I shared my attempt to understand Mike's commentary "Trust Math, Not People" with a reply I made before reading "The Revolution." Often in my life, things happen that have me feeling that my neuronal pathways are connected to specific individuals. In this case, read "The Revolution" came across as a gentler, somewhat metaphysical variation of my reply to Trust Math. Let me explain further.
The "Theory of Everything" means to me that all of life is interconnected, from the microcosm of cellular structure and signaling pathways, to the galactic and planetary orbits and black holes within our Universe. The uni-verse is in this theory literally and figuratively equates with "one story." Monotheism in this Theory involves a broader and perennial philosophy and not one needing an incarnate being seen as God, but because the oneness of the creation is wONEder, or w⑴der, and this oneness embodies the true, the beautiful, and the good.
Brock's commentary today is the second bookend to his earlier commentary, "The Revealer."
I love this kind of writing, but I question whether the majority of the population has the attention span or the intellect to hear the message. We have a fascist regime, headed by a fascist POTUS, who has his camp of acolytes already speaking of a 3rd term. We have already seen outright, eyes wide open attacks on Freedom of the Press, The 5th and 14th U.S. Constitutional Amendments "guaranteeing" the right to Due Process, threats to judges and justices that do not
bend the knee in obeisance to Emperor Trump. These are hallmarks of Fascism.
Reading Mike's beautiful writing, three associations came to my mind.
1. Words from Don Mclean's lyrics "Vincent" saying: They would not listen, they did not know how. Perhaps they'll listen now.
2. A quote from W.H. Murray on commitment:
"Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back… Concerning all acts of initiative, there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets:
"Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."
−William Hutchison Murray (1913-1996)— The Scottish Himalayan Expedition, 1/1/1951
I suspect the above would have relevance to Brock's Grand Praxis.
3. A quote from the writings of Ida B. Wells (1892, 1895) shared during last night's White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) by Eugene Daniels:
"The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them." — Ida B. Wells in preface to "Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases" (1892) and "A Red Record (1895) documenting the scale of lynchings and racial injustice in the United States. For lovers of music talent, listen to Billy Holiday sing Strange Fruit (1939).
I wish Mike Brock would make his Commentaries available as PDFs. I have tried to share his site with others per the benefit of my paid subscription, but have had negative feedback from some I have sent emails to who have been annoyed with requests to use QR and other annoying tasks.
I could be wrong, but I'm not sure these writings themselves are meant for certain swaths of the population (re: your concern that some folks would not understand the message). I mean the writings pertain to them, but my impression is that the writings are to provide a moral grounding and historical clarity for those who are saying, "I'm scared shitless, this is a fucking nightmare, and I don't know what to do to get out of this mess."
Here's another thing. As I was reading, I thought to myself, if this story was distributed to MAGA folks, would they see themselves as being the characters within the tent holding the candles or as the outside threatening force?
I'm guessing it's the former, and therein lies the problem...
I am cynical about the intellect of the majority of the U.S. population. Of the many professionals in medicine and other fields I have had contact with, few seem to read anymore. In medicine, I am flabbergasted at how few MDs read medical articles in peer-reviewed journals. Of neighbors, family, and friends, a scant minority read books, even with enthusiastic endorsements as to writing artistry and content. Regarding the patients in my practice from the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Australia, only a handful follow advice that invokes cognitive work, yet would extend their lives by an average of 5 years.
"Reading without reflecting is like eating without digesting." — Edmund Burke.
Jamie, we are amid a far-reaching extension of the great line "What we've got here is failure to communicate" —Strother Martin & Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke (1967). We have multiple pandemics, if you will, in the arenas of "attention deficit" where texts, one line replies to an email or no replies at all, and apps like What'sApp, Instagram, Facebook, X, TruthSocial have replaced writing a letter or talking on the phone or heaven forbid, fact-to-face. We have a pandemic of obesity that is ignored due to the typical overreach of left-wing wokeness. We have TV shows that push homosexuality in our face but bleep out words like "shit" or "fuck" yet replace them with shite or Eff word or "freakin." We have a pandemic of stupidity combined with hypocrisy relating to racism, where anti-semitism exists and is growing. Yet, Jesus, the Apostles, the Holy Family, and John the Baptist were born Jews and died Jewish.
I have family who are MAGA and who no longer will maintain contact with me, even now with Trump's full fascist behavior in evidence. I have medical colleagues who think Trump is the greatest POTUS of all time, a belief that belongs in the same crazed mindset of "did the holocaust exist?" I think MAGA doesn't think; it doesn't reflect or concern itself with facts. I fly two flags outside our home. One side says Slava Ukraini (Слава Україні!) and the other has our beliefs: Science is Real, Women Have Rights, Black Lives Matter, etc. Rarely do neighbors passing by stop to discuss either as I tend to the shrubs and flowers in my front yard. I had a sign before the 2024 election that said Democracy or Dictatorship, Your Choice. I did have one or maybe two people say, "I like your sign." One neighbor suggested I remove the sign after the election.
I don't think MAGA would even read Mike Brock's allegorical piece, which I think is masterful. What I do think is that Americans, in general, are like two lines in Wordsworth's poem:
The world is too much with us late and soon,
Getting and spending, we see too little in nature that is ours.
Jamie, I am sadly at a point where the pandemics affecting this country have resulted in a rapid spiral downward reminiscent of the fall of the Roman Empire. Too many have bought into the glitz and glamour of the rich and famous. Too many have their idols as sports figures or those who make the big bucks. I share with you my awakening to this as a med student at the U of Chicago, and those times were by comparison a lot better than the shit-storm we are now in.
MEN OF MEDICINE
Men of Hippocrates, I too am one,
Now, I'm ashamed of what has become
A once noble art turned around
Spiraling quickly from heaven to ground.
Gods, we were never, yet closer before,
Now much more base, the art from us tore.
Strive for the heights; compete with each other,
Close eyes and ears to those who smother,
Under ills that mankind gave birth,
To strangle our fellows
And douse out their mirth.
It is time we spoke less of things esoteric,
Filled our hearts with compassion empathetic,
Cried in our souls when we feel others suffer,
Smile and laugh when sick is no more,
Know all men are rich when they seem poor.
Stephen B. Strum, MD
Hyde Park, Chicago 1968
I have lived in the best times and practiced my profession with the utmost love and care for the patient. I have been a good steward of my fellow men and of this planet. I do not see many following in my footsteps. Yes, there are some, but the apathetic, the indifferent, those lacking in legacy, unity, and vision, have grown in number and replaced us. If Trump is not removed from office, his Administration replaced with competency, and a political party steered by a compass of LUV (Legacy, Unity, Vision) is not in office, I see no chance for so-called H. sapiens.
I share a lot of your concerns, especially regarding social media, which I think has been far more detrimental to us than many care to admit. I have seen some science pertaining to the issue slowly making its way into the public sphere, so we'll see if over time it has any impact on changing human behavior.
I do want to say that I don't share your perspective regarding homosexuality being shoved in our faces. Now if you had said that you find romantic relationships or sex in general as being ubiquitous on TV, then okay. But to single out homosexuality, well, that just strikes me as an odd thing to say simply because I don't see that in any greater degree, by any stretch, than I do heterosexual relationships.
I do understand that for most folks, when presented with having to adjust to certain cultural changes, those changes can seem like they're everywhere. In some cases they are, like cell phone use for example. Others though, may simply be perceived that way (for a variety of reasons), but in reality all we're actually witnessing is a segment of the population finally being allowed to publicaly love one another as all others do.
Thank you for sharing all your thoughts. I can hear the loneliness through your writing. I understand it as well. Hopefully we humans can find our way back to one another in a meaningful way.
I respect your views and like sincere confrontation. In contrast to our European counterparts, Americans do not seem bothered by heated discussions in which passion and patience are displayed. Factual input is admired and not disdained, a common reaction without reflection in the U.S.
About homosexuality, especially on TV, I find both male and female homosexual scenes to be so common, more the case than the incident, that I am sure for some producers it is now part of a genre. Let me explain further. In cinema and TV, certain aspects of human behavior have been shown for their “shock” and “startle” effect. The cancer patient kneeling in front of the toilet vomiting, the female protagonist who lowers her skirt to pee, more scenes with vomiting and expelling something simulating vomitus, and more recently, lesbian and male homosexuality. I have seen episodes from Grey’s Anatomy where someone naive to the hospital scene would wonder if everyone was gay. Living in Southern Oregon, I have watched the Oregon Shakespeare Theatre do the same, and much of the audience left wishing for good, old, traditional Shakespeare rather than a cast turned gay.
OK, I understand sexuality and am no prude. All of us have gay friends and perhaps gay relatives. Living to the age of 82, I don’t buy that if you’re gay, it is commonplace or inherent to walk with a sashay and speak with an intentional lisp. Is this for a shock effect? Should I pad my genital area to portray that I am a well-endowed man ready for all hungry-for-sex females? How many times do we have to watch the sex scene in the kitchen where a tabletop has everything on it pushed off in a moment of passion, and the woman is lifted to the kitchen block (of course, the height is perfect) and wraps her legs around her lover? I, and I’m sure others, have had sex in some pretty kinky places, but if theatre, be it TV, movies, and plays, are to simulate reality, then let’s get real and desist from the hackneyed scenes we are shown.
My solution is to watch more movies from other countries and move away from the stereotyped Americana to more sensitive, thought-provoking, and reality-based ones. And I am OK with the homosexuality scenes, but do not portray them in such a superficial manner, like guy meets guy and they have no control over themselves and are madly French kissing in between floors on an elevator. C’mon. When I started working in Southern California in the 1970s, my older physician employer, Beverly Hills, was taken aback by my unmanicured fingernails. He could not believe that I never had a manicure, and paid for me to get my haircut (I was a hippy MD with long hair and a Fu-Manchu mustache) and manicure. The male hairdresser was fine, but somewhere after the haircut, shampoo, etc., and during the manicure, he made overtures that were subtle but unmistakable. He asked if I was busy that evening and if I would like to have dinner with him. I recall how flushed I was realizing that another man was making a pass at me. This was real life. We did not look at each other, eyes making contact, passion overwhelming us, and engage in kissing, then go into the back room and have sex. Let’s not be so trite or superficial about what we do in life, be it in the cinema, TV, the hospital as physicians, etc.
Read Michael Medved, Hollywood Vs. America. Below is the Amazon review of this important book on how Hollywood has adversely affected our values and distorted our thinking.
Why does our popular culture seem so consistently hostile to the values that most Americans hold dear? Why does the entertainment industry attack religion, glorify brutality, undermine the family, and deride patriotism?
In this explosive book, one of the nation's best known film critics examines how Hollywood has broken faith with its public, creating movies, television, and popular music that exacerbate every serious social problem we face, from teenage pregnancies to violence in the streets.
Michael Medved powerfully argues that the entertainment business follows its own dark obsessions, rather than giving the public what it wants: In fact, the audience for feature films and network television has demonstrated its profound disillusionment in recent years, with disastrous consequences for many entertainment companies. Meanwhile, overwhelming numbers of our fellow citizens complain about the wretched quality of our popular culture - describing the offerings of the mass media as the worst ever. Medved asserts that Hollywood ignores - and assaults - the values of ordinary American families, pursuing a self-destructive and alienated ideological agenda that is harmful to the nation at large and to the industry's own interests.
Reply to Mike Brock's the Revolution.
I shared my attempt to understand Mike's commentary "Trust Math, Not People" with a reply I made before reading "The Revolution." Often in my life, things happen that have me feeling that my neuronal pathways are connected to specific individuals. In this case, read "The Revolution" came across as a gentler, somewhat metaphysical variation of my reply to Trust Math. Let me explain further.
The "Theory of Everything" means to me that all of life is interconnected, from the microcosm of cellular structure and signaling pathways, to the galactic and planetary orbits and black holes within our Universe. The uni-verse is in this theory literally and figuratively equates with "one story." Monotheism in this Theory involves a broader and perennial philosophy and not one needing an incarnate being seen as God, but because the oneness of the creation is wONEder, or w⑴der, and this oneness embodies the true, the beautiful, and the good.
Brock's commentary today is the second bookend to his earlier commentary, "The Revealer."
I love this kind of writing, but I question whether the majority of the population has the attention span or the intellect to hear the message. We have a fascist regime, headed by a fascist POTUS, who has his camp of acolytes already speaking of a 3rd term. We have already seen outright, eyes wide open attacks on Freedom of the Press, The 5th and 14th U.S. Constitutional Amendments "guaranteeing" the right to Due Process, threats to judges and justices that do not
bend the knee in obeisance to Emperor Trump. These are hallmarks of Fascism.
Reading Mike's beautiful writing, three associations came to my mind.
1. Words from Don Mclean's lyrics "Vincent" saying: They would not listen, they did not know how. Perhaps they'll listen now.
2. A quote from W.H. Murray on commitment:
"Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back… Concerning all acts of initiative, there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets:
"Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."
−William Hutchison Murray (1913-1996)— The Scottish Himalayan Expedition, 1/1/1951
I suspect the above would have relevance to Brock's Grand Praxis.
3. A quote from the writings of Ida B. Wells (1892, 1895) shared during last night's White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) by Eugene Daniels:
"The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them." — Ida B. Wells in preface to "Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases" (1892) and "A Red Record (1895) documenting the scale of lynchings and racial injustice in the United States. For lovers of music talent, listen to Billy Holiday sing Strange Fruit (1939).
I wish Mike Brock would make his Commentaries available as PDFs. I have tried to share his site with others per the benefit of my paid subscription, but have had negative feedback from some I have sent emails to who have been annoyed with requests to use QR and other annoying tasks.

Stephen,
I could be wrong, but I'm not sure these writings themselves are meant for certain swaths of the population (re: your concern that some folks would not understand the message). I mean the writings pertain to them, but my impression is that the writings are to provide a moral grounding and historical clarity for those who are saying, "I'm scared shitless, this is a fucking nightmare, and I don't know what to do to get out of this mess."
Here's another thing. As I was reading, I thought to myself, if this story was distributed to MAGA folks, would they see themselves as being the characters within the tent holding the candles or as the outside threatening force?
I'm guessing it's the former, and therein lies the problem...
Jamie,
I am cynical about the intellect of the majority of the U.S. population. Of the many professionals in medicine and other fields I have had contact with, few seem to read anymore. In medicine, I am flabbergasted at how few MDs read medical articles in peer-reviewed journals. Of neighbors, family, and friends, a scant minority read books, even with enthusiastic endorsements as to writing artistry and content. Regarding the patients in my practice from the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Australia, only a handful follow advice that invokes cognitive work, yet would extend their lives by an average of 5 years.
"Reading without reflecting is like eating without digesting." — Edmund Burke.
Jamie, we are amid a far-reaching extension of the great line "What we've got here is failure to communicate" —Strother Martin & Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke (1967). We have multiple pandemics, if you will, in the arenas of "attention deficit" where texts, one line replies to an email or no replies at all, and apps like What'sApp, Instagram, Facebook, X, TruthSocial have replaced writing a letter or talking on the phone or heaven forbid, fact-to-face. We have a pandemic of obesity that is ignored due to the typical overreach of left-wing wokeness. We have TV shows that push homosexuality in our face but bleep out words like "shit" or "fuck" yet replace them with shite or Eff word or "freakin." We have a pandemic of stupidity combined with hypocrisy relating to racism, where anti-semitism exists and is growing. Yet, Jesus, the Apostles, the Holy Family, and John the Baptist were born Jews and died Jewish.
I have family who are MAGA and who no longer will maintain contact with me, even now with Trump's full fascist behavior in evidence. I have medical colleagues who think Trump is the greatest POTUS of all time, a belief that belongs in the same crazed mindset of "did the holocaust exist?" I think MAGA doesn't think; it doesn't reflect or concern itself with facts. I fly two flags outside our home. One side says Slava Ukraini (Слава Україні!) and the other has our beliefs: Science is Real, Women Have Rights, Black Lives Matter, etc. Rarely do neighbors passing by stop to discuss either as I tend to the shrubs and flowers in my front yard. I had a sign before the 2024 election that said Democracy or Dictatorship, Your Choice. I did have one or maybe two people say, "I like your sign." One neighbor suggested I remove the sign after the election.
I don't think MAGA would even read Mike Brock's allegorical piece, which I think is masterful. What I do think is that Americans, in general, are like two lines in Wordsworth's poem:
The world is too much with us late and soon,
Getting and spending, we see too little in nature that is ours.
Jamie, I am sadly at a point where the pandemics affecting this country have resulted in a rapid spiral downward reminiscent of the fall of the Roman Empire. Too many have bought into the glitz and glamour of the rich and famous. Too many have their idols as sports figures or those who make the big bucks. I share with you my awakening to this as a med student at the U of Chicago, and those times were by comparison a lot better than the shit-storm we are now in.
MEN OF MEDICINE
Men of Hippocrates, I too am one,
Now, I'm ashamed of what has become
A once noble art turned around
Spiraling quickly from heaven to ground.
Gods, we were never, yet closer before,
Now much more base, the art from us tore.
Strive for the heights; compete with each other,
Close eyes and ears to those who smother,
Under ills that mankind gave birth,
To strangle our fellows
And douse out their mirth.
It is time we spoke less of things esoteric,
Filled our hearts with compassion empathetic,
Cried in our souls when we feel others suffer,
Smile and laugh when sick is no more,
Know all men are rich when they seem poor.
Stephen B. Strum, MD
Hyde Park, Chicago 1968
I have lived in the best times and practiced my profession with the utmost love and care for the patient. I have been a good steward of my fellow men and of this planet. I do not see many following in my footsteps. Yes, there are some, but the apathetic, the indifferent, those lacking in legacy, unity, and vision, have grown in number and replaced us. If Trump is not removed from office, his Administration replaced with competency, and a political party steered by a compass of LUV (Legacy, Unity, Vision) is not in office, I see no chance for so-called H. sapiens.
Hi Stephen,
I share a lot of your concerns, especially regarding social media, which I think has been far more detrimental to us than many care to admit. I have seen some science pertaining to the issue slowly making its way into the public sphere, so we'll see if over time it has any impact on changing human behavior.
I do want to say that I don't share your perspective regarding homosexuality being shoved in our faces. Now if you had said that you find romantic relationships or sex in general as being ubiquitous on TV, then okay. But to single out homosexuality, well, that just strikes me as an odd thing to say simply because I don't see that in any greater degree, by any stretch, than I do heterosexual relationships.
I do understand that for most folks, when presented with having to adjust to certain cultural changes, those changes can seem like they're everywhere. In some cases they are, like cell phone use for example. Others though, may simply be perceived that way (for a variety of reasons), but in reality all we're actually witnessing is a segment of the population finally being allowed to publicaly love one another as all others do.
Thank you for sharing all your thoughts. I can hear the loneliness through your writing. I understand it as well. Hopefully we humans can find our way back to one another in a meaningful way.
I respect your views and like sincere confrontation. In contrast to our European counterparts, Americans do not seem bothered by heated discussions in which passion and patience are displayed. Factual input is admired and not disdained, a common reaction without reflection in the U.S.
About homosexuality, especially on TV, I find both male and female homosexual scenes to be so common, more the case than the incident, that I am sure for some producers it is now part of a genre. Let me explain further. In cinema and TV, certain aspects of human behavior have been shown for their “shock” and “startle” effect. The cancer patient kneeling in front of the toilet vomiting, the female protagonist who lowers her skirt to pee, more scenes with vomiting and expelling something simulating vomitus, and more recently, lesbian and male homosexuality. I have seen episodes from Grey’s Anatomy where someone naive to the hospital scene would wonder if everyone was gay. Living in Southern Oregon, I have watched the Oregon Shakespeare Theatre do the same, and much of the audience left wishing for good, old, traditional Shakespeare rather than a cast turned gay.
OK, I understand sexuality and am no prude. All of us have gay friends and perhaps gay relatives. Living to the age of 82, I don’t buy that if you’re gay, it is commonplace or inherent to walk with a sashay and speak with an intentional lisp. Is this for a shock effect? Should I pad my genital area to portray that I am a well-endowed man ready for all hungry-for-sex females? How many times do we have to watch the sex scene in the kitchen where a tabletop has everything on it pushed off in a moment of passion, and the woman is lifted to the kitchen block (of course, the height is perfect) and wraps her legs around her lover? I, and I’m sure others, have had sex in some pretty kinky places, but if theatre, be it TV, movies, and plays, are to simulate reality, then let’s get real and desist from the hackneyed scenes we are shown.
My solution is to watch more movies from other countries and move away from the stereotyped Americana to more sensitive, thought-provoking, and reality-based ones. And I am OK with the homosexuality scenes, but do not portray them in such a superficial manner, like guy meets guy and they have no control over themselves and are madly French kissing in between floors on an elevator. C’mon. When I started working in Southern California in the 1970s, my older physician employer, Beverly Hills, was taken aback by my unmanicured fingernails. He could not believe that I never had a manicure, and paid for me to get my haircut (I was a hippy MD with long hair and a Fu-Manchu mustache) and manicure. The male hairdresser was fine, but somewhere after the haircut, shampoo, etc., and during the manicure, he made overtures that were subtle but unmistakable. He asked if I was busy that evening and if I would like to have dinner with him. I recall how flushed I was realizing that another man was making a pass at me. This was real life. We did not look at each other, eyes making contact, passion overwhelming us, and engage in kissing, then go into the back room and have sex. Let’s not be so trite or superficial about what we do in life, be it in the cinema, TV, the hospital as physicians, etc.
Read Michael Medved, Hollywood Vs. America. Below is the Amazon review of this important book on how Hollywood has adversely affected our values and distorted our thinking.
Why does our popular culture seem so consistently hostile to the values that most Americans hold dear? Why does the entertainment industry attack religion, glorify brutality, undermine the family, and deride patriotism?
In this explosive book, one of the nation's best known film critics examines how Hollywood has broken faith with its public, creating movies, television, and popular music that exacerbate every serious social problem we face, from teenage pregnancies to violence in the streets.
Michael Medved powerfully argues that the entertainment business follows its own dark obsessions, rather than giving the public what it wants: In fact, the audience for feature films and network television has demonstrated its profound disillusionment in recent years, with disastrous consequences for many entertainment companies. Meanwhile, overwhelming numbers of our fellow citizens complain about the wretched quality of our popular culture - describing the offerings of the mass media as the worst ever. Medved asserts that Hollywood ignores - and assaults - the values of ordinary American families, pursuing a self-destructive and alienated ideological agenda that is harmful to the nation at large and to the industry's own interests.
Ok, I really need to know the ending to this story.... ;-)
Well done - thank you.