in industry, our hopes for peace and security, our obligations to ourselves as well as others, all require us to make this effort, to solve these mysteries, to solve them for the good of all men, and to become the world’s leading space-faring nation.
We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and all technology, has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war. I do not say the we should or will go unprotected against the hostile misuse of space any more than we go unprotected against the hostile use of land or sea, but I do say that space can be explored and mastered without feeding the fires of war, without repeating the mistakes that man has made in extending his writ around this globe of ours.
There is no strife, no prejudice, no national conflict in outer space as yet. Its hazards are hostile to us all. Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for peaceful cooperation may never come again. But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?
We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.
It is for these reasons that I regard the decision last year to shift our efforts in space from low to high gear as among the most important decisions that will be made during my incumbency in the office of the presidency.”
The time has come for us to once again embrace the hard things. The time has come for us to reject the poison of “not in my neighborhood” and to remember that we are all in this together. We are one nation, one people, and we will either rise together or we will fall together. The choice is ours.