truth | The Direction of Intention

A Well Known Truth [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on October 23, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

I’ve been thinking a lot about truth lately. What is true and what is not – and in this age of technology how do we know? A photograph is no longer proof that something happened. Neither is a film or a voice recording. All can be manufactured and manipulated. The legacy news outlets are partisan at best: narratives are manipulated for ratings or some other less palatable agenda…but only loosely related to truth.

How do we know what is factual when there is a concerted effort – from every direction – to spin the truth?

If truth is a coherence that emerges when facts are lined up and stitched together, then the best way to undermine the truth is to deny the facts. In this age of rampant gaslighting and cries of “fake news”, indisputable facts are daily obscured by clouds of deceit and tsunamis of nonsense.

How do we, as a nation, as a community, expect to debate best paths forward when we are incapable – or unwilling – to acknowledge facts? At the No Kings rally I had a conversation with a man who perfectly captured the challenge we face. Playing devil’s advocate, he said: “Who needs facts! If I believe it is true then it is true.”

These are facts:

~ Election fraud in our system is statistically zero.

~ In 2020 a mob incited by the current president attacked the Capitol.

~ He lost the 2020 election. He is a felon. He’s been found libel for sexual assault.

~ He’s a pathological liar.

~He wants us to believe that voter fraud is rampant in our elections.

Based on a plethora of facts, when stitched together, it is impossible to escape this truth: he is waging a war on our Constitution in order to install an authoritarian state. To do it he needs us to divorce ourselves from the facts. He needs us to be afraid.

Water freezes at 32 degrees. Fact.

Truth: The horizon calls us to the unknown. It invites us to ask, “What’s beyond?” It’s why we build ships, sail to the edge, seek religious freedom, play with fire, build roads, seek cures and imagine and strive for a nation governed by the people and not a king. It’s why we seek truth and rely on facts to get us there.

This is a well-known truth stitched together from facts: Democracy dies in darkness. “Without reliable information, the public cannot make informed choices, leading to the gradual erosion and collapse of democratic institutions.”

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Filed under: KS Friday, Language, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, facts, gaslighting, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, story, studio melange, the melange, truth, vote | Leave a comment »

The Jetty [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on October 21, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

I am surrounded by so much beauty that I sometimes forget. I take it for granted. And then, walking the paths that hug the lake, I suddenly see again. I stop because I am overwhelmed by the enormity of it all, just as I was the very first time I walked these paths. “Look where we live!” I say.

“I know,” she replies.

Our loop takes us along the lake, through the marina and around the point to the channel, the jetty and red lighthouse. The jetty serves as a stalwart guardian at the mouth of the channel. When the lake is raging it absorbs the force of the waves. On any day it keeps silt from collecting and clogging the channel. On calm days it is an excellent spot for the seagulls to gather and confab. When the salmon are running the fishermen in their small boats gather at the mouth of the channel and take advantage of the jetty’s protection.

Kerri and I are a jetty for each other.

I’ve decided that everyone needs a jetty.

It’s one of the things we take for granted about our democracy – about the idea that is a democracy. It is meant to be a government made up of regular people who serve their neighbors. People protecting people from exploitation and persecution, striving for “a more perfect union”. At least that is the idea. Of, by and for the people. In a democracy, the law is the jetty.

I suppose autocracies are a jetty too, but serve a purpose that is the opposite of a democracy. It establishes a barrier that protects the privileged few from the majority who are exploited for private gain. In an autocracy, brute force is the jetty. ICE. The SS.

So, I must amend my thought: everyone needs a jetty and everyone needs to be a jetty for others.

I recently heard an interview with Maria Ressa, a Noble Peace Prize laureate. She said something that reminds me of the democracy-jetty that we’ve lost and need to rebuild: facts make truth and truth makes justice. Without equal application of the law, law that serves facts that illuminate truth, there is no justice. Where there is no justice there is no liberty.

I have been surrounded all my life by liberty and I have taken it for granted. Rights and freedoms. The sitting president just announced that the courts have no power over him, that he need not follow the law. The protective jetty has been breached and I am overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.

Our vote in a few short weeks will not restore the jetty but will serve to slow its dismantling. It will take some time to rebuild our stalwart guardian jetty. That process will first necessitate a grounding in fact so we might be able to restore shared truth which will revivify the respect for the law.

I look forward to the day* – I hope for the day – that we can look at each other, recognize our hard-earned good fortune, the beauty of our democracy, a nation of equal justice under the law, honestly striving for a more perfect union, and once again say to each other, “Look at where we live!”

*(restoration begins now with your vote. Vote. Help your neighbors to vote)

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE JETTY

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Filed under: Edges, Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Metaphor, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, autocracy, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, equality, government, justice, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, law, story, studio melange, the melange, truth | Leave a comment »

More Fantastic [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on October 14, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

I dreamed that there were grizzly bears swimming in my pool. I don’t have a pool. In the dream, the bears were friendly. I enjoyed their antics. They were showing off because they knew I was watching.

On our walk, the maples in the park are beginning to turn. I look forward to this time of year when the color of the leaves knocks my socks off. Isn’t that a funny image? My socks flying off my feet from the sheer force of color. It’s a dream image. Metaphors are like that.

They are pulling the boats out of the harbor. We watched as the rolling crane lifted an enormous yacht from the water – as if it was a toy – and then slowly rolled it into the boatyard for cleaning, shrink wrap and storage. A surreal experience.

These days I go outside with Dogga to keep an eye on him. He wakes us before dawn. I have been enjoying watching the moon wane. This morning it was a sliver. Orion was high in the sky. The only sound was a distant train engine idling. Dogga was suddenly at my feet. We sat on the cool stone of the patio and had a sweet pet.

Everything seems dreamlike to me in this era of mass disorientation. I don’t know about you but I’m having a much easier time believing that grizzly bears are swimming in my pool than I am that anyone still supports this pedophile president and his feckless republican party. Unlike the bears, he is not friendly and his followers are not a joy to behold.

Like me, do you dream of a time when truth is once again valued and integrity restored, when dreams are more fantastic than the daily tsunami of outrage and lies?

read Kerri’s blog about THE MAPLES

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Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Metaphor, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, dreams, integrity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, MAGA, reality, republicans, story, studio melange, surreal, the melange, truth | Leave a comment »

Shadow and Substance [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on September 22, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Even in the valley of the shadow of death, two and two do not make six.” ~ Leo Tolstoy

When I am stuck or empty of thought, when I do not know what to write about, I sometimes jump into quotes to get me moving. The quote is like a pebble that starts an avalanche. This quote assures me that there is sense to be made, that there are universal rules that apply to all. We are born. We all die. Gravity keeps our feet on the ground even though the ground is a ball spinning through space. Two and two make four, even if the current occupant of the White House insists that it is six.

“A false friend and a shadow attend only while the sun shines.” ~ Benjamin Franklin

I have a theory about maga republicans. They are false friends, keeping close to their dear-leader as long as the sun shines. Sundown is coming, if not already here. They are already fading. Some have stopped attending but they have already rendered themselves as substance-free, nothing more than shadow. The question becomes, “Will we believe them when they claim to be thought-full, 3 dimensional, independent, caring and well-intended representatives of their constituents?” I hope not. I hope we-the-people have more substance than that, a higher expectation of the people who are meant to represent us.

“There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires.” ~ Nelson Mandela

There is a dial called “If they gain, we lose,” that the wealthy twist every time this nation actually approaches equality. It’s a very old dial, installed at our nation’s inception. It has been extremely useful for protecting privilege when the greater rabble question the inequities in a nation purportedly based on the ideals of equality and freedom-and-justice-for-all. The current lot have been cranking the dial. Despite their fears and repeated efforts to divide us, to demolish democracy and enrich their holdings, the mountaintop of our desires remains. Perhaps this will be our last pass through the valley? Perhaps we will finally be willing and able to disconnect the dial, erase the concocted divisions and, together, reach the mountaintop?

“Beware that you do not lose the substance by grasping at the shadow.” ~ Aesop

Growing older, stacking experiences, is a great teacher of shadow versus substance. Our nation has just passed its 250th year though it seems locked in a cycle of shadow-grabbing. Separating substance from shadow is a skill that comes from an honest review of history. The good, the bad, and the ugly – all of it – is necessary for clarifying what matters and what does not. Is a ballroom essential while the people starve? Is a president profiteering from his office an official duty that betters the community and advances our society? It begs two related questions: How long are we will to pretend that shadow is substance? How long can we enable shadow-grasping before we lose our national substance, before we become nothing more than a shadow?

“When virtue is lost, benevolence appears, when benevolence is lost right conduct appears, when right conduct is lost, expedience appears. Expediency is the mere shadow of right and truth; it is the beginning of disorder.” ~ Lao Tzu

A pebble starts an avalanche.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE SHADOW

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Filed under: Identity, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: Aesop, artistry, Ben Franklin, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, equality, freedom, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lao tzu, Leo Tolstoy, Nelson Mandela, shadow, story, studio melange, substance, the melange, truth, virtue | Leave a comment »

The Warp And Woof [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on September 8, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Old and new make the warp and woof of every moment. There is no thread that is not a twist of these two strands.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Among the most toxic false divisions currently being foisted upon us is the idea that we are either exclusively conservative or progressive. We love our traditions AND want a better life for our descendants. Both/And. We are all progressive and conservative. We are more alike than we realize.

No bird flies if it only has a single wing; it needs the balance of a right wing AND a left. That is the genius of our system as it was initially conceived. A government that thrives on the honest debate of opposing points of view. Compromise is key. Compromise is balance and balance affords flight.

We are coming apart at the seams, not because we have divided into liberal or conservative camps but because we’ve lost the capacity for honest debate. It is not opposing points of view that plague us; it is a disbelief in substance, a disqualification of fact. A loss of balance. We do not share common truth. This bird cannot fly.

You’d think our division would be fairly easy to transcend. Shared facts are not so hard to establish. Observed, measurable, testable. Lately, our leaders can’t agree that ice forms when temperatures drop beneath 32 degrees. We are awash in “alternative facts” and purposely irreconcilable narratives. A disqualification of fact is a dedication to lies.

After encouragement from the president, a mob storms the Capitol. Is it an insurrection or peaceful tourists? Both interpretations are out there. Only one is rooted in observable, measurable, testable fact.

There were over 60 court challenges to the 2020 election, each was thrown out for lack of evidence. Yet, to this day we are still forced to swallow the narrative that the election was stolen even though all the evidence, all of the facts, substantiate that the election was free and fair.

A disqualification of fact. A dedication to lies.

A lie thrives on bluster and runs from proof whereas fact is quiet, independent of personal agenda or claim. Our capacity for honest debates is mired in personal agenda and drowning in a bucket of loud lies. We can only hope that someday soon integrity returns to our politics. We can only hope that proof and accountability find their way back in the executive office, the legislative chambers, and the judicial, the court Supremes.

Both Barney and the sweet potato vine he hosts are beautiful in their second chance. Barney was a rescue, a piano on the way to the scrap yard. The sweet potato vine was nearly dead, root-bound, when we intervened and gave it a bigger pot. Now it thrives.

Our nation is on the way to the scrap yard but it is not too late to intervene. It can be beautiful, a dynamic mix, a creative tension of old and new, progressive and conservative, a guardian of tradition that creates a better life for all of our descendants, a rich diverse nation that fulfills the promise upon which it was founded. We need not be lie-bound. We are nation of immigrants capable of creating a container big enough to hold a world of perspectives, strong enough to face the facts, sturdy enough to pursue the truth. We are made strong when we uphold our dedication to honest debate and compromise. Honest debate and the capacity to compromise is not the sole dominion of conservatives or progressives. It requires both.

That is our secret sauce.

A dynamic container capable of holding space for varied cultures and beliefs. A nation that offers a second chance to all newcomers. A energetic crossroads. Balanced weave of conservative and progressive, a nation unified by a deep embrace of a single fundamental truth: that all people are created equal.

read Kerri’s blog about SWEET POTATO BARNEY

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Filed under: Metaphor, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: alternative facts, artistry, balance, Compromise, conservative, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, division, fact, integrity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, progressive, story, studio melange, the melange, truth | 1 Comment »

Our Naked Truth [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on August 10, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

“It’s been on my mind a lot lately,” she said. “The word veritas.”

Veritas.

Veritas is the Latin word for truth though it is more precise than the blanket word, “truth”. It denotes an alignment of words and actions with facts and yet it reaches beyond the hard science of fact into the metaphysics of morality . It is meant to be a core lived-value. One of The Four Agreements of Don Miguel Ruiz is “to be impeccable to your word,” say what you mean and mean what you say. Impeccability to your word is veritas.

Veritas is a Roman goddess “…often depicted as nuda veritas (naked truth), holding a hand mirror to show self-reflection and how things truly are without disguise.” (Wikipedia)

It goes without saying that Veritas is not high on the list of aspirations in these un-United States. We are awash in misinformation, propaganda, deception and lie. In Latin, our current value set is more Falsitas (untruth) than Veritas. In recent history we eschew the hand-mirror and bury ourselves in disguises.

Another yummy Latin word, Simulatio, meaning hypocrisy and deceit, brought a smile to me when I thought it could be the new name of GOP Elephant. It’s either Simulatio or a more considerate moniker: Mentis Morbum (mental illness).

We are in the midst of primary season, choosing the candidates that will run in the November midterm election. Veritas must be on the minds of millions of people. More than once I’ve heard a candidate say something like, “This is not a progressive or conservative issue. It is a human issue.” Hearing this phrase gives me some small measure of hope. It transcends partisan divides. Perhaps we-the-people are finally sick to death of Falsitas and are trying to find our way to common ground. Our shared values. Perhaps the distance between who-we say-we-are and how-we-act has become too vast. Perhaps the weight of the disguise has become to heavy to bear.

Perhaps our only route to survival – and health – as a democracy is by dropping the Falsitas and taking up the hand-mirror of Veritas and having a good long look at our naked truth. Perhaps we will have the courage to open our eyes see our full reflection. Perhaps we will deal honestly with our manufactured divide. Perhaps we will once-and-for-all put to rest the ugly white nationalism, the root of our Falsitas, the seed of our racial inequality, and at long last live without apology the Veritas at the heart of our foundational aspiration: a nation that believes to its core that all people – all people – are created equal.

Equality is not a conservative or progressive issue. It is a human issue.

read Kerri’s blogpost about VERITAS

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Filed under: Identity, Language, Merely A Thought Monday, Uncategorized | Tagged: alignment, artistry, aspiration, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, don miguel ruiz, hypocrisy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, naked truth, story, studio melange, the melange, truth, values, veritas | 1 Comment »

Give Voice [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on July 28, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

We saw this phrase printed on a bag in a bookstore. I thought, “It is no small feat to speak truth to power”. Especially for “she”.

Since seeing it at the bookstore, this phrase has come across my screen more than a few times. It is not a platitude. For a woman to choose to speak truth rather than maintain silence, “she” will necessarily step into the fire. Note the Epstein survivors. There could not be a hotter fire and yet, for years, many have chosen the fire. Silence is untenable when silence guarantees that yet another generation of women -sisters, mothers, daughters, aunts – will be abused and discarded. For “she,” the step into the fire is often selfless.

Silence means survival. That is why the fire is so hot when “she” chooses to speak. It is quite possible, even likely, that the fire will consume her. “She” knows that. “She” speaks anyway.

Yet, silence is also a firewall against really living. “She” knows that, too. Silence-transcended is a fire that transforms.

Fire is the threat. Fire is the hope.

Glimpsing some small hope, perhaps the slim promise of change or simply having had enough…breaks the silence. It necessitates voice. Giving voice to truth is shining light into dark corners.

Consumed by fire? Transformed by fire? Either way, it is the fire-of-necessity. It is an incredible act of courage to stand up and say aloud to those who would have “she” remain silent: “This happened. This was wrong. This matters.” ~ Deborah Tuerkheimer, Credible

read Kerri’s blogpost about FIRE

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Filed under: Edges, Power, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, breaking silence, courage, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Epstein survivors, fire, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, selfless, silence, speaking truth, story, studio melange, the melange, transcend, transform, truth | Leave a comment »

Read The Rings [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on July 24, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The “Lost Cause” is a revisionist narrative that emerged in the American South after the Civil War to romanticize the Confederacy and justify secession. It falsely claims the war was fought over “states’ rights” rather than slavery, portrays slavery as a benign institution, and asserts that Confederate defeat was caused solely by Union advantages in resources and manpower.” ~ EBSCO

In 2023 I wrote a play entitled DIORAMA that explores our nation’s inability to deal honestly with our history. Even after all of my research and immersion into the topic, I have been agog at the lengths the current administration has gone in the past 18 months to whitewash our history in order to reinvigorate The Lost Cause narrative. White supremacy cannot face the mirror of history so must selectively distort, assault and/or eliminate fact and truth.

Last week Stephen Miller labeled progressives – or anyone who does not agree with his white nationalism – as less than human. We were witness to the president of the United States call the democrats and progressives “a danger to our democracy” and dust off the tired-old-chicken-little-cry: liberals are communists! It would be sad and laughable if history had not taught us of the dangers of desperate dictators and their nationalist sycophants.

As we have previously written, a storm recently broke our mighty maple tree. Kerri’s relationship with this guardian reaches back nearly 40 years. She has a long and precious history with this gentle giant. I have only had a fragment of that time but felt deeply the loss of this near-century old spirit. It is part of our history. As I watched the crew quickly take it down, I couldn’t help but think about how long it took to grow. It seemed unfair how rapidly it was removed.

Destruction is easy. Growth takes time, nurturing, patience. Perseverance.

A healthy history – a healthy nation – relies on the strength of its roots – all of its roots. The rings preserve and tell the story of the good, the bad and the ugly. To attempt to cut out the bad and the ugliness of manifest destiny, slavery, the trail of tears…to eliminate the rings of diversity, suffrage, the struggle for civil rights…is to badly weaken the tree. Kill the history and you kill the root. Kill the root and the democracy will not survive. And that is precisely why they attack our history. To be successful, an authoritarian regime needs to weaken and then cut down the tree of democracy. Systematically. Efficiently. And the fastest route to dismemberment of democracy is to amputate its history, eliminate entirely the struggle for equality.

Of course, like our tree, they can remove the exhibits from the institutions, they can fire women and people of color, they can vilify DEI, they can ban books and force universities to suspend programs of study…but that will never cancel the truth of the history of our nation. It lives in us as powerfully as the history of our tree lives in Kerri.

The Nazis made the same mistake as did the Daughters of the Confederacy when they concocted their Lost Cause narrative. Whitewash only temporarily covers the substance; it is not the substance. We the people hold the history, not a made-up curriculum. History is lived.

We-the-people are the “burning point of our ancestral ship”and history teaches us that sooner or later, given enough time, these scrubbers of history, these fearmongers, will eventually scrub themselves. They will become a single ring in our tree, a marker of a bad time, a forest fire that we survived and transcended. A moment in time that ultimately made our democracy stronger and, hopefully, a ring that marks the time when we finally faced – without fear – the complete story of our nation’s history.

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read Kerri’s blogpost about THE STUMP

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Filed under: Edges, Identity, KS Friday, Metaphor, Transcendence, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democrat, dictator, fact, history, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Lost Cause narrative, perseverance, progressive, story, studio melange, the melange, truth, white nationalism | Leave a comment »

Take The Keys [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on July 22, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

We’re writing a bit ahead so by the time you read this the smoke may have cleared. However, the challenge will remain.

Kerri just shared a short instagram piece. The cost of fighting the now mega-fires runs roughly a trillion dollars a year. The Instagram-speaker made it clear that, although forest fires happen every year, the mega-fires that are now an annual occurrence are avoidable. He asked an obvious question: why wouldn’t we put our trillion dollars toward combating climate change, toward green energy, toward the future…toward preventing the conditions that produce the mega-fires, tornadoes, floods and droughts that a heating globe produces?

There is a man in our community who claims to be climate scientist. Meet him on the street and he will loudly proclaim that climate change is a hoax. Hit him with some data and facts and he’ll reject it all as “fake science”. Apparently, his belief in himself is more powerful than actual science – which affords him the capacity to claim that only his science is real. It’s the same logic employed by RFK Jr., Dr. Oz and the rest of the authoritarian clown car, including the chief authoritarian who loves to yammer on and on about the virtues of clean coal. This is the same guy that suggested we shoot up with bleach to clean ourselves of COVID, the same man who lost an election six years ago and to this day refuses to accept the truth. His only recourse is to foment lies – much like the man in our community who thumps his chest on city streets and insists that he alone is the steward of facts.

It is no small challenge we face.

We took the keys from my dad when dementia unplugged him from reality. He slipped into a world all his own and that made him a danger to himself and to others. Listening to the confirmation hearings of Todd Blanche and Jay Clayton, the ramblings of a president in obvious mental decline, the white nationalist ravings of Stephen Miller…it’s time to take the keys. The whole maga country club is unplugged and dangerous.

Even though the actual fires are hundreds of miles away, the air in our region is too dangerous to breathe. That’s the way the systems on earth work. We are not separate no matter how much the current administration would like to pretend that we are. The number of tornadoes are breaking records. Record rainfall is causing flash floods here, there, and everywhere. “The world’s oceans absorb over 90% of the excess heat trapped in the Earth’s climate system. This relentless absorption is driving ocean temperatures to record highs, warming at double the rate they were twenty years ago.” (NASA Science)

The rising temperature in the ocean is akin to the canary in the coal mine. Our canary is currently motionless at the bottom of the cage.

We are the frog in the pot yet still might have the capacity to control the stove if we show up en masse to vote, if we fight to protect our vote from the crew that insists on living in their alternative facts, who claim to be cowboys but daily cry that they are victims of the past administration-or-plots-or-the-other-party, that their facts are the only facts, even when nothing they espouse lines up with demonstrable truth. They want power in perpetuity and will do and say anything to get it. Anything.

The reality that they deny – or are too morbidly wealthy to see – is that they, too, are frogs in the pot. They believe power and money will put them out of reach of the natural disasters that they conveniently ignore. Magical thinking. There is, after all, only one pot.

It’s time to take the keys before their hubris – or dedicated ignorance – kills all of us.

read Kerri’s blogpost about SUNRISE THOUGH SMOKE

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Filed under: Edges, Flawed Wednesday, Pattern, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, climate change, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fact, fires, forest fires, global warming, hubris, ignorance, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, science, story, studio melange, the melange, truth, vote | Leave a comment »

Bubbles, Bubbles Everywhere [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on July 20, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

A “useful idiot” is a derogatory political term for a person who is manipulated into supporting a cause or agenda without fully understanding its true goals or consequences. They inadvertently aid a political group that may actually oppose their own interests. ~ Merriam-Webster

Historians will write of maga as a coalition of useful idiots.

Farmers. Hispanic males. Blue collar workers. Red-hat-wearing-flag-waving-women. People. Despite a mountain of evidence to the contrary, despite an insurrection, a first go-round that left the world slack-jawed at the incompetence, these people bit the lie hook, line and sinker. They voted a second time – in some cases a third time – for their own demise and the ruination of the very system they believed they were voting to protect.

I’ve ask myself everyday, “How is this possible?” And then…

And then I watch on-the-street-interviews with hardcore maga-mates who are honestly shocked when shown images of January 6th. It is as if they’ve never seen them – because they haven’t. Their news source – their information source – edited the facts to maintain the illusion within their bubble.

I am agog at the legion of Hispanic males who voted for a candidate who promised mass-deportation. What bubble gave them the illusion that masked immigration agents running amok, targeting brown and black people for deportation, would not impact them? What bubble gave them the illusion that they and their families would not be the target of the horror?

The current occupant of the White House destroyed the farm economy in his first term. What info-bubble made is possible for them to once again vote for the man, the party and “policies” so ruinous to their livelihood? “The number of farm bankruptcies in the second quarter of 2025 was double the number of bankruptcies for the entire year of 2024″. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…

I shake my head in utter disbelief at the Joe Rogans, the right wing media who are now gobsmacked that inflation is rising, that we are in yet another forever war, that this administration is throwing the full weight of the government behind protecting the Epstein Class, that billionaires are getting wealthier while the American dream is farther and farther out of reach for the rest of the nation. Why are they now surprised? They voted for it. They cheered it into existence.

What bubble prevented them from seeing the obvious? The grift. The lies. The corruption. The incompetence. Project 2025, the blueprint for fascism, was not hidden. What bubble promotes dross as valuable?

It’s possible that we’ve found the Achilles Heel of the 1st Amendment. None of us are impervious to misinformation. What happens when the right of free speech, the protected expression of opinion, is confused with the concept of “news”? What happens when fiction is juicier and more profitable than fact? Confirmation bias for you and for me. A people no longer seeking the truth, but opinions with which we agree. Bubbles, bubbles, here and there. Useful idiots everywhere.

read Kerri’s blogpost about BUBBLES