Presenting ideas and thoughts about matters of importance
Michael Snyder
After six decades, one begins to acquire some bits that might be worthy of sharing and consideration. This blog offers no affiliation, only thoughts to be considered and discussed.
In the first 100 days of the second Trump Presidency, the President whipsawed threats and implementation of massive tariffs on friend and foe alike, possibly inching toward a foundation for a fiscal holocaust. In a thinly veiled effort to force the re-shoring or relocation of manufacturing to “make America great again,” President Trump tapped the … Read more
Diplomatic hubris descended into Oval Office cacophony on Feb. 28, 2025, as a stunned global audience looked on aghast, tensed up to brace for impact. “You don’t have the cards,” barked President Donald Trump to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, wrapping up a free-for-all pile-on from administration officials. Hopes of a deal for security guarantees and peace instantly vanished, all-but-scuttled for the time being.
After diplomatic chaos in the Oval Office, is an era of darkness and irrelevancy settling on the European Continent — or something else? (iStock)
A planned staged show of unity collapsed disastrously into chaos, with diplomatic and economic shock waves rolling out of D.C. and across the globe. After a brief pause and no possibility of a signed agreement for Ukrainian minerals, Zelenskyy was asked to leave by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, once an advocate for the Ukrainian President.
“The free world needs a new leader”
How bad was the reaction from long-time allies? “Today, it became clear that the free world needs a new leader,” said Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat, quoted in Bloomberg. “It’s up to us, Europeans, to take this challenge.”
In a world increasingly dominated by disinformation, a rising threat of unthinkable thermonuclear war, conflict piled upon conflict, and loss of key societal freedoms, is it even possible to think of thoughts and expectations for peace? As Americans withdraw from a stabilizing global benefactor into self-serving protectionism, anxieties and fears soar across the planet.
As a new Presidential administration appears to foment chaos, upending order in the name of progress, Foreign Affairs magazine leads with coverage detailing “The Strange Triumph of a Broken America.”
What is the hope – at the least the short-term hope – of the world?
The defense attorney unexpectedly looked me straight in the eye.
“Juror Number Eight, are you a good judge of character?”
How would you have answered?
I was sitting in the jury box in a courtroom high up in the gleaming new Community Justice Campus in Indianapolis. It was not a place where I would have chosen to be, except that I had received the yellow Summons for Jury Service postcard a few weeks earlier, ordering me to appear as a prospective juror.
When conflicting forces compromise a PC, the operating system freezes and generates a “blue screen of death.” A question presented in a spirit of humility – are we here nationally?
What does “abide” have to do with living successfully in an anxiety-saturated, hope-sapped world? What’s the pathway – what should be our focus?
Here’s a vital directive that can help us. It was given to us some 2,000 years ago on possibly the darkest night of the physical universe. Just hours before His gruesome death and ultimate sacrifice, our Savior and Elder Brother, Jesus Christ the Messiah, provided this deeply personal and powerful imperative command.
His directive is heightened by the fact that he was in full possession of the facts. He knew full well what was about to happen to Him, and, as the Bible records, it troubled Him. But His focus was elsewhere, like ours needs to be.
While Jesus knew he would soon experience searing pain, humiliation and death, he had been given a remarkably special gift.
What was that gift?
In Hebrews 1, verse nine, we read something that sometimes gets read right over. Quoting Psalm 45:6-7, we read from the New Living Translation, “You [referring to Jesus Christ] love justice and hate evil.
Therefore…your God has anointed you, pouring out the oil of joy on you more than on anyone else”
We may not think of Jesus Christ being a joy-filled person while on earth, but the Bible confirms that He had a special anointing of joy from God Himself. The spiritually driven positive outlook was part of Jesus’ ministry. What did that gift reflect?
It is not pleasant to consider, but it’s obvious today – the United States of America – and in fact, much of the world – is savagely divided. Superheated fissures fracture across numerous political viewpoints, personal conduct, and even whether or not anything exists that can be regarded as truth, especially when one adds the word “absolute.”
We all hold a perspective. How can we know we have the most accurate one?
Here’s a thought: I recently had a conversation with a retired senior FBI agent. He talked considerably about how divided America was – politically, intellectually, even morally. He was agitated, concerned, and thoughtful about the present and the future of America.
He didn’t directly quote the scripture, but he alluded to the words of Jesus in Matthew 12:25 – noting that a nation divided against itself cannot stand.
So what does that mean for us? What can we personally do?
We shape, mold and fashion our lives according to our perceptions and our perspectives. Which perspectives are true? Which are false? Which are misleading?
One could make a case that we live today in a 21st century Rashomon effect.
The famous 1950 Japanese psychodrama movie Rashomon is considered one of the greatest movies ever made.
In the movie, a murder takes place. But four eyewitnesses all have their own take on what happened, which all differ dramatically. Each presents subjective, alternative and contradictory versions of the same incident. One of the main takeaways is that people see things, process them, and interpret them occurring to their own backgrounds, standards and experiences.
Which one is true? Well, there’s the rub. The movie – which resembles life today – examines how different eyewitness perspectives can be.
A quick look at today’s geopolitical events sadly demonstrates how the Rashomon effect is alive and well today. Whole groups of people hold energizing but completely opposite political and societal perspectives.
Like in the movie Rashomon, people regularly create and vigorously present subjective, alternative and contradictory versions of the same incident.
With different eyewitness of big history claiming radically different perspectives, we live in the midst of a giant living Rashomon movie. It affects us deeply, whether we want it to or not.
Saw an interesting social media post — perhaps a bit snarky — asking why in a complicated world of 7.4 billion people would the Bible appear to exclusively focus only on one general area: the Middle East? The snarky bit emphasizes the apparent myopic view of this ancient text, particularly as it focuses on numerous … Read more
“Do everything in love.” An unexpected directive at the conclusion of an intense ancient letter. When the apostle Paul wrote his first letter (or rather, the first letter that we know of) to the gentile congregation at Corinth, he covered the whole spectrum. He profoundly emphasized the truth of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, to … Read more
![Fiscal holocaust - If economic sanctions are used recklessly, they [economic sanction tools] could be broken forever or trigger unforeseen economic and political repercussions that could come back to haunt America.](https://i0.wp.com/www.seekingtheway.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/The-coming-Fiscal-holocaust.png?fit=2372%2C1388&ssl=1)
His directive is heightened by the fact that he was in full possession of the facts. He knew full well what was about to happen to Him, and, as the Bible records, it troubled Him. But His focus was elsewhere, like ours needs to be.
In Hebrews 1, verse nine, we read something that sometimes gets read right over. Quoting Psalm 45:6-7, we read from the New Living Translation, “You [referring to Jesus Christ] love justice and hate evil.
