Category: My Take

Look, liars always know. You always know when you lie. In more than 50 years of working with organizations, institutions, senior people, businesses, agencies, and the news media through an extraordinarily broad spectrum of problems and serious circumstances, I have yet to meet anyone who accidentally lied. Well, I did meet one person years back. He knowingly enhanced his war record and suffered expulsion when it was revealed. All lies are intentional.

Lies & Liars Are Everywhere

Our culture is full of professional and serial liars. Among the biggest are the entertainment industries, including the news. Anyone who uses stories is lying. All stories are fabrications, often containing elements of truth and, probably, equal elements of fabrication. Always beware of stories that are “balanced.” That means they maybe half truth and half something else. One thing is for sure, even if the story is “balanced,” it’s a whole lie.

  1. Lying on the face of it: When was the last time – if there ever was a time – when the movie you saw at the theater matched its description in the newspaper and the promotional hype? These are deceptions at best, lies at worst.
  2. Deception: For that matter, live theater never tells the whole truth about the programs you have paid big bucks to see. They lie even as you sit in your seats waiting for the performance, by omission, commission, negligence, i.e., your program fails to tell you that the “romantic comedy” you’re about to see has three murders, two rapes, a suicide, and an abused, gay child. Theater, movies, and many live events often use one word promotions, “fantastic,” “powerful,” “memorable,” “lovable.” Then when you leave the event, you aren’t handed a survey with an appropriate validation comment, “worthless,” “dull,” “boring,” “misleading,” “unbearable,” “I want a refund.”
  3. Dishonesty: “Breaking News” is the biggest lie in all communications . . .  On CNN the sign never goes off despite the fact that they use the same doctored video footage and repeat stories dozens of times a day, often for weeks. We never know when news clips were produced, originally shown, or how many times the clip has been replayed. This is deceptive and unethical. Now CNN even flashes “Breaking News” signs just before their 10-minute commercials. What are these people thinking? We are hapless victims.
  4. Fabricating news when there isn’t any: This is extremely obvious when a news organization tosses on a bunch of reporters and paid consultants (everybody’s paid in television) rather than actual news subjects, victims, or individuals directly connected or affected by the story material being discussed. How many experts does it take in a day to repeatedly say, “They are still searching for the black boxes.” “They are still bombing.” The staged expert shows are collections of political losers. The mouthpiece news shows are like watching wrestling . . .  a shit show.
  5. Exaggeration: Tiny, inconsequential news stories are blown out of proportion or attach false urgency to stories that have actually played out and been resolved hours, sometimes days, before.
  6. Politics: Don’t get me started.
  7. Fires never go out: The day before the murder of George Floyd, there were some fires in downtown Minneapolis, which were put out almost immediately. But then, when Floyd’s murder occurred, the television news started with the fires from the day before only identified as Minneapolis, Minnesota. It looked as though the Floyd murder was connected somehow to the flames, which had already been put out. Thousands of times after those two events had occurred and were over, whenever the Floyd murder was mentioned, the clip of the city burning was used along with the clip of the Minneapolis police murdering George. I started getting notes from people around the country asking when we’re going to put the fires out and why hasn’t this already been taken care of? This is the lie, especially of CNN, but of all television news. They love fires, and they love to use clips of them because it gets attention. It is a lie. Just a lie pure and simple. This has got to stop or be metered so that we can know the original use and the number of the current use.

These are just samples of well-known lying habits we and our culture tolerate every day.

Liars and fakers always know. When they are caught and confronted, they cry. Yes, people can be naive, simpletons, stupid, or victims . . . But there is something in human nature that sets off the lie alarm or the perpetrator alert. Whether you are 9-years-old or 90-years-old, most of us can spot a lie and a liar, detect a fake and a faker.

An old friend of mine who was in the FBI for a dozen years in New York and the Caribbean. He retired as the head of security for a Fortune 250 company. He used to tell me an FBI truism about criminals; what criminals learn quickly was that it is always better to commit a large crime. The burglars, the bullies, the petty thieves, and pickpockets are crushed by the criminal justice system. Commit an important crime, and you get better treatment, cells, lawyers, press coverage, better meals, and you’re protected from the riffraff.

The same rules apply for celebrity misbehavior, criminal or not, especially the media coverage part. The media loves criminals and important people who do really stupid things, then behave badly.

If you are a colorful criminal, you get special media treatment. If you are a terrorist, you can be canonized and admired by the reporting stirring up the radicalized individuals to act out their fears, angers, and to die gloriously. The victims and survivors get occasional coverage, but the media always returns to the killers, rapists, terrorists, and especially how the terror was carried out. CNN has been broadcasting the world terrorism handbook daily for decades.

The person, organization, business, agency, movement, or foundation with integrity speaks up, stands up, and fesses up immediately. In fact, they seek forgiveness immediately.

©2026, James E. Lukaszewski. Contact the copyright holder at jel@e911.com for information and reproduction permissions. Editing or excerpting is forbidden.

Artificial intelligence has generated incredible amounts of optimistic speculation, anticipation and ever-expanding forecasts about the world’s magical future since its debut almost four years ago. The impact of this imperfect, invasive, unfinished technology has changed a lot of thinking. Problems and serious issues are finally coming to light.

I’ve been studying this subject since Generative AI’s introduction. My approach to new innovations and developments is from the perspective of the victims that can and will be created. Reducing the production of victims is at the heart of readiness for crisis response.

Fundamentally, this situation is a mass-casualty problem moving toward becoming a crisis. If it gets to the crisis phase, it will be the victims who control the outcome.

My definition of crisis is short and clear: A crisis is a people-stopping, show-stopping, product-stopping, reputation-redefining, trust-busting event that creates victims—people, animals, living systems—and often, but not always, explosive negative visibility. With AI, we didn’t have long to wait.

There are at least four categories of problems that need to be addressed immediately:

  1. Revealing the hidden software that is activated for the benefit of the tech industry without the knowledge of the owner and user.
  2. Software modifications that put users at risk, especially those that cause addiction.
  3. The urgent need for rules, guidelines, laws, and approved procedures to require and provide permanent oversight and crisis readiness.
  4. Victimization prevention introduction response requirements, including public oversight and participation in the governance of these industries.

Near the end of 2025, two wrongful-death lawsuits involving the suicides of two teenagers allegedly caused by AI addiction were settled out of court. These cases, and more that are in process or on the way, are the tip of an iceberg that will reveal risks, hidden consequences and secret modifications within AI software. Also exposed will be the fuzzy, limited understanding of what AI is. Earlier this year, Anthropic PBC introduced a revised 76-page constitution for its AI model, Claude, to learn and be governed by. In the process, Claude is tutoring Anthropic about itself. AI has created a dozen gigabuck companies and dozens—maybe hundreds—of smaller ventures. Anthropic alone raised $30 billion in 2025. AI is here to stay, with some enormous problems that must be dealt with.

This quote appears in the introduction of Claude’s constitution: “We believe that AI might be one of the most world-altering and potentially dangerous technologies in human history, yet we are developing this very technology ourselves.” What they admitted in the small print was how little they understand about this powerful and highly intelligent software.

When stories of this miracle technology began grabbing the headlines the tech industry, not wanting visibility, reacted by saying, “leave it alone.” That response ignited an explosion of enthusiasm and over-the-top speculation and experimentation. The industry response was like a mother telling her children not to stick their fingers in the little black holes in the wall. And like children, the world decided to do it anyway.

After several years of extraordinary euphoria, litigation against AI tech companies is now growing. Lawsuits for negligence, design defects and failure to warn parents about the dangers, especially to young children, posed by AI chatbots. This includes the alleged behavior leading to teen suicides, self-harm and exposure to sexualized content, plus inappropriate data collection and deepfakes. In one case, a mother alleged that a chatbot relentlessly generated sexually explicit questions for her 11-year-old daughter, who is likely to be in assisted care for the rest of her life.

Businesses are already salivating at the prospect of replacing tens of thousands of humans, especially in jobs where human judgment is required. Quality Control was identified as a candidate. Bots can learn the rules, regulations and standards so the humans who enforce compliance with their pesky human factors like ethics, conscience, rightness, wrongness can be gone.

An entirely new communication sub-industry the tech companies didn’t ask for has appeared to assist these companies in covering their tracks when bad news appears and can develop ethical excuses and overlook suspect software behavior. I follow Will Durant’s definition of ethics, “seeking and finding ideal behavior.” With AI we witness autonomous intentional inappropriate digital behaviors, label them, with little intention, effort, energy or resources committed to resolve them. “Hallucination” comes to mind. Cute but annoying, intentional and inappropriate. It’s a euphemism for bots fabricating and lying.

There are organizations studying ways to police and assert control over AI. The Rand Corporation recently published an important report, “Four Governance Approaches to Securing Advanced AI,” recommending:

  1. Government-enforced AI security standards for high-risk model developers.
  2. Government-led AI developer authorization programs conditioning federal use on security compliance.
  3. Industry-led AI security certification to promote adoption of common standards.
  4. Self-regulation combined with increased government and industry collaboration on security practices.

2026 will see significantly more AI-related civil litigation. Little will be learned from the civil cases that will be settled out of court, the outcomes sealed, protected by NDAs. Published reports indicate that multiple families in different states have filed or will file lawsuits against generative artificial intelligence developers for contributing to teens’ mental health problems. Government regulation is needed so violations can be litigated and punished.

This industry can’t be lawless until laws, rules, regulations and enforceable guardrails are in place. The tech industry prefers to be untouchable for as long as possible.

In August 2025, the Attorney Generals of 44 jurisdictions wrote to the CEOs of the 10 largest AI companies. The letter began, “We, the undersigned Attorneys General of 44 jurisdictions, write to inform you of our resolve to use every facet of our authority to protect children from exploitation, predatory, and artificial intelligence products.” This organization of AGs can be remarkably collaborative. Remember, these are prosecutors.

My perspective comes as an observer, witness and victim of the current situation, looking for ways to reduce the victimization this technology causes.

A few ways to reduce victimization come from Thom Hartmann’s book, “The Last American President: A Broken Man, a Corrupt Party, and a World on the Brink,” Copyright © 2025 by Thom Hartmann, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.

What can we do now?

“To start, we must treat the regulation of AI and the people who own/use/deploy it as a democratic survival issue. That means:

  • Banning the use of deepfakes in political ads
  • Enforcing transparency on algorithmic decision-making
  • Creating public, open-source alternatives to corporate-controlled models
  • Creating disinformation-catching infrastructure as we would biological or nuclear weapons (that are also not just dangerous, but potentially civilization-ending)
  • Demanding that social media outlets publish their algorithms so we can see how we’re being manipulated”

Tech companies are quietly influencing and controlling every aspect of their lives. You can see their influence everywhere. The bad news for this industry will grow as increasing numbers of victims are created and reported. Now is the time for the principal tech companies to organize and step forward to publicly help guide the massive disclosures and exposures needed to build an atmosphere of trust based on a collaborative approach: Vigorous problem solving now combined with rigorous public oversight and participation now. When trust is gone, the vacuum fills with fear.

I believe in the “Do it Now” theory of problem management. Fix it now. Challenge it now. Change it now. Reveal it now. Repair it now. The sooner you do the things that need to be done, the sooner trust can emerge. Trust is the absence of fear. Managing problems has only three options: doing nothing, doing something and doing something more. The tech industry will be in the third category, not counting the ethical expectations they have allowed to awaken. Failure to act on today’s problems today is how crisis is born.

Crisis is the sudden but predictable and almost always preventable presence of victim creating chaos. It will be the victims and their survivors who determine the outcome and choose the replacement magicians.

©2026, James E. Lukaszewski. Contact the copyright holder at jel@e911.com for information and reproduction permissions. Editing or excerpting is forbidden. Originally published in O’Dwyer’s, February 23, 2026.

He Has Attacked So Many, So Frequently, For So Long

He has left a lifelong trail of the humiliated, vilified, embarrassed, shamed, slimed, assaulted, victimized, and bullied. He seems to add to his victim lists every day.

A catalog of Trump’s repeated and often doubled down relentlessly unconscionable, personal public attacks:

  1. Deeds, words, or actions that vilify.
  2. Sarcasm that ridicules and damages, demeans, dismisses, diminishes, and humiliates.
  3. Deeds, words, or actions that are arrogant, causing needless but intentional pain and suffering.
  4. Deeds, words, or actions that clearly express nasty anger and irritation.
  5. Actions that are demanding and bullying.
  6. Deeds, words, or actions that are just plain mean.
  7. Deeds, words, or actions that insult, are corrosive and disrespectful.
  8. Deeds, words, or actions that are disparaging and tone-deaf.
  9. Deeds, words, or actions that:
    1. are callous (without empathy).
    2.  mindlessly injure.
    3. intentionally injure.
    4. spread false accusations and phony suspicion.
    5. exhibit overbearing and overzealousness.
    6. are negative, punitive, and defensive.
    7. far exceed America’s cultural boundaries of decency, civility, and integrity.

The Personal Damage of These Attacks is Permanent

Words used as weapons victimize, terrorize, horrify, and paralyze forever.

Each of these behaviors and words produce walking wounded whose real wounds are:

  • Bloodless
  • Deep and Unhealable
  • Invisible
  • Permanent
  • Personally and Emotionally Destructive
  • Scarless
  • Untreatable

The impact and personal destructiveness of these insults accumulate and intensify over time.

His civil litigation docket seems to be an endless stream of victims who keep winning huge judgments against him. He is, of course, a convicted felon.

This American Jackass, a verbal terrorist, with decades of complicit promotional daily help of American journalism has created countless thousands of walking wounded who follow along behind him, in a bloodless bullied trail of mortally injured refugees, probably hoping that the next attempt will succeed. Regardless of the election outcome, we can expect these Trump behaviors to continue.

He and only he has brought this on himself. To paraphrase a famous and nearly immortal former Minnesotan, we need to move from the darkness and terror of Trumpism into the bright sunlight of a new and joyful leadership generation, committed to America’s promise of life, liberty, and most of all, the pursuit of happiness.

The Bottom Line

Either way, on November 5th, we get to pay the daily multi-million dollar bill for this private citizen’s security.

  • How many children could be fed with all of that money?
  • How many new homes could be financed for first-time home buyers?
  • How many student loans could be retired?
  • How many pregnant women could manage their pregnancies more safely?
  • How many Americans living in poverty could be lifted into the middle class?
  • How many immigrants could legally and safely enter our magical and amazing country?
  • How many homeless could be housed?
  • Add your items here.

Maybe, if he remains a convicted felon, his rights to federally funded 24/7 security should be terminated. He can then fund his own security.

What is a commercial break? Or is that just another, “Breaking News” lie?

            This service interruption, whatever it is, needs to be prohibited.

It seems frequently that they seem to add up to 30 minutes per broadcast hour. We should not, as viewers and owners of the airwaves, have to tolerate service interruptions of this magnitude.

If CNN, which is having financial and success difficulties, can’t afford to create content for these large time blocks, to a level near 50 minutes per hour allowing 10 minutes for commercials each hour, their license should be revoked until they can.

The spectrum this network occupies should be given away to other interests who can provide genuine content, 24-7.

©2024 James E. Lukaszewski

For information on reprinting or for the use of this material, editing is not permitted, contact the Copyright holder at jel@e911.com.

The choice for American leadership gets clearer and clearer every day. Your decision will be based on the meaning of the word “greatness”. There are two very different greatness options to choose from in 2024.

American democracy is in crisis. In Chinese, the word crisis is a symbol that has two faces, one face is danger, dark, troubled, fearful, and angry. The other face is bright, hopeful, optimistic, happy, and opportunistic.

That’s the choice in 2024, Dark, Troubled, Angry, Fearful, and Evil Greatness vs. Hopeful, Optimistic, Happy, Competent, and Opportunistic Greatness. 

The Ingredients of Hopeful, Optimistic, Happy, and Competent Greatness

The optimistic face of greatness is illustrated by these words and concepts.

CompetenceInformative
CreativityInspirational
DignityKind
DistinctionLeadership
EnthusiasmMemorable
EthicalMotivating
GenerousPerceptive
HumbleVirtuous
IdealisticVisionary
InclusiveWise
InfluentialWorthy
The Ingredients of Angry, Dark, Dangerous, Troubled, Fearful, and Often Evil Greatness
The Evil Greatness Creed
Be Angry, Evil, Every Day, Constantly Frown and Scowl.

Victimize, intimidate, harm the harmless, harass the helpless, hurt, shame the blameless, lie all the time.

Daily Dark Greatness Behaviors
  1. Whine, moan, cry, “I am the Victim.”
  2. Cry, “Doom’s Day is almost here.”
  3. “I am the only one who can prevent Dooms Day and the blood baths to follow.”
  4. “I am not a crook.”
  5. “I am not a racist.”
  6. “I did not have sex with those women.”
  7. Some of my best friends are (pardoned) crooks, dictators, and people loyal only to themselves.
  8. Hate democracy.  
Top Ten Required Daily Dark Greatness Behaviors
  1. Deeds, words, or actions that vilify.
  2. Deeds, words, or actions that use sarcasm to ridicule, damage, demean, dismiss, diminish, or humiliate.
  3. Deeds, words, or actions that are arrogant, causing needless, intentional pain and suffering.
  4. Deeds, words, or actions that intentionally, harmfully, and overbearingly express anger and irritation.
  5. Deeds, words, or actions that are overly demanding and bullying.
  6. Deeds, words, or actions that are just plain mean.
  7. Deeds, words, or actions that insult, intentionally demean, minimize, and marginalize.
  8. Deeds, words, or actions that become emotionally corrosive, disrespectful, and disparaging.
  9. Put forth proposals that are negative, punitive, defensive, and harmfully restrictive on others.
  10. Lie about everything, all the time, careless and constant repetition in the press and new media will make the lies into the truth.
The Choice is Clear and That Choice is Yours Alone to Make

The Definition of greatness you choose in 2024 will set the tone and temperature for American democracy, if it survives the danger, for a long time.

Now is the time to start paying attention.  

Link to Book by Helio Fred Garcia – Words on Fire

Jeff Greenfield, a nationally known political correspondent and analyst for four major television networks, has a fool-proof methodology for predicting who will be elected president. He forecasts, “To know who will win, keep in mind one clear consistent irrefutable rule: Bugs Bunny always beats Daffy Duck.” Greenfield goes on to explain with many examples, “The candidate who exudes the cool, savvy confidence of Bugs beats the one who projects Daffy’s tightly wound anger.”

Greenfield calls it the, “Having a beer after work factor.” Greenfield reminds us that, despite the hundreds, even thousands of polls and election models when you’re in that voting booth, you will look for the candidate who exhibits the Bugs Bunny factors and the winner of the election, even if you don’t drink beer.  

For the whole story see The Wall Street Journal, March 22, 2024 print edition, “Who Will Win in November? Think Bugs vs. Daffy”.

Editors Comment: This may be the only truly funny, but serious idea in this entire 8-month election process. Read it, laugh, and get ready to tough your way to the polling booth on November 5th. Good luck.  

Jeff Greenfield’s quotes are taken from:
©2024 Dow Jones and Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Appeared in the March 23, 2024 Print Edition of the Wall Street Journal as, “Who Will Win in November? Think Bugs vs. Daffy.” 

One clear fact at the moment is that there will be one national election on November 5, 2024. Whatever the outcome we will get and live with what we deserve.

Another fact is that the outcome is likely to be one of only two possibilities. Each of these possibilities can be recognized by the language and behaviors of the candidates.

  1. The Candidate who defines democracy by the language of bullying, shaming, anger, retribution, score-settling, humiliation, shoulda, coulda, woulda’s done yesterday, with desperation, evil, and baseless attacks on Government institutions and officials.
    Or
  2. The Candidate who defines democracy using the language of greatness, building on past achievements, striving to continue, succeeding, optimism, and tomorrow.

The Vocabulary and Behaviors
of Desperation and Evil
Are Easily Felt and Recognized

AgitatingDespicable
AngerHorrible
Blame ShiftingSmall
Baseless AttacksStupid
BullyingTerrible
DemeaningUseless
DenunciationWeak
DisparagingLying
EvilMaliciousness
Hate FilledMeanness
HumiliatingThreats
LabelingVilification
AwfulWhining
CoruptWitch Hunting

Or,
The Vocabulary and Behaviors of Greatness
Are Equally and Easily Recognized

CompetenceInformative
CreativityInspiration
DignityKindness
DistinctionLeadership
DistinctiveMagnanimity
EnthusiasmMemorable
EthicalMotivation
FlashPerceptive
GenerosityRenown
GeniusRevelation
HumilitySpark
IdealismStateliness
IllustriousVirtue
ImaginationVision
InclusivenessWhismy
InfluentialWisdom
WorthWorthiness

Your Choice Will Be Very Clear

Code of Conduct For
Evil’s Troops and Followers

Their Creed:
 Be Evil, Every Day, In Every Way

Required Daily Actions

a. Deeds, words or actions that vilify.

b. Deeds, words or actions that use sarcasm to ridicule, damage, demean, dismiss, diminish or humiliate.

c. Deeds, words, or actions that are arrogant, causing needless, intentional pain and suffering.

d. Deeds, words, or actions that intentionally, harmfully, and overbearingly express anger and irritation.

e. Deeds, words, or actions that are overly demanding and bullying.

f. Deeds, words, or actions that are just plain mean.

g. Deeds, words, or actions that insult, intentionally demean, minimize, and marginalize.

h. Deeds, words, or actions that become emotionally corrosive, disrespectful, and disparaging.

i. Deeds, words, or actions that are intentionally and maliciously tone-deaf.

j. Deeds, words, or actions that are mindlessly callous (without empathy).

k. Deeds, words, or actions that mindlessly injure.

l. Deeds, words, or actions that intentionally injure.

m. Deeds, words, or actions that spread baseless or contrived accusations and suspicion.

n. Deeds, words, or actions that exhibit overbearing and overzealousness.

What Kind of Country Do You Want?

As the 2024 Davos meeting in Switzerland closed, CNN did an in-person, on-air straw poll with a couple dozen global executives and other important people on the question of world society being prepared for AI issues.

CNN Straw Poll Results:

  1. World society is dangerously ill-prepared for AI issues and events.
  2. The vast majority were very optimistic about the potential for AI.
  3. Crucial issues and questions were cited.

Clearly, AI will remain a big-time issue throughout the year and undoubtedly occupy a prominent position in the Davos discussions of 2025. The Public Relations Society of America’s (PRSA) newest publication, “The Ethical Use of AI for Public Relations Practitioners” could play an important role in helping world leaders sort out just how this technology is going to be utilized, managed, and in some cases survived. Ethical Use of AI Document

Many of the AI issues mentioned at Davos are reflected in PRSA’s Ethical Use document.

Some very specific concerns voiced by those attending Davos:

Retraining employees to accommodate AI, equality, ethics, the public good, possible global cooperation, security, the power of the technology itself. AI effect on productivity, polarization, and others.

These topics remain on the world’s AI discussion table.

PRSA’S Crucial Contribution

“The Ethical Use of AI for Public Relations Practitioners” breaks down three of the most crucial areas of ethical response options.

  1. Adverse endpoints that arise from operational outcomes.
  2. Examples of improper use of AI.
  3. Guidance from an ethical perspective on proper AI use.

What’s Needed Between Now and Davos 2025

In my judgment, based on what I’ve heard and seen and now with the published results of Davos, it’s quite clear that industry leaders remain confused though enthusiastic, anxious, yet committed to maximizing what AI has to offer. They are however missing one critical component which needs developing: Fact-based recommendations and an operational and reputational risk assessment related to AI issues.

Proposed
Fact Based Recommendations
Based On
Operational, Reputational, Risk-Assessment, and Recovery Readiness
Draft
Table Of Contents for
Proposed Fact-Based Recommendations
  1. The specific and attributed warnings, from the tech companies, in bold letters.
  2. The dozen or so most disastrous, costly, and worst-case guesses all gathered together in a single exhibit to focus attention and fear as well as encourage risk recognition. (We do the Reputational Risk part.)
  3. Warning signs, danger signals, and potential risks. How we might begin to recognize prevent, detect, deter, maybe deflect a disaster before it occurs
  4. Data-based Recommendations for doable operational and reputational preventive readiness and post-adverse event response readiness.
  5. Operational response readiness by scenario
  6. Reputational response readiness by scenario
  7. Organizational readiness structured around essential operational concerns. Help the bosses get ready to prepare their employees with response saavy.

My two cents: PRSA has earned a seat in the Davos AI discussion 2025

With Just three words . . . “Leave it alone,” the tech industry globally mobilized thousands of companies, organizations, individuals, and industries. Like an experienced parent who wants their child to do something, or not do something, but might have difficulty persuading them, they simply say, “Don’t do . . . you name it” and it becomes a do-or-die mission. So it has become for AI.

Are these tech people brilliant, or are they really that smart? We may never know. What we do know is that thousands have been mobilized, and millions or billions are being spent and all in the quest to figure something out with little or no help from the tech industries who started all of this. Clearly, the tech industries deserve a prize of some kind.

Never have so few words mobilized so many human beings and a colossal amount of cash for what appears far less fearsome than forecast.

Typically, in such a huge venture, something called an “Operational and reputational risk assessment and fact based recommendations” would have been prepared. In the case of AI, since no one had any facts to go on, everything kind of got made up in a huge fiction like activity. Which has yet to yield much except sporadic anecdotal success stories. And one large failure that of Donald Trump’s former attorney using AI to generate what turned out to be fake legal references for a motion he was proposing in federal court.

That’s because, of course, the tech industry does not intend to share additional information until it’s in their interest to do so. During the last year, I have attended a number of policy-level discussions (people who own, run, and make crucial decisions in the organizations)  of AI and while organizations like PRSA were busy developing hypothetical situational responses based on zero facts and data, the tech companies were having a great success with “leave it alone.” Why spoil all the fun with facts?

In contrast, virtually every policy-level discussion I attended developed only a sketchy, fuzzy concept called things like, “Responsible AI.” The responsibilities were described in a list of words with little explanation: fairness, reliability and safety, privacy and security, inclusiveness, transparency, and accountability. Sometimes described as core principles without much additional explanation. It’s still impossible to know what guidance is truly needed. We’ll need a few surprises and disasters to begin developing useful information.

It’s probably time for all of us to get back to work on our regular jobs and regular activities and await the inevitable catastrophes the media has predicted, always aiming for the worst-case scenarios. Where are the truth tellers when you need them most?

Much of my nearly 40-year career in communications involved codes of conduct, compliance, and grievance procedure development. Some observations.

  • The Supreme’s Impressions of a Code of Conduct contain five Canons, and with commentary is more than 5000 words. A Canon, in the Catholic Church, is an ecclesiastical rule or law enacted by a council or other competent authority and approved by the Pope.
  • In perspective, The Ten Commandments (in Exodus) is 313 words that, standing alone, have spoken more powerfully to the world for thousands of years, never really needing 50, 500, or 5000 words of explanation or interpretation. It got them anyway, but they don’t matter. Well, except for the George Carlin “Ten Commandments” version on You Tube . Funny but crude.
  • The Gettysburg address was 272 words.
  • The SCOTUS Toothless Code has five Canons, but no compliance, enforcement,or penalties for mistakes and intentional errors. The Catholic Church has 1752 Canons complete with penalties and punishments. Enforced by men purportedly representing God.
  • Look where their Canons got them.
  • Strangely missing from the SCOTUS Code are the who and how the Code is monitored rand enforced. Instead, it is explained that SCOTUS is more than just another court system, it is The Head of all courtm systems.
  • The SCOTUS introduction to its Code sounds a lot like the opening of a legal defense than setting conduct standards. It contains this phrase: “For the most part these rules and principles are not new.” Indicating that the entire document is suspect, guilt averse, and “Not New.” than setting conduct standards. It contains this phrase: “For the most part these rules and principles are not new.” Indicating that the entire document is suspect, guilt averse, and “Not New.”
  • Defendant statements like this one frequently contain “Not” statements where the “Not” usually precedes or succeeds a lie. “I am not a crook.”, “I did not have sex with that woman.”, “I am not a racist.”, you get the idea.
  • The Justice’s avoid setting behavior standards and absolute guidance by sprinkling the five Canons with mealy mouthed equivocation and uncertainties primarily using the word “should”.
  • Set Behavior Standards by replacing the words should, may, might, could, and would, everywhere in the five Canon’s document with will, must, or shall.:
    • Canon ONE: A Justice Should Perform. A Justice Should Uphold The Integrity And Independence Of The Judiciary. Why not, must, will, or shall?
    • Canon TWO: A Justice Should Avoid Impropriety And The Appearance Of Impropriety In All Activities. . Why not, must, will, or shall?
    • Canon THREE: A Justice Should Perform The Duties Of The Office Fairly, Impartially, And Diligently. . Why not, must, will, or shall?
    • Canon FOUR: Replace Should with must, will, or shall.
    • Canon FIVE: Replace Should with must, will, or shall.
    • To be credible, Codes set Behavior Standards by using clear language of accountability and authorize sanctions and penalties.
    • The net effect of the 5000-word SCOTUS Code commentary seems to ordain justices as Demigods, sort of deified mortals. In a democracy, it is the people who have the last word. Several concepts for Code oversight have been proposed. Recent Further revelations of long-time judicial impropriety and that of with their friends, family, and political associates dramatically illustrates the immediate need for this extra level of protection for our democracy.
    • The Supreme’s Troupe is operating like any large corporation in trouble. In the introduction, they advance an ex post facto explanation to demonstrate that they were in the right from the very beginning, and it is we who misunderstood. Oh, it’s our fault. This despite weeks and months of news stories where some of them are clearly in the wrong. Plus, we have suspected liars, during their confirmations, among the Supreme’s. It appears these individuals are still working for the person who appointed them and only part-time for the American people.
    • Surely, there should be a scale of penalties up to and including suspension and expulsion. When the Supreme’s can whittle this 5000-word tome down to one or two 8.5” x 11” sheets of paper, on one side double-spaced, including compliance requirements, some of the credibility they seek to re-establish may yet return. Most of the collateral language in the existing commentary can be boiled down to being an exculpatory and deflective exercise meaning, “Never mind, just trust us.” Trust but verify, yes.

    SCOTUS, in fact, acts as many of my large corporate clients have over the years when in trouble. They believe that producing an overwhelming amount of data (5000+ words?) demonstrates the truth of any position and the insidious falseness of the non-believers (many, many of us). They ignore the basic structure of truth, which in my experience is 15% facts and data. 85% is responding to the emotions of its audiences and victims who are responsible for the ongoing disappointedly low and declining levels of respect for SCOTUS. The court says we misunderstood. The court chooses negative condescension and condemnation as its defense against you and me.
    -It is we who are too stupid to understand what these omnipotent deities should be doing and working on.

    The Justices call their Code exercise a “codification.” In plain English? The translation: from the bureaucratic to self-forgiving obfuscation.

    Why do the smart ones in trouble always blame the victims (you and me) and question our intelligence? The answer is this pattern of misbehavior so prevalent these days at the top of things. This Code is an exercise in invincibility. Enabled by ignoring what it considers petty misbehaviors, then uses these mundane systemic personal leadership failures to justify even authorize their previously committed bad acts and subsequent misbehavior.

    Also see: “The Psychology Behind Unethical Behavior,” Merete Wedell-Wedellsborg, Harvard Business Review, 4/12/19. Her theory of omnipotence (invincibility), cultural numbness, and justified neglect is a truly original and invaluable insight into the misbehavior of powerful people.

    Republican Debate #3 Was Informative (Surprise)

    Trump’s absence allows a much better view of those he is about to defeat. The poling results in 2020 were a disaster (to quote someone we shall not name.) Please, remember, in American politics, nothing is certain until the votes are counted. The media still uses polls mixed together. Each poll alone is likely misleading and inaccurate.

    The media’s solution is mixing polls together. But, unlike a tasty midwestern hotdish, mixing polls keeps a small, fading industry alive and produces what? False hopes, misleading information, and confusion. Look for repeat polling failure in 2024. Notice the word Truth is missing from the media’s product list. Been gone a long time.

    What We Learned From The Third Debate

    Mr. Scott Departed.

    Mr. Ramaswamy Departed.

    Mr. Christie, sometimes makes sense, states the obvious, but you just can’t see him as a president. He may be younger than Biden, but he still represents yesterday. Is that where America wants to go?

    Mr. DeSanctimonious remains the self-declared better person than everyone else unless you are too stupid to see it. Hah! Even on television, his nose is so high it almost leaves the screen. His decline continues. He begs you to hate him. He wants to teach your children. That is scary.

    Mrs. Haley, New leaders are often discovered during controversy. This happened during Debate a viable/peaceful resolution to the abortion conundrum plaguing American politics for the last half century, amazing. Her numbers are up and , leading Mr. DeSanctimonious in some early primaries.

    Some Things Seem Certain

    • The primary season already underway is going to be long, with lots of fake, non-news, and phony information and predictions sold as “breaking news.” (The biggest lie in communications.)
    • CNN will reach 40 commercials per hour.
    • Heavyset sick people will continue dancing happily in television commercials (fromtheir residuals) for really expensive diabetes drugs. I have diabetes, I’m in the doctor’soffice frequently. I can assure you; no one is dancing in there.
    • Medicare Insurance Scams Must Be Stopped. The insurance vultures and crooks ledby formerly trustworthy movie, television and sports stars are out in force ripping offmillions of seniors selling unneeded Medicare advice, and needless extra insurance. Medicare was designed so that senior citizens could easily and conveniently get Medicarehelp and information from empathetic and helpful Government agencies. I am 82, I do know.
    • The Department of Justice needs to powerfully prosecute and penalize the Licensed insurance Agents and the celebrities who benefit if fraud is occurring.