Who’s In Charge?

September 23, 2024

By Jim Towey

As I watched the presidential debate and the two candidates fail to answer questions or make obvious rebuttals to each other’s arguments, my mind drifted back to the T-ball baseball games my sons played long ago.  Parents lined the basepaths, some lounging in lawn chairs, cheering eagerly for their seven-year-old sons as they approached the plate. All the little batters had to do was swing their bats and hit the over-sized ball that was sitting motionless on the tee in front of them. 

But that seldom happened. Instead, the aspiring sluggers usually whacked the tee and the ball dribbled off. Then, they often stood frozen in the batter’s box or ran to third base. It was all delightful amusement for us adoring parents. It was the stuff memories are made of.

But the presidential showdown was memorable for all the wrong reasons.  A Lincoln-Douglas debate it wasn’t.  One candidate evaded questions and the other chased cats and dogs.  The biased ABC network moderators made matters worse.  In the two weeks that have passed, the national hangover has not lifted.

The election is only six weeks from today.  Instead of robust policy discussions, we are getting tired, canned speeches and vacuous promises. Beyond the bands of die-hard supporters that both candidates enjoy, the rest of the country has no political home. I worked at the White House during a presidential campaign 20 years ago when America was at war. There were bitter divisions across the red state-blue state divide then but nothing like today. Among much of the American electorate there is a sense of foreboding about the unusual race we’ve witnessed. Will we see high-tech election interference by actors at home and abroad, or perhaps a major international event, to add to the drama of assassination attempts and the late substitution of a party’s nominee?

The candidates at the top of the ballot do not seem suited to the seriousness of the moment.  The rest of the world sees this.  They look incredulously at the United States, a country whose sitting president has virtually disappeared, and the two vying to replace him seem, as a Gen Z’er might say, mid at best.  It is a wonder there isn’t a worldwide Tylenol shortage.

Anyone care about Big Tech?

For me, the most alarming takeaway from the debate was the absence of any discussion about Big Tech’s unimpeded march into all aspects of our lives – military, health care, economy, education, you name it. Our world is being transformed by science and technology in ways unimaginable.  Already we are seeing white collar jobs disappear in the ether, health care treatment decisions governed by algorithms, and gene editing transforming life itself – all developments driven primarily by mankind’s love of money and desire to be god.  

Artificial Intelligence – A.I. – has been unleashed on an unsuspecting, unprepared civilization.  Don’t the candidates see this? The last three administrations allowed Big Tech monopolies to grow to galactic dimensions. Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Nvidia, and the lesser tech gods are not too big to fail – they are too big to be humane. Scientific and technological advancements demand not simply acceptance, but submission.

 “I want to speak to you today about what I regard as the one vital question of our time: Is God in charge of our affairs, or are we?  Formerly it was considered man’s highest aim to understand God’s purpose for him…now we are urged to dispense with God altogether and assume control ourselves of the world, the universe, and our own collective destiny… God, we are told – if he ever existed – has died; as a concept, he is not needed any more… Our apprenticeship is served; mankind has come of age, and the time has come for us to assume command of ourselves and our world in our own right.”

Spoken last week? No, in 1968 by BBC legend Malcolm Muggeridge. He went on to describe the 20th century scientific mind as an “extraordinary blend of knowledge, dogmatic arrogance, and infantile credulity.” He said Huxley’s and Orwell’s imagined dystopia was already outdated.  He warned, by means of a quote from the poet William Blake, “They ever must believe a lie who see with, not through, the eye.”

Prophetic words

Fifty-five years of accelerated “progress” in the sciences and technology make Muggeridge’s words a prophetic warning for the 21st century as A.I., Big Tech and secret science (like gain-of-function research that was done in Wuhan) operate without ethical guardrails and rob civilization of its humanness.  By aspiring to be gods, we have condemned ourselves to believe a lie that this “progress” and the utopia it promises, are worthy of us.  They aren’t and they will fail. You can’t delete or cancel God. Heaven’s clouds aren’t begotten by data centers. Invited or not, God is present, as a Delphic oracle says.

While Big Tech strengthens its tyrannical grip, the Middle East, Russia, China, the global economy, the national debt, and other real-world challenges demand our attention. It is not too much to ask the candidates how they will lead our country and meet these challenges.

Afterall, this isn’t T-ball.

(The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Aging with Dignity and/or its Board of Directors.)