Roy Casagranda returns to the Plutopia News Network to help the hosts process what Scoop calls the “cornucopia of crap” that was 2025, ranging from social media’s corrosive incentives to AI hype, rising economic pain, and the destabilizing effects of Trump-era foreign and domestic policy heading into the 2026 midterms. Casagranda argues the U.S. is drifting toward an “electoral monarchy,” with a hollowed-out Congress and a Supreme Court increasingly empowering a unitary, executive-order-driven presidency, while the panel connects this to broader institutional decay, public cynicism, and a sense that global leaders are making irrational, self-destructive choices reminiscent of darker historical periods. They debate whether social media is the primary driver or merely an accelerant that converts frustration into addictive “hour of hate” posting rather than real-world collective action like organizing, boycotts, and strikes, and they trade observations about AI’s usefulness as a tool versus its dangers as an unaccountable decision-maker, especially as “AI slop” contaminates law, education, and public knowledge. The conversation also touches on crypto, energy-hungry data centers, and governance contrasts, with Casagranda describing Dubai’s future-oriented planning and service efficiency as a stark counterpoint to U.S. dysfunction, before closing on skepticism that the Democratic Party alone can meaningfully “rein in” Trumpism and a worry that the same cycle of backlash, complacency, and renewed crisis could repeat.
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The definition of monarch is one person rules. It’s not necessarily that it’s hereditary. So what the United States has basically done is — Congress doesn’t function anymore, and the Supreme Court is handing the power over to the presidency, and the president is ruling through executive orders. And so at that point, that’s the definition of a monarchy. You could have it so that you elect the monarch every four years. But the Constitution James Madison wrote us was meant for Congress to be in charge, not Congress to be the rubber stamp for the president. And that’s where we are. We’re in a situation where we have devolved into a monarchy. Osama bin Laden’s in his grave laughing his head off… like, wow, I triggered U. S. idiocy to the point where Americans can’t get their heads out of 911. And here it is, 24 years later, and they voted for this maniac who’s destroying the empire. He did more damage to the United States than could have been imaginable. Well, the United States did all the damage
Link to Roy Casagranda’s podcast
