This annual pilgrimage to Martha’s Vineyard and more specifically, The Inkwell is as predictable as Democrats ignoring the Black vote.

Martha’s Vineyard is a 112 square mile island in Massachusetts, known for its mix of coastal beauty, historic towns, and cultural heritage. The Inkwell (officially Town Beach) is a specific, historically significant beach in Oak Bluffs, MA, on the island, celebrated for its role in Black history.

Martha’s Vineyard is a summer resort destination with a rich history dating back to the 18th century when Methodist and Baptist revivals drew visitors. It has evolved from whaling, brickmaking, and farming into a scenic, cultural hub with towns like Oak Bluffs, Edgartown, and Falmouth. The island offers beaches, historic sites, art galleries, and seasonal events, and it has a diverse cultural fabric.

The Inkwell is a small, sandy stretch of beach in Oak Bluffs, MA near the ferry terminal, popular for its gentle waves and central location. Its name comes from a derogatory nickname used in the late 1800s for the Black community that frequented it.

Blacks began visiting the Inkwell during the Great Migration, attracted by Oak Bluffs’ openness during this time of segregation.

The Great Migration, sometimes known as the Great Northward Migration or the Black Migration, was the movement of six million Black Americans out of the rural Southern United States to the urban Northeast, Midwest, and West between 1910 and 1970.

In 1912, Charles and Henrietta Shearer opened the first Black owned inn on the island, catering to Black vacationers.

And the rest, as they say, is history.

I had the fortune of knowing many of the legendary families who were foundational to the Inkwell.  The ones I knew are all dead, but sitting at their feet and learning history from their lived experiences was phenomenal.

When these very wealthy, successful, influential Blacks made their annual August trek to the Inkwell it was not only for vacation, but also to discuss solutions to what ailed the Black community.  Let me reiterate—SOLUTIONS, not complaints about white folks.

They did not spend their precious time talking about how racist presidents like Roosevelt, Truman Eisenhower, Nixon, Kennedy, or LBJ were.  They believed in the Colin Powell doctrine of “constructive engagement.”

These Oldtimers from the Inkwell believed in talking through their disagreements with people in power, both Democrats and Republicans.

They were focused on solutions that would make life better for the whole of the Black community; not simply flexing and self-congratulating each other about their latest material purchases—their new vacation home, their new Rolls Royce, or their latest million-dollar contribution to the boule!!!

I have had many opportunities to go to the Vineyard, but up now have refused all offers because I have to be in a certain mental frame of mind to be around these types of arrogant, uppity Black folks.

I am not there yet.

I know many who are about to make this annual pilgrimage.

These are the who’s who of corporate, political, and Black high society in America.  These are some of the highest-level executives in Fortune 500 companies.  These are some of the most successful entrepreneurs in America.

They are the talented tenth, the bourgeoisie, and the boule.

The talented tenth was made famous by W.E.B. Du Bois, a prominent Black historian and civil rights legend from the early nineteen hundreds.

In his 1903 essay The Talented Tenth, Du Bois argued,  “That for the Black community to rise from the vestiges of slavery and systemic oppression, a small group of the most talented and educated individuals must be trained as leaders, intellectuals, and professionals…They are supposed to serve as role models, uplift the masses and advocate for civil rights, education and political participation.”

Du Bois would be very disappointed that the opposite is occurring today.

The bourgeoisie and the boule will use the occasion of this annual tradition to pair off their young adult children with what they deem to be suitable potential spouses for marriage.  They want to keep their bloodlines pure, socially, financially, and politically.

There will be multiple millions of dollars spent during the month of August on hotels, housing, and exotic catered parties to talk about how bad America is!

There will be no mention of the steady Black on Black killings in Chicago, Baltimore, New York City, or St. Louis; there will be no mention of the out of control out of wedlock birthrates in our community. Despite their protestations to the contrary, these pathologies have nothing to do with Donald Trump, racism or poverty.

It has everything to do with the destruction of the Black family and more specifically the Black male.  The supposed talented tenth do not want to have the discussion about how these radical liberal Democrat policies have and are continuing to destroy the very group they claim to speak for and represent.

There will be no mention of how illegal immigrants are devastating the Black community with murder, increased housing cost, and rising unemployment.

But there will be sunup to sundown conversation about how racist Donald Trump is; how America is racist towards Blacks, and how the legacy of slavery is at the root of all that ails the Black community.

The founders of the Inkwell would be totally ashamed of the state of the Black community today.  They had less opportunity in their time but lived a better quality of life than we are living today.

Make it make sense!!!

Today’s Blacks are doing very well financially, but I would argue that we have a lower quality of life than our forefathers.

We have more material possessions, but our families are in an alarming state of dysfunctionality.

Our sons are suffering from major mental diseases like thinking they can become girls; and their parents are co-signing on this foolishness.  Ask Earvin Johnson and Dwyane Wade.

Our daughters may as well be high-class streetwalkers.  But this would be an insult to real streetwalkers.  Ask Angel Reese and Tyla!

These elite Blacks are overwhelmingly radical liberal Democrats who refuse to engage in the politics of self-interest versus simply following Democrat Party orthodoxy.

These Blacks do more harm to our community than anyone with a white sheet over their face.

I challenge my readers to name me one “media approved” Black organization that is making a meaningful difference in the Black community.

It surely is not radical liberal groups like the NAACP (The National Association for the Advancement of Certain People), the National Action Network (the National Reaction Network), the National Urban League (the National Disturbing League), the Black Economic Alliance (the Lack of Economic Alliance), the Congressional Black Caucus (the Con Black Caucus), the National Association of Black Journalists (the National Association of Whack Journalists), to name a few.

The Black community is always REACTING to change; they are never the change.  Blacks are living in a digital world but operating with analog thinking.

These media appointed Black organizations and their leaders refuse to think new thoughts.  Liberal approaches to business, government, civil society is over, dead, finished.

Whether you like it or not, the U.S. and the world is slowing drifting back to a slightly right of center mindset.  The dead body of liberalism is already at the funeral home; the funeral simply has yet to take place.

We have had sixty years of liberal policies unleashed on America and well over twenty trillion dollars spent on various social experiments and they have failed.

The challenge for Black folks is how can and or they willing to craft solutions to the problems that ail the Black community from a right of center perspective?

What does that picture look like and or they willing to form alliances with people like me who have a proven track record of navigating the halls of power at the highest levels?

Black folks have ninety-nine problems but Trump ain’t one!

Staff Writer; Raynard Jackson

This talented brother is a Pulitzer Award nominated columnist and founder and chairman of Black Americans for a Better Future (BAFBF), a federally registered 527 Super PAC established to get more Blacks involved in the Republican Party. BAFBF focuses on the Black entrepreneur. For more information about BAFBF, visit www.bafbf.org. You can follow Raynard on Twitter; RealRaynardJ; on Gettr: RaynardJackson.

Can also drop him an email at; RaynardJ@ThyBlackMan.com.

]]> https://thyblackman.com/2026/08/01/donald-trump-is-not-what-ails-the-black-community/feed/ 1 https://thyblackman.com/2026/07/30/long-term-wealth-planning-beyond-paper-assets/ https://thyblackman.com/2026/07/30/long-term-wealth-planning-beyond-paper-assets/#respond Thu, 30 Jul 2026 04:42:46 +0000 https://thyblackman.com/?p=141743 (ThyBlackMan.com) Long-term wealth planning is not simply about maximising returns. It also involves deciding how much of a portfolio should depend on financial institutions, market liquidity and confidence in conventional assets. Shares, bonds and investment funds remain valuable, but tangible assets can provide another layer of diversification when inflation, currency movements or market stress challenge paper-based holdings.

Add Tangible Assets to the Portfolio

Physical precious metals differ from shares and bonds because they are not another party’s promise to pay. Gold, silver, platinum, palladium and rhodium have distinct supply dynamics, industrial uses and investment characteristics. Their tangible nature can make them useful within a broader strategy designed to preserve wealth across different economic conditions.

Specialist resources such as auctusmetals.com can help investors examine precious metals within the context of portfolio construction rather than treating them as short-term speculative trades. The purpose is not to replace conventional investments, but to understand where physical assets may reduce dependence on financial markets.

Diversify Across Different Economic Risks

A portfolio holding only shares and bonds may appear diversified while remaining heavily exposed to interest rates, corporate earnings and market sentiment. Precious metals can respond to different forces, including mining supply, geopolitical uncertainty, industrial demand and changes in currency values.

Gold is often associated with monetary uncertainty, while silver combines investment demand with extensive industrial use. Platinum, palladium and rhodium are influenced more strongly by manufacturing requirements and constrained production. These differences mean that metals should not be treated as a single, uniform asset class.

Protect Purchasing Power Over Time

Inflation gradually reduces the amount that money can buy. Although no asset provides guaranteed protection, scarce physical assets may help preserve purchasing power over long periods, particularly when confidence in a currency weakens.

Gold is commonly assessed as a store of value, meaning an asset expected to retain usefulness or purchasing power over time. Its effectiveness can vary considerably across shorter periods, however. Long-term planning should therefore consider the investor’s time horizon, entry price and overall allocation rather than assuming that metal prices will automatically rise alongside inflation.

Reduce Reliance on Counterparties

Paper investments usually involve counterparty risk: the possibility that an institution, issuer or contractual party cannot meet its obligations. This risk exists in different forms across bank deposits, corporate bonds, derivatives and some metal-backed financial products.

Direct ownership of allocated physical metal can reduce certain counterparty exposures, provided ownership is legally clear and storage arrangements are sound. Investors must still assess custody, insurance, verification and access. Removing one form of risk does not eliminate the need for careful administration.

Balance Stability With Liquidity Needs

Precious metals can strengthen diversification, but they do not generate dividends, rent or interest. Their returns depend primarily on price movements, and less actively traded metals may have wider differences between buying and selling prices.

A sensible allocation should reflect expected spending needs and access to emergency funds. Money required in the near term generally belongs in liquid assets rather than holdings that may need to be sold during an unfavourable market. Rebalancing can then be used periodically to restore the intended proportions as asset values change.

Plan Ownership Beyond the Investment Period

Long-term wealth planning also includes what happens when assets pass to another person. Physical holdings require accurate records covering ownership, purchase prices, storage locations, insurance and instructions for access. Without reliable documentation, valuable assets can become difficult for executors or beneficiaries to identify and manage.

Tax and estate rules vary between jurisdictions, so professional advice may be necessary before making substantial purchases or transferring ownership. Clear documentation ensures that diversification remains an advantage rather than creating an administrative burden.

Build Resilience, Not a Market Bet

Planning beyond paper assets is ultimately about resilience. Precious metals can broaden a portfolio’s sources of value, reduce reliance on counterparties and introduce assets influenced by different economic forces. Their role should nevertheless be proportionate, carefully documented and aligned with liquidity needs. Used alongside productive financial assets rather than as a wholesale substitute, tangible metals can support a more balanced long-term wealth strategy.

Staff Writer; Keith Poole

Throughout most of America’s history, the answer has been an emphatic yes. Scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, artists and strivers from around the world have chosen the United States because they believed they could build something, discover something or start a business while making a better life in this country.

We should worry about the day when this is no longer true.

Unfortunately, the Trump administration seems determined to make that day arrive sooner rather than later. Its destructive embrace of protectionism is not merely directed against foreign goods and capital. It’s not limited to low-skill immigrants, either. It’s also directed against in-demand foreign talent.

For instance, a rule finalized in early July replaces “duration of status” for foreign students, exchange visitors and foreign journalists with fixed admission periods. In other words, it forces international students to seek government approval to stay beyond four years, regardless of whether their studies can be completed that quickly. It also makes it more difficult for international graduates of American universities to stay and work after graduation through the Optional Practical Training program.

A recent brief by Amy Nice, Michael Clemens and Jeremy Neufeld of the Peterson Institute for International Economics highlights the stakes. The authors examine the pipeline through which international students — particularly those studying science, technology, engineering and mathematics — enter American universities and eventually the American workforce. It is an enormously valuable pipeline for all of us.

The authors found that America’s science and technology workforce depends heavily on talent from abroad. Immigrants fill almost one in three advanced STEM positions and nearly one in two requiring a doctorate. People who first entered the country to study represent about one-fifth of degree-holding STEM workers and more than one-third at the Ph.D. level.

Clemens explains that the STEM students who stay in the U.S. after graduation “patent new inventions at four times the rate of typical college graduates and are responsible for around 10 percent of all new inventions patented in the United States. They found high-growth startup companies at six times the rate of US-born graduates.”

That means we can dispense with the idea that if a foreign engineer gets a job, an American engineer must have lost one. Protectionism applied to human capital relies on the same economic fallacy that underlies other forms of protectionism: the belief that the economy is like one pie, and hence, allowing foreign interests to take a seat hurts those already at the table.

Economies don’t work that way. Talented people don’t merely fill existing jobs. They create them by inventing products, starting companies, conducting research and making the people around them more productive. In the process, they create opportunities for other people that otherwise wouldn’t exist.

Giving a cold shoulder to foreign students is particularly absurd when you consider Washington’s obsession with competing against China. Politicians insist that America is engaged in an existential technological race. They spend billions of dollars subsidizing semiconductors and other favored industries. They develop elaborate industrial policies intended to make America dominant in artificial intelligence, quantum computing and advanced manufacturing.

Then, when a potentially brilliant young scientist from India, China or anywhere else earns an advanced degree at an American university and wants to stay and contribute to the American economy, our government says perhaps they should leave.

You can throw billions of taxpayer dollars at a semiconductor factory in Arizona. You cannot manufacture genius through an appropriations bill.

The Peterson researchers estimate that discouraging just one-third of international STEM graduates could leave the American economy 0.7% to 1.3% smaller, or roughly $200 billion to $400 billion in GDP over a decade — equivalent to losing the entire economy of Utah or South Carolina.

Those estimates necessarily depend on assumptions about future immigration and productivity, but we don’t need to know the precise numbers to understand the effect. When productive people leave — or never arrive — we lose their ideas, businesses, discoveries and all the related economic activity.

There is also something deeper at stake. One of America’s greatest strengths is that people vote for this country with their feet. They leave familiar places, sometimes traveling thousands of miles, because of possibilities unavailable elsewhere. It’s an extraordinary vote of confidence in American institutions: our markets, rule of law and culture of entrepreneurship. We should never take it for granted.

Indeed, the possibility that the world’s brightest young people will decide that America is no longer worth the trouble should terrify us. Not simply because we will lose their economic contributions, but because their decision will tell us something about what America has become.

Written by Veronique de Rugy

Official website; http://twitter.com/veroderugy

What to do about a nominee as chief law enforcement officer in the land who has and will not disavow this conflict? Reject him.

Here is the backstory.

For America’s first 100 years, there was no Department of Justice. Federal laws were enforced by state authorities in federal courts. This was part of James Madison’s genius to divide governmental power between the states and the feds.

The modern presidency sits at the intersection of two powerful and often conflicting ideas. One is the unitary executive theory, which argues that because Article II of the Constitution vests “[t]he executive Power” in the president, every official exercising executive authority ultimately answers to him.

The other is the longstanding expectation that the DoJ, while undeniably part of the executive branch, should administer the law impartially and according to facts, evidence, caselaw, precedent and professional ethics rather than presidential preference.

Today, the tension between these principles has become especially visible in the nomination of Blanche.

Supporters of the unitary executive theory argue that the president cannot faithfully execute the laws if subordinate officers are free to disregard his lawful directives. In this view, all executive officials exercise authority only because the president has delegated it to them. If DoJ lawyers become independent centers of power, democratic accountability suffers because voters elect only one chief executive.

The DoJ, however, has always occupied a somewhat unusual position. Legally, there is no constitutional independence. The attorney general serves at the pleasure of the president. United States attorneys are presidential appointees. Federal prosecutors exercise executive authority. Nothing in the Constitution establishes the DoJ as a fourth branch of government insulated from presidential supervision.

Yet, over many decades, norms have developed to preserve public confidence in criminal prosecutions. Presidents of both parties have generally avoided directing individual prosecutorial decisions. Attorneys general have frequently emphasized that charging decisions should be based upon evidence, applicable law and the likelihood of obtaining a sustainable conviction — not political advantage.

Adding another layer to this tension are the professional obligations of DoJ lawyers themselves. Federal prosecutors are not simply political appointees. They are attorneys licensed by state authorities and bound by professional rules of ethics. Their paramount duties include candor toward tribunals, honesty in representations to courts, disclosure obligations, fidelity to their client and the prohibition against presenting evidence they know to be false.

Those ethical responsibilities do not disappear because a president expresses a preference. If a presidential directive would require an attorney to violate professional ethics or mislead a court, a prosecutor should resign rather than participate in conduct believed to be unethical.

That is precisely where the theoretical collision occurs. A strong version of the unitary executive theory suggests the president should ultimately control every exercise of executive discretion. We know from history and common sense, however, that certain prosecutorial judgments require legal expertise and professional competence inherently independent from political influence. Neither principle entirely eliminates the other. Instead, both coexist in uneasy tension.

Blanche finds himself squarely within that difficult intersection. Two notorious cases, one involving government murders of innocents and the other involving a swindle of taxpayer dollars, came across Blanche’s desk recently, and in both cases, he rejected the rule of law and bowed to presidential whim.

Blanche surely knows the basics of due process — notice, hearing, right to appeal — whenever the feds want life, liberty or property. Yet he permitted and accepted as appropriate the presidential order to enforce U.S. laws against drug trafficking by murdering 221 persons in 67 speedboats on the high seas. Needless to say, none of these folks received due process, and Blanche must answer for that.

The better known of Blanche’s ethical failures involves Trump suing the IRS for $10 billion because an IRS employee criminally revealed the contents of Trump’s tax returns. Two weeks ago, the U.S. District Court in Miami excoriated both Trump’s present personal lawyers and his former lawyers for engaging in a false cause of action — one where there was no adversity between the parties because both sides wanted the identical result.

In response to the lawsuit, Trump’s DoJ lawyers agreed to give his personal lawyers a fund of $1.776 billion from the federal Treasury to disburse to Trump’s supporters at Trump’s personal discretion; and Trump’s IRS lawyers agreed that neither Trump personally nor his family or closely held corporations could be audited by the IRS.

According to the DoJ, none of the $1.776 billion has been spent and the fund is now dormant. But Blanche refuses to renounce it or negate his own signature on a document he filed establishing the fund. The federal court ruled the lawyers on both sides of this matter did not act in good faith because all sought to please Trump at taxpayer expense.

Lawyers in litigation have a duty of zealous advocacy and unimpeachable loyalty to their clients. They cannot secretly or openly aid their client’s adversary. If they are morally or personally or legally conflicted, they must withdraw from the case.

Blanche remains bound by the same ethical obligations governing every federal prosecutor. He cannot simply substitute presidential preference for legal analysis.

If Blanche can’t do the right thing on cases where the law is obvious and unambiguous, how can he be trusted with complex decisions? Courts, disciplinary authorities and history judge attorneys according to established legal standards rather than partisan loyalty. In the case of Todd Blanche, the Senate should do the same — and reject his nomination.

Written by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano

Official website; https://twitter.com/Judgenap

On July 23, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) proposed abolishing the EEO-1 report and five related workforce reports. For nearly sixty years, EEO-1 has required large private employers to report the race, ethnicity and sex of their employees across major occupational categories. The information helps us see who gets hired, who advances, who remains clustered at the bottom and who never gets through the door. Now the federal government proposes to stop collecting it.

This is far more than bureaucratic housekeeping. It is the deliberate destruction of evidence. Without data, disparities cannot be adequately documented; without documentation, discrimination becomes more difficult to prove. An administration already committed to declaring our nation colorblind will then be free to point to the absence of evidence—an absence it created—as evidence that inequality no longer exists.

First they deny inequality. Then they destroy the evidence. Finally, they declare the problem solved.

The EEO-1 report has been collected since 1966, just two years after passage of the Civil Rights Act. Private employers with at least 100 workers, along with certain federal contractors with at least 50, have been required to provide workforce demographic information. Approximately 110,000 employers are covered. While that is less than 2 percent of the nation’s nearly 6 million employer firms, these are among our largest employers and collectively employ a substantial share of the American workforce.

The proposed rule goes beyond private employers. It would also eliminate reports covering unions, state and local governments, public school systems, apprenticeship programs and institutions of higher education, as well as some of the recordkeeping requirements associated with those reports. The administration is not simply turning off the camera; it is also proposing to throw away the film.

The EEOC contends that these reports are burdensome, of limited usefulness and potentially unconstitutional because they classify workers by race and sex. That reasoning turns civil-rights enforcement on its head. In the twisted logic of this political moment, counting racial inequality is treated as a form of racial discrimination, while actual discrimination is rendered invisible.

Collecting information about race is not the same as discriminating by race. A thermometer does not cause a fever, nor does a scale cause weight gain. Data do not create inequality; they reveal it. Indeed, without data, claims of equal opportunity are little more than corporate advertising.

The EEOC estimates that eliminating the reporting requirements would save employers and the federal government about $278 million annually, including approximately $273 million for private employers. That sounds like a large amount until it is compared with the economic cost of workplace discrimination. Wage disparities, occupational segregation, biased hiring and blocked promotions cost workers—and the larger economy—far more than employers spend completing a report.

Furthermore, businesses already collect much of this information through their payroll and human-resources systems. The real burden may not be gathering the numbers but being held accountable for what those numbers reveal.

EEO-1 data are hardly perfect. The report does not tell us everything about pay, promotions, discrimination or workplace culture; it offers a snapshot rather than a full biography. Still, snapshots matter. They can reveal whether Black women are concentrated in administrative and support positions while white men dominate senior management. They can expose the distance between a company’s carefully worded commitment to diversity and its actual employment practices.

Such patterns do not prove every individual allegation of discrimination, but they tell investigators where to look. They allow employers to identify problems before those problems become lawsuits, while giving researchers and policymakers a way to measure progress—or the lack of it. Eliminating the data will not make workplaces more equal; it will simply make inequality easier to conceal.

This attack on EEO-1 reporting is part of a broader war on facts. The Trump administration has attacked diversity, equity and inclusion programs, weakened federal contracting protections and attempted to purge race-conscious analysis from government. It apparently wants a nation in which racial inequality may be experienced but not measured, described but not documented, protested but not proved.

Black workers know better, and so do women who continue to encounter occupational segregation and unequal opportunity. We know that fairness cannot be measured by a corporate slogan or a glossy photograph featuring a carefully assembled rainbow of employees. It must be measured by who is hired, what they earn, where they work, whether they advance and who holds power.

Data are instruments of democratic accountability because they allow ordinary people to compare promises with performance. That is precisely why those who resist accountability want the numbers buried. The proposed elimination of EEO-1 reporting is not colorblindness but willful blindness—a declaration that the federal government would prefer not to know what is happening inside American workplaces.

Inequality does not disappear when government closes its eyes. When the people charged with enforcing equal opportunity stop collecting the evidence, they are not being neutral. They are choosing concealment over accountability and darkness over the illumination that data provide.

Written by Julianne Malveaux

Official website; https://www.juliannemalveaux.com

Americans are not naive. They realize that fast-evolving technologies will disrupt how we do business, just like the Industrial Revolution replaced blacksmiths and the horse and buggy. Many young people, particularly, are already pivoting toward “AI-proof” career fields that promise long-term stability.

However, while concerns about AI automation have dominated headlines and sucked the oxygen out of the room, a bigger, more immediate threat to Americans’ job prospects and wages continues to go virtually ignored: That is the crowding-out effect of the rising federal debt on private investment.

Our national debt is not a theoretical boogeyman. It’s a bona fide job-killer that is impeding economic growth and driving up costs on everyday families. And it will only get worse the longer it is ignored.

An analysis by Ernst & Young projects that on the 2025 debt path, which has accelerated in the current fiscal year, the United States will lose over 1 million jobs by 2035, 2.7 million by 2055, and 3.6 million by 2075. These losses will disproportionately impact young people, who are more sensitive to labor market conditions.

At the same time, evidence indicates that the “crowding-out” effect of the national debt — whereby the high cost of servicing the debt pushes investment into Treasury bonds instead of private, job-creating capital — will reduce income growth by 16% between now and 2055.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office pegs that number even higher. A 2023 report estimates that the rising debt will cut income growth by a third, or more than $14,000, over the next three decades. It notes that every dollar of federal borrowing causes a 33-cent reduction in private investment.

In other words, our national debt and the interest costs that accompany it are stifling job creation and wage growth, and the situation will only get increasingly worse as our federal debt load continues to balloon.

What’s more, the interest on our national debt — which costs about $2.8 billion per day and is projected to grow to nearly $6 billion per day by 2036 — is driving up borrowing costs for consumers, exacerbating the affordability crisis. A Yale Budget Lab report found that every 1-point increase in the permanent deficit relative to GDP adds between $600 and $1,240 per year in loan costs for the median U.S. home.

Sadly, young people bear the worst of these job losses, wage stagnation and borrowing cost increases. Last August unemployment among 20- to 24-year-olds peaked at over 9%, more than double the general rate of 4.3%. Since 2023, younger Americans’ job-market optimism has fallen 23 points, similar to the Great Recession — which caused millennials to earn about 20% less over their careers, with roughly half the wealth of their parents at the same age.

Coupled with Social Security’s 2032 depletion date, all these factors are squeezing young workers from every angle: disappearing jobs and lower wages today, and a shrinking safety net tomorrow.

Our massive national debt and the significant costs it imposes on ordinary Americans is a problem of Washington’s own making. It will take leaders with political courage to address it — leaders who are willing to say no to reckless spending our country can’t afford, even when it may cost them their job.

Democrats have proven they have no interest in getting the debt under control. They know that federal spending builds dependence on the welfare state and obstructs private-sector growth, consolidating power in Washington. That’s their end goal — a powerful government that “provides” for all, picks winners and losers, and usurps personal liberties.

There’s only one problem: Their socialist vision doesn’t work. It never has. That’s because government doesn’t create wealth; private enterprise does. As Winston Churchill famously explained, “The inherent vice of Capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.”

Young people are not wrong to worry about the economic disruptions AI could bring about, but our out-of-control national debt is the bigger, more pressing elephant in the room. And we cannot afford for lawmakers to kick the can down the road.

Written by Ken Buck

Official website; https://x.com/BuckForColorado

It’s only a game. It’s supposed to be a pastime (according to AI, something that “helps make the hours pass pleasantly when you are not working”), not an obsession. There are 162 games a year and letting your emotional state hinge on whether your favorite team scores more runs than the other team is obviously senseless.

And yet.

Generations of Americans have been swept up by the game. Children never forget their first trip to the ballpark or memories of playing catch with their father, or the ball players they elevated to heroes, or observing their elders go ballistic over a dropped ball. My friend Paul remembers being five years old and watching his father rip the radio out of the wall after the Red Sox grounded into a rally-killing double play.

That was in 1958. For New Englanders, that kind of passion hasn’t abated much, even if people are watching games on cell phones.

It’s been ever thus. “Six months out of every year, I may as well be made of stone,” laments the long-suffering wife of a die-hard Washington Senators fan in the 1955 Broadway musical “Damn Yankees”, while her long-suffering husband sings “Those damn Yankees, why can’t we beat ’em?”

Speaking of the Yankees, years ago I was comparing notes about baseball obsession with Floyd Abrams, the great First Amendment scholar/advocate, who has argued numerous cases before the U.S. Supreme Court on erudite points of constitutional law. Abrams, an overcharged Yankees fan, told me that any neurosis I had about the Red Sox paled before his about the Yankees.

“I doubt it,” I said.

“Trust me,” he said, and related that every night, when he watched the Yankees games on television, he had to leave the room while the opposing team was at bat.

“You win,” I said.

Anyone who has ever dropped their kid off to begin their freshman year at college remembers the surge of emotion that the experience triggers: the sad wonder about the time that has flown by, the brooding about the things not done together, the re-discovery of the bedroom, hermetically sealed since age 13, suddenly open to reveal a space, once a pigsty, now deserted.

As in every other New England family, my son and I bonded intensely over the Red Sox. The weekend after we dropped him off at college, while I was still in a post-drop-off funk, the Sox and their archrival Yankees played a three-game series. The Sox won the first game, the Bad Guys the second. In the final game, nationally televised, the Yankees beat the Red Sox in the ninth inning.

I did not throw furniture. I did not rip the television out of the wall. But it’s possible that some of the pent-up emotion over the previous week’s college drop-off seeped out, just a bit.

Perhaps trying to comfort, our teenage daughter attempted to reason with me. “Why does it matter?” she asked. “It’s just a piece of wood and a ball.

This wasn’t helpful.

Exactly at that moment, a text arrived from my son, looking after his old man, albeit from a distance. “Don’t do it,” the text said simply. “You have so much to live for.”

Given the state of the world, there was particular reason to look forward to the Red Sox season this year: part diversion, part reason for hope.

The team did not oblige for the first half of the season. They did not hit. They did not pitch. They did not field. Consequently, they did not win.

Then a miracle happened. Call it a sign from God. The team won 15 games in a row. They are back in contention — for now.

My son and daughter-in-law have been staying with us for a few weeks. The old ritual has returned: sitting together to watch our beloved team and sweat every pitch.

Point is: you have got to hand it to the Boys of Summer. Somehow or other, however bad things are, they give you reason to hope.

And to remember.

Written by Jeff Robbins

Official website; https://x.com/jeffreysrobbins

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• Using several methods in tandem can help you consistently accumulate rewards and increase your gift card earnings.

In today’s digital age, the possibility of earning gift cards from home is no longer a distant dream. Thanks to a variety of reputable online platforms, individuals now have several options for boosting their savings or supplementing their income without stepping out of the house. Whether you want to treat yourself to something special or save on everyday purchases, this guide covers practical ways to earn free gift cards through safe and accessible online activities.

By combining multiple earning opportunities, you can unlock a steady stream of rewards and enjoy the flexibility of working on your own schedule. It’s crucial, however, to choose legitimate sites and methods to ensure your efforts lead to real payouts. Using trustworthy platforms protects your personal information and guarantees that you’ll actually receive your hard-earned gift cards.

If you’re looking for actionable ideas you can trust, this article will walk you through proven approaches and give tips to maximize your returns. Think of gift cards as a way to lower your monthly spending, support your favorite retailers, or even treat friends and family.

Remember, the right combination of time, effort, and platform choice can make these methods an effective part of your financial toolkit. To protect yourself from scams and stay updated with reliable online money-making strategies, check out resources from organizations like the Federal Trade Commission.

1. Participate in Online Surveys

Brands and research firms are eager to hear from real consumers, so they pay people to participate in online surveys. Reputable survey sites like Swagbucks and Survey Junkie offer points for each completed survey. These points translate directly into gift cards for retailers such as Amazon, Walmart, and Starbucks. For many, survey-taking is an easy and flexible way to earn rewards, especially if you enjoy sharing your opinion on products and services.

2. Play Games for Rewards

If you love gaming, several platforms will reward you with points or credits for playing and testing new games. Mistplay and Gamehag are standout options where users accumulate rewards that can be redeemed for gift cards. These platforms typically offer a wide variety of games ranging from strategy to puzzles, making it easy to find something enjoyable that also earns you rewards. For additional safety tips on gaming rewards, see Tom’s Guide’s article on identifying legitimate online opportunities.

3. Utilize Cashback and Rewards Apps

Shopping online or in-store can help you earn even more by using cashback apps. Apps like Rakuten and Honey allow users to earn a percentage of their purchase back in the form of points or direct cashback, which can later be traded for gift cards. Some of these apps provide bonus rewards for scanning receipts or trying new stores. When shopping for essentials, using these apps regularly can translate to substantial savings over time.

4. Engage in Microtasks

Microtask platforms such as Amazon Mechanical Turk and Clickworker pay users for small online jobs, including data entry, researching, testing websites, or even basic content moderation. The payment for each task tends to be modest, but with consistency, your earnings can accumulate. Most microtask platforms allow users to redeem their balances via gift cards for a variety of well-known retailers.

5. Refer Friends and Family

Referral programs are a simple way to earn extra rewards by spreading the word about your favorite platforms. Many survey and cashback sites offer referral bonuses, providing you with additional points or cash each time a friend joins and completes specific tasks. Swagbucks, for instance, rewards you with a percentage of your referral’s earnings indefinitely, potentially growing your gift card balance over time.

6. Participate in Product Testing

Product testing panels connect you with brands seeking honest feedback on new items, be it electronics, cosmetics, or household goods. By testing these products and offering your opinion, you often receive both the product and a gift card as compensation. Pinecone Research and BzzAgent are trusted sources for such opportunities, helping consumers influence product development while earning valuable incentives.

7. Watch Videos and Ads

Platforms such as Swagbucks allow users to earn points by simply watching short online videos or advertisements. The payouts per video may be small, but with consistent participation, you can gradually build up enough points for gift card redemption. If you already spend time watching videos, turning that time into earnings is a win-win.

8. Leverage Credit Card Rewards

Many credit cards offer reward programs for everyday purchases. By using a rewards credit card for routine expenses and paying off your balance each month, you can rack up points that are often redeemable for gift cards to major retailers. Some cards also run special promotions or sign-up bonuses, further increasing the potential return. Always choose a card that matches your spending habits to get the most value.

By exploring these varied options, anyone can start earning gift cards safely and efficiently from the comfort of their own home. The key is to use reputable sites, stay consistent, and always be vigilant of scams. With a strategic approach, these legitimate methods will help you unlock a stream of gift card rewards whenever you need a little extra spending power.

Staff Writer; Walter Moore

This article runs the actual numbers so you can.

The 47% Who Finance: What They’re Actually Spending on Interest

When Rocket Mortgage’s survey on financing home renovations asked 1,018 U.S. homeowners about renovation plans and funding methods, 53% said they would use personal savings. The remaining 47% planned to borrow — spreading across HELOCs (13%), home equity loans (10%), credit cards (10%), personal loans (7%), and cash-out refinances (4%).

That distribution matters because each product carries a structurally different cost over time. The interest rate is only part of the equation. The term length — how many months you are paying — multiplies that rate into a total dollar figure that can surprise even financially experienced borrowers.

Take a $20,000 renovation as a baseline. It is a reasonable midpoint for the projects homeowners actually want. The same survey found that bathrooms rank as the top interior priority (28%) and kitchens second (25%), with realistic costs ranging from $15,000 to $30,000 for a bathroom remodel and $25,000 to $60,000 for a full kitchen renovation.

HELOCs vs. Personal Loans: The Total Cost Comparison

A HELOC at 8.5% over a five-year repayment period on a $20,000 draw generates roughly $4,500 in interest. Your total repayment is approximately $24,500. Monthly payments run around $410.

A personal loan at 12% over three years on the same $20,000 generates roughly $3,900 in interest — slightly less in absolute dollars, but the monthly payment climbs to about $664 because the term is shorter. The faster payoff saves money on paper, but it creates a meaningfully higher monthly obligation.

The comparison flips depending on what you optimize for. If cash flow is tight, the HELOC’s lower monthly payment looks attractive. If you want to minimize total interest paid and can handle the payment, the personal loan’s shorter term wins on total cost — barely. The real danger sits on the credit card line. At 20% or higher APR with minimum payments, a $20,000 renovation charge can take a decade or more to pay off and accumulate interest that dwarfs the original project cost. The survey’s 10% who plan to use credit cards are taking on the highest-risk financing path available.

One factor that shifts HELOC math: rates are variable. An 8.5% rate today can move upward during your repayment window. The total interest figure of $4,500 assumes the rate holds. If it climbs to 10.5% midway through repayment, your actual cost rises accordingly. This is not a reason to avoid HELOCs — they are well-suited for larger projects — but it is a reason to stress-test the numbers before committing.

When a Cash-Out Refinance Makes the Math Work — and When It Doesn’t

The cash-out refinance deserves its own section because it operates on entirely different logic than every other product on this list. When you roll renovation costs into a mortgage, you are not borrowing over three or five years. You are borrowing over twenty or thirty years, which changes the math dramatically.

A $20,000 addition to a 30-year mortgage at 7% does not cost $4,500 in interest. It costs approximately $27,000 in interest on that portion alone over the full loan term. You are paying for a bathroom remodel from 2025 until 2055. Stated plainly, a $20,000 project becomes a $47,000 project when financed this way over the full term.

That does not mean cash-out refinances are the wrong tool. They are the right tool in specific circumstances: when you are already refinancing for rate reasons, when the renovation is substantial enough (think a $60,000 kitchen at the upper end of the survey’s range) that a lower monthly payment is genuinely necessary, or when the alternative is carrying a high-rate personal loan. At larger project scales, spreading cost over 30 years with a lower interest rate can make monthly ownership more manageable. The problem is using a 30-year instrument for a project that a 3-to-5-year product could handle.

Matching the Financing Product to the Project Scale

The survey data on project preferences maps reasonably well onto a financing tier structure.

For projects in the $10,000 to $20,000 range — a bathroom remodel, window replacements, or landscaping upgrades (which ranked as the top exterior priority at 23%) — personal loans and HELOCs both work. The total interest difference is modest, and neither requires tapping long-term mortgage debt for a short-term improvement.

For projects in the $20,000 to $40,000 range — a mid-scale kitchen renovation or a significant exterior upgrade — home equity loans and HELOCs become more competitive because fixed rates and larger credit lines suit the scale. A home equity loan at a fixed rate eliminates the variable-rate risk a HELOC carries.

For projects above $40,000, the math shifts enough that a cash-out refinance or home equity loan starts making structural sense, particularly if the homeowner has sufficient equity and is not extending the payoff window unnecessarily. The 47% of survey respondents who cited resale value as a significant factor in their renovation decisions are likely thinking at this scale — projects large enough to move the needle on a home’s appraised value.

The underlying principle is straightforward: match the financing term to the useful life of what you are building, and calculate total cost — not monthly payment — before you sign anything. Monthly payment tells you what you can afford. Total cost tells you what you are actually paying.

References

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. (2024). What you should know about HELOCs. https://www.consumerfinance.gov

Federal Reserve. (2025). Survey of Consumer Finances. https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm

Staff Writer; Charlie Goode

Sure, there’s a sucker born every minute, as P.T. Barnum allegedly said. But now we have a federal government that’s gone backward in providing protection from predators just as they adopt sophisticated technology to ply their craft.

Criminals now use AI to generate fake images and scrub their pitches of misspellings and odd English usage that would give away their origins in Africa and Southeast Asia. They set up slick websites with glib text hawking their investment swindles. Amazingly, they convince Americans, especially older ones, to wire their life savings to someone they’ve never met.

And to top off the cruelty, they follow up with “recovery scams,” portraying themselves as lawyers or even FBI agents able to get the money back. The dupes then wire money to the recovery scammers promising to recover the money they foolishly wired to the original crooks.

Lonely women lured online by potential romantic partners count among the saddest marks. Some stories are shocking: Women send thousands of dollars to help their phantom mates get out of legal trouble, pay for childcare or travel expenses — all sold as a means of furthering a meeting with the nonexistent lover. You know the end.

And we now have a Trump administration that’s actually grooming suckers to fall for the president’s investment offers. Shortly after leaving office in June 2021, Donald Trump was asked about Bitcoin, a type of cryptocurrency, on Fox Business Network.

“Bitcoin, it just seems like a scam,” he responded.

Complaining about a “scam” seemed a good tactic for later getting elected to a second term. Trump cleverly tacked on a patriotic message: “I don’t like it because it’s another currency competing against the dollar,” he said. The U.S. dollar should remain “the currency of the world” and Bitcoin should be regulated “very, very high.”

As a master scammer himself — recall Trump University and his saddling fans with stock in bankrupt casinos — you wonder how the voice in his head might have shifted at the thought of crypto as a scam. Was it “this must be stopped” or “hmmm”? We now know the answer.

Five years later, Trump is back in office, and guess what? He promises to make America the “crypto capital of the world.” And his family is up to their eyeballs in crypto while as president, he influences how it is regulated.

The latest reports have Trump vacuuming up $1.4 billion in crypto deals. His buyers are not doing so well. About two-thirds of the investors in his meme coins, $TRUMP and $MELANIA, have basically lost their shirts.

World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency company tied to the Trumps, was launched in 2024. One analysis found that 85% of investors who bought World Liberty’s $WLFI token after it began trading publicly are underwater. Trump-controlled interests, however, made $520 million last year from token sales.

It would be inaccurate to call his crypto deals “scams.” His lawyers’ fine print protects him from suits. For example, the website for the $TRUMP token specifically calls it an expression of support “not intended to be … an investment opportunity, investment contract, or security.”

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created in 2010 to protect ordinary folk from unfair, deceptive and abusive practices in the financial industry. Trump in his second term has been shrinking the agency to mouse size, dramatically cutting the watchdog agency’s power.

Americans, you’re on your own. Our freedom to be scammed has never been greater.

Written by Froma Harrop

Official website; https://twitter.com/FromaHarrop