regulation | The Direction of Intention

The Reason [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on September 7, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

“[Teddy]Roosevelt had come to believe that a strong government must regulate business. “The absence of effective State, and, especially, national, restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power,” he said.

After all, he said, “[t]he object of government is the welfare of the people.” ~ Milwaukee Independent

It reads like copy from today yet it’s from a speech Roosevelt gave in 1912. The times have changed but the tension remains the same. The question is as it was then: is the object of government the welfare of the people – all of the people – or is it to protect the prosperity of the few?

Theodore Roosevelt believed that the purpose of government was to prosper the people. In today’s parlance that would make him a Democratic Socialist. Government must be strong in order to regulate corporations. Government is the firewall that protects the people from corporate greed and exploitation.

The current occupant of the White House and the contemporary republican party believe the opposite: The purpose of government is deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy few. It’s an agenda that serves a long debunked claim that wealth will trickle down. It doesn’t. It never has. It never will. It creates “…a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power.”

The purpose of DOGE was not to cut waste, fraud and abuse. The purpose of DOGE was to cut oversight and regulation of corporate activity. We are feeling the effects of a weakened government oversight in the grocery store, at the gas pump, in the gutting of healthcare and the social safety net.

“Over the past five decades, economic analyses indicate that roughly $50 trillion to $80 trillion in aggregate income and wealth has been redistributed upward or concentrated into the highest-earning brackets away from the bottom 90% of Americans.”

The cuts to healthcare, to Medicaid, to SNAP…to every program that served the welfare of the people pays for an enormous tax cut extended to the already morbidly wealthy. It is the centerpiece of the republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill. It balloons our national debt. Much of the damage is yet to be felt since they courageously (I’m being facetious) planned for the majority of the cuts to take effect AFTER the midterms.

Today is Labor Day. It has a history and a purpose: “Workers formed unions and held rallies. On September 5, 1882, the first Labor Day parade was held in New York City when 10,000 workers marched for better pay and conditions.”

Although the cost of living has escalated, the last raise to the minimum wage was in 2009.

The republicans under the current occupant of the White House have convinced many people at the bottom of the economic ladder that government is the problem. It’s not corporate greed. It’s not corporate influence in Washington D.C., it’s not that business driven policy and purchased-politicians that weaken the role of government… The MAGA cult famously votes – and continues to vote – for its own exploitation. They cheer the wreckage of the firewall built to protect them.

It’s Labor Day. It’s time for us to remember the reason why we gather this day and place our focus and intention on the workers. It’s time for us to remember that “the object of government is the welfare of the people.”

It is time for the people to reclaim their government from the small class of enormously wealthy people who exploit the people at every turn. And, more to the point, it is time for this nation to exit the question: is the object of government the welfare of the people – all of the people – or is it to protect the prosperity of the few? This nation has always prospered when the welfare of the people are the object of policy. It teeters when our government is hijacked and used to protect the wealth of the few.

We are a government of, by, and for the people. A government for the people. It’s in our founding documents. It is the reason why we vote, why we have the right to vote. It is the reason the republicans and this president are assaulting our right to vote from every direction.

It’s Labor Day. It’s time to remember that working people had to fight for their rights. They are not a given. They are tenuous. It’s time for us to realize how hard this administration is working to strip us of our rights, to gut the government whose purpose is to protect the welfare of the people while it is working overtime to protect “a small class of enormously wealthy people, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power.”

What will you do now and in November to protect your rights, especially your right to vote in free and fair election, given that this might be our last Labor Day celebrated by people governed by a system rooted in the belief that the people should choose their leaders – and not the other way around?

read Kerri’s blog post about LABOR DAY

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Filed under: Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, DOGE, elections, exploitation, free and fair elections, government, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, labor day, regulation, rights, story, studio melange, the melange, Theodore Roosevelt, vote | 1 Comment »

An Avalanche of Change [David’s blog on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on August 26, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

Who knows why the mind associates one thing with another? Synapse firing often seems senseless. Sitting in the backyard, the warm orange and yellow sunset reflecting on the back fence, calling attention to the rusty sunflower, I was transported back in time to the Little Theatre, a converted mechanics shop tucked beside the maintenance yard on a high school campus. I ran a summer theatre program in that ramshackle-yet-sacred building for several years.

The memory that caught me while staring at the ferns and sunflowers at sunset was the day I arrived in town and found students stripping the asbestos insulation from the wiring of all the lighting instruments. Their teacher, the woman who taught theatre during the regular school year, had recently read an article about the dangers of asbestos. Since the lighting instruments were old and likely insulated with asbestos, she thought it was a good idea to have her students remove the insulation from the instruments.

I was gobsmacked. Asbestos is not dangerous until disturbed. Lighting instruments, like all things electrical become dangerous when the wiring is exposed and stripped of insulation. Not only was she exposing her students to the danger that she was trying to avoid but she was rendering the electrical equipment dangerous and a deadly fire hazard. She had good intentions. She had no idea what she was doing. In one fell swoop, she endangered her students lives on multiple fronts while ruining every single lighting instrument in the theatre.

I don’t know how ferns and sunflowers evoked that memory but I know where it took me: it immediately became a useful analogy for the current administration. Since they’ve cut and stripped regulations and oversight protections, Cyclospora, salmonella and eColi are run amok in our food chain. Measles are back with a vengeance. The Navy can’t feed its sailors as we fight a war without a reason. The oil reserves are disappearing. The healthcare system is collapsing. The justice department is soiling itself. Inflation is rising, but not nearly as fast as the national debt. They do not know what they are doing. They are stripping the asbestos from the lighting instruments. They let loose The Doge, elevated the Sycophants and are daily placing us in harms way while hampering our capacity to function. They are like the theatre teacher though not so well-meaning. This group is self-serving in its ineptitude.

Thankfully, my analogy doesn’t stop at the destruction. The actions of the theatre teacher ultimately served to remove her from her position. It was easy to see that she was a danger to her students and herself. The immediate necessity of having to resurrect or replace the lighting equipment was a tiny pebble that began an avalanche of change. In a few years there was a new theatre building with rehearsal space and shop space and updated technology. Our capacity to function not only improved, it opened doors to previously unimaginable possibilities.

That is my hope as I watch this kakistocracy systematically strip the insulation from our democratic wires. It’s becoming easier and easier to see that they are a danger to the people, the nation and to themselves. Ultimately, they will be removed and held accountable. The immediate necessity of fixing what they broke will lead to an avalanche of change that will prevent incompetence from every again grabbing the reins of the nation, and will open doors to previously unimaginable possibilities.

***

(During my time at the Little Theatre I would often take a break at sunset, climb to the roof and watch the world bath in warm orange and yellow light. I would take a breath in a busy day before climbing back down the ladder into the vibrant creative space – my laboratory space – that was a small black box theatre made from a converted mechanics shop. Sacred space. Maybe those synapses make sense after all.)

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE SUNFLOWER SUNSET

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Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Metaphor, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: analogy, artistry, cyclospora, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, DOGE, incompetence, kakistocracy, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, regulation, story, studio melange, sunflower, sunset, the melange | Leave a comment »

Look Closely [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on July 2, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

Look closely. The dill wilts under the heat dome. Unusually high temperatures and humidity leave it unprotected.

Look closely. Once upon a time we enjoyed an FCC policy called The Fairness Doctrine. It was also known as the “truth in media” regulation. It required broadcast media to present contrasting viewpoints on controversial issues. It was intended to promote public discourse while preventing biased media agendas. It was largely successful. Rupert Murdoch hated it. Ronald Reagan repealed it. “The demise of this FCC rule has been cited as a contributing factor in the rising level of party polarization in the United States.” The demise of The Fairness Doctrine stimulated the divisive info-bubbles that we now inhabit. It opened the door for the rise of the toxic Murdoch fox and his ultra-conservative copycats. It has left us unprotected.

Look closely. We did not arrive here by accident. Party polarization. Divisive echo chambers. Biased media agendas. The absence of civil public discourse. 24/7 commentary and opinion uprooted from reality and meant to foster outrage. It’s fertile ground for dark money purchasing politicians and supreme court justices.

Look closely: the celebration of media bias. The interruption – the dismantling – of public discourse. The unbridled magnification and normalization of lies. Polarization is great for profiteers but deadly to democracy.

Our media carries the story we tell ourselves about ourselves. Are we really hyper-biased, polarized liars so enraged that we’re incapable of public discourse? Is there truly no common ground?

Look closely. The regulation of traffic – the law – makes us capable of safe travel. The regulation does not inhibit us. It fosters necessary cooperation. Building codes are regulations ensuring that our dwellings and places of business are safely constructed. The regulations do not inhibit us – they protect us. They establish and maintain a high quality standard.

A regulation like The Fairness Doctrine was neither conservative nor progressive. It didn’t inhibit us. It ensured that we were not made victim to bad information. It established a standard for truth-in-media and engendered respect for differing perspectives.

We know how to exit our echo chambers. We know how to ensure that we are acting – and voting – on unbiased information. Healthy public discourse is the epicenter of our democracy. Healthy public discourse relies on truthful information and civil debate. We know how to foster a better field of discourse and it requires adequate regulation meant to prevent media exploitation and manipulation.

Regulation. The Constitution is a document of regulations. It is neither conservative nor progressive, it establishes simple rules for how we safeguard our values, how we live and thrive together. Breaching the boundaries, ignoring the law, like removing all traffic laws, serves to expedite our confusion and fiery demise.

Look closely. Granting presidential immunity from law is a breach. Eliminating due process and habeas corpus is a breach. Consolidating power in the executive branch is a breach. We are unprotected. ICE plucks innocent people from the streets. Congress intends to pass a bill – make a law – that impoverishes the many to enrich the few.

Integrity is the word that comes to mind. It has two relevant meanings. First, having strong moral principles. Moral principles are akin to regulations – they define shared values and provide the basis for society’s laws. They foster cooperation. The second meaning is unity. Wholeness is a result of a shared story based on common values and moral principles. The second meaning of Integrity – unity – is the blossom of the first. Division and discord are the blossoms of the collapse of shared values and breaches of communal moral principles.

It’s worth asking again: are we really hyper-biased, polarized liars so enraged that we’re incapable of public discourse? Do we really hold our democracy so lightly? Or have we been poisoned by the biased toxic fables we daily consume from the free-for-all media-stream? Are we intoxicated on the outrage daily pumped into our brains from a media the grows wealthy on our dysfunction?

Look closely. We are unprotected.

read Kerri’s blogpost about WILTED DILL