MAGA Christians vs. Matthew 25 Christians

 A new trend popped up in the media this week. Someone coined the term "Matthew 25 Christians," and it gained immediate traction.

Background: MAGA Christians

The term "Matthew 25 Christians" was created by someone trying to differentiate between MAGA Christians and true Christians. A MAGA Christian believes in a Christianity that promotes equality, peace, love, charity, and religious freedom -- but only if you're a white, Protestant American, born and living in the USA, and of western European ancestry. Even Jesus Christ himself wouldn't qualify to be a Christian under this definition.

Closely related to MAGA Christianity is Christian Nationalism, which title claims two pieces of virtue that it does not deserve. Christian Nationalism is the belief that the USA was founded on Christian principles, as a Christian nation, and that that makes it a special nation among all the nations of the world. (Parenthetical comment: other ideologies also have this belief. But they don't turn it into a blunt weapon like Christian Nationalism does.) Christian Nationalists wish to force their beliefs onto everyone in the USA, through laws, regulations, and physical enforcement. 

If the two overlapping groups, MAGA Christians and Christian Nationalists, have their way, then the country will be run by an American Taliban, indistinguishable from the despots currently oppressing Afghanistan, Iran, and other nations under the color of religion.

Much of this is being driven by evangelical Christians, whose professed beliefs are often so far removed from true Christianity as to be unrecognizable. And the evangelicals are the best at setting themselves up to judge who is and isn't Christian.

(To be fair: It's not just the evangelicals. Every single slice of Christianity is expert at judging and condemning their fellow Christians, putting themselves with the sheep and everyone else with the goats, arrogating the authority of Him Whose Right It Is To Judge. But if my own children's high school experience is any indicator, the evangelicals are the worst offenders. If you are an evangelical Christian, and you object to this characterization, then show it to me by the way you live. See By Their Fruits, below.)

The Quiet Rise of the Matthew 25 Christians

The people who coined the term "Matthew 25 Christians" were pointing out the wide divide between true Christianity and MAGA Christianity.

In the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25, Jesus gives the great parable about separating the sheep (his followers) from the goats (everybody else) at his Second Coming. The whole parable is summarized in verse 40: "And the King shall answer and say unto them, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

MAGA Christianity denies aid to the poor, sanctuary to the immigrant, health care to the sick, and kindness to the prisoner, actions that Jesus specifically calls out in this parable. He condemns those who practice MAGA Christianity with this counterpoint in verse 45: "Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these, ye did it not unto me."

More and more Christians are standing up and denouncing MAGA Christianity. They are finally saying, "That's not who I am. That's not what I believe."

"But, but --" the MAGAs Protest

During the 2012 elections, evangelical Christians mobilized and became a potent political power. Their leaders became kingmakers. One evangelical leader was interviewed on the radio, and he was condemning certain political candidates for not being Christian, and therefore, of course, unworthy to hold public office.

The interviewer asked him what constitutes a Christian.

"One who believes in the Bible."

The interviewer pointed out that nearly everyone calling themselves a Christian believes in the Bible.

"Well then, one who believes in my Bible."

Not a word about believing in the person, Jesus Christ. Not a word about believing that He was the Son of God. Not a word about believing in His divine mission. Not a word about knowing what is written in the Bible and putting it into practice in their daily lives.

This has been carried to extremes in the last three years. To a MAGA Christian, you are only a Christian if you hold the same political views that they hold, if you agree with their "othering" of the American population, and if you agree with the supremacy of white, Protestant, natural-born American citizens over everyone else.

Nothing in there about their namesake, Jesus Christ.

How to Tell the Difference

The easiest way to tell the difference between the MAGA Christians and the Matthew 25 Christians is to use Jesus' own Sermon on the Mount as a yardstick. This sermon, the greatest guide on true Christian living, is found in chapters 5 through 7 of the Gospel of Matthew.

"Lord, Lord"

In chapter 7, Jesus himself warned: "Not everyone that says to me, 'Lord, Lord' will get into the kingdom of heaven." He told of those who would plead with, "Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? And in our name cast out devils? And in your name done might works?" 

He told them that he would say, "I never knew you; get away from me, you who work iniquity."

About Public Displays of Christianity

One of the most insidious things in today's world is the rise of performative Christianity. Once confined to gatherings like church camps, rallies, and jamborees, now Christian "influencers" have a louder and louder voice, through TikTok, Instagram, podcasts, and other social media. All of this "influence" draws people away from true Christianity and closer to the extreme, damaging positions espoused by MAGA and Christian Nationalists.

Jesus warned about these types in chapter 6, when he said: "Moreover, when you do your alms, don't sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the churches and in the streets, so that they can receive the glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward."

They do good because they want the public praise and adulation -- and, in 2026, Likes and followers. That is their reward. As far as Jesus is concerned, that's all they get.

"But," He continued, "when YOU do alms, let not your right hand know what your left hand is doing: that your alms may be seen in secret, and your Father who sees in secret shall reward you openly."

By Their Fruits

Again in chapter 7 of Matthew, Jesus himself tells how you can tell the difference between a MAGA Christian and a Matthew 25 Christian: "You shall know them by their fruits."

Whose words and deeds correspond more closely to the deeds and the teachings of the Master?

Whose life more closely follows the admonition, "Follow me, and do the things that you have seen me do"?

Who spreads out their hands and echoes the Master's invitation, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest?" 

Who is brave enough to tell someone who lives a lifestyle different from theirs, "Neither do I condemn thee"?

Who emulates the Master by simply "[going] about doing good?"

No, way too many of us are on the wrong side of Jesus's warning from Matthew chapter 6: "Judge not, that you be not judged." And especially the MAGA Christians. They have everyone judged, condemned, marginalized, disenfranchised, and in many cases deported. That's so much easier to do.

Pure Religion and Undefiled

Jesus' apostle James wrote this in his tiny part of the Bible: "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." I submit that this is only a tiny slice of true Christianity, but MAGA Christians can't even do this part.

"You must choose. But choose wisely."

The old knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade said these words: "You must choose. But choose wisely."

So, which one are you going to be? A goat, or a sheep? A MAGA Christian? A Christian Nationalist? Or a Matthew 25 Christian? You must choose. Choose wisely.

Choose wisely.

Tracing the Depew lineage: how far back can we go?

For years, my Depew ancestry was stuck at 1850, with Joseph Depew in Montrose, Iowa. Joseph and his wife, Wealthy Elmer, had migrated with the Mormons to Nauvoo, Illinois, and had settled in Montrose, just across the Mississippi River from Nauvoo. Family legend was that, when the family was packing up to leave Montrose and head west with the Saints, Joseph was nowhere to be found. Wealthy and her sons were in her parents’ wagon, ready to move out, when Joseph showed up drunk. He yelled that no wife of his was going west with the Mormons, and pulled her off the wagon. Her father got the horses moving, the wagon started rolling, and Joseph couldn’t stop it. So Joseph and Wealthy stayed behind while their boys went to Payson, where they were raised by their grandparents.

The oldest record of Joseph Depew was an 1850 census record, saying that he was born “about 1800” in “Pennsylvania.”

My brother, Craig Depew, has done a lot of digging over the years, and we think that Joseph’s reputation has been rehabilitated. He may or may not have been the town drunk, but he did move west with his family. He never made it to Utah. Both Joseph and Wealthy died of illness in Winter Quarters, Nebraska. Their sons did go to Payson, where they were raised by their grandparents.

Uncle Craig also found that Joseph was descended from Nicolas DuPuy, a Dutch immigrant who arrived in New Amsterdam (now New York) in the 1663. Nicolas was born in Holland in 1627.

Further digging gets us tangled up with questionable sources, including a French historian named Louis Moréri, who never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

If Moréri is to be believed, Nicolas’ lineage can be traced from Holland to France, where the DuPuy family were knights and noblemen, originally from the Dauphiné region of southeastern France. They converted to the Huguenot religion, which put them at odds with the Catholic church and the French king, and eventually made them outcasts. That’s why they fled to Holland, and from there to the New World.

In the Dauphiné, Hugues DuPuy was born in 1055, in Peyrins, France. He and his three sons went to the Holy Land with the First Crusade, and acquitted themselves well. One of his three sons, Raymond DuPuy, was the “second Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller, of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.” He was a Big Cheese. No, I’m not named after him. And no, I’m not descended from him.

If you go back further, and if Moréri can be believed, Hugues was the son of Raphael de Podio, who was born in 1011 in Lucca, Tuscany, Italy. (Italy!) He was a military commander and the Grand Chamberlain of Conrad II, the Holy Roman Emperor. Conrad gave Raphael a governorship in the Dauphiné, so he moved to Peyrins and Frenchified his last name to DuPuy.

Both “DuPuy” and “de Podio” translate literally to “of (or from) the podium,” but can also be translated to “of (or from) the heights.” Many French geographical names include “Puy” in reference to a hill, a ridge, or another high place.

Raphael himself was a descendant of Norman Anglie de Podio, born in A.D. 905. Norm was the first to bear the “de Podio” surname, his father being named Adminius Amélius Simplicius. It would be really great if we could say that the Depew family line goes all the way back to Norm, in A.D. 905.

Norman’s name is dangerously anachronistic, and I have a couple of problems with it.

First, the term “Norman” meant “Northman” or “Norseman.” Originally, it referred to the Vikings, the Scandinavian raiders that terrorized Europe and Britain for a century or more. The term wasn’t generally used until after Norm was born. The earliest it could have been used is A.D. 911. That’s when king Charles III of France and the Viking leader Rollo signed a treaty, giving Rollo and his people the land that is now called Normandy, in exchange for no longer raiding the rest of France. Over time, Rollo’s people became known as “Normans.” But that began in 911, and our man Norm was born in 905.

Second, the middle name “Anglie,” or “Anglo saxony” as one source renders it, refers to two Germanic tribes, the Angles and the Saxons, who invaded the island of Britain in the 5th Century, and by A.D. 899 were united in one kingdom under Alfred the Great. The year 899 is when Alfred the great died.

Our man Norm was born in 905. The term “Norman” didn’t exist until after 911. And the term “Anglo Saxon” referred to a people on an island all the way on the other side of the continent, a people that didn’t exist as a unified people until 899. I will state plainly that I think someone in a later century made up the name “Norman Anglie”, and they may have even made up the person.

To complicate things even further, it looks like the Amelii line is from southwestern France, near the Pyrenees and Spain. While Moréri has been quick to connect the Ameliis in the southwest with the de Podios in the southeast (and in Italy!), other reputable historians have not been able to confirm that connection, and there is considerable arguing between the two factions.

So, depending on how much you believe, we can trace our Depew lineage back to Joseph in 1850, Nicholas in 1627, Hugues in 1055, or Norman in 905. 

"Other" and "Othering"

"Other" is a powerful weapon. It's a cruel weapon.

"Other" allows us to divide the world into two groups: people who are like us, and people who aren't like us.

We can then marginalize the "other" group. We can ignore them. We can resent them. We can fear them, and hate them, whoever they are. When you "other" someone, you can feel justified in mistreating them, excluding them, denying them respect, denying them basic humanity. You can feel justified in bullying them, hurting them or casting them out.

"Othering" someone lets you assign a label to them, to make them easier to identify because of their "otherness." Often, the label acquires a pejorative connotation, if it didn't have one to start with. "Others" become "extremists," "terrorists," "criminals," "undesirables."

It's easy to generalize about an entire population of "others" based on the public actions of one or more bad actors. But it's just as easy to justify or rationalize the bad actors in our own group, the population of people like us, and to say "the rest of us aren't like that." That's called the Fundamental Attribution Error. More about that in another post.

If we succeed in getting rid of all the "others," if we end up with a population that is just like us, then we end up in a bland, boring world. We end up with a plate of plain, white rice. Every day. For every meal. BORING.

I used to attend a regular weekly meeting (high priests group; if you know you know) where everyone thought the same thoughts and said the same things, all the time, week after week. Saying something different was, um, not well received. I finally started finding excuses to skip the meetings. I would rather pull the veins out of my forearm with a fork than sit through that again.

The fact that we are not all the same should make us stronger and more united, not weaker and less united. Granite is made of four different minerals, none of them as strong in their pure form as when they are combined in granite.

Our differences are what make life interesting. A smarter man than me once sang:

    Rejoicing in the differences, there's no one just like me
    Yet as different as we are, we're still the same.

We need to recognize that we are all children of the same God. He loves us equally, and therefore we should love each other equally. When we truly understand this, the "other" designations melt away. Rather than building walls, or fences, or detention/isolation centers, we should be building bridges. Remember, we are stronger together. 

Oh Please, Not an AI Music Composer

A Hamilton player piano:
 an old-fashioned music machine.

Facebook just fed me an advertisement for an AI music composer -- an AI engine that will write music for you. Does nobody remember George Orwell's 1984? In that dystopian novel, all of the pop music was written by computers. It was glurge that appealed to the masses, and pacified them, but it was emphatically not high art.

So far, I'm not all that impressed with AI. I know it's "the future," and I know "the future is now," but frankly, the way most humans wield AI is clumsy and talentless. We are excited about the sloppy software, and B-grade graphics that people have generated using AI. And we've read story after story about people using AI to make resumes, term papers, book reports, newspaper articles, speeches, and even legal briefs -- all of them marred by sloppy logic, inaccurate "facts" and analyses, made-up references, and so on.

If AI music promises to be of the same quality as the rest of this garbage, then I will only listen to musc created before 2025, thankyouverymuch.

To be clear, ultimately it's not the AI engine or Large Language Model (LLM) that's the problem. The AI is just a tool. The problem lies with the human using the tool.

Most of you are too young to remember the original Apple Macintosh computer. It was released in 1984 -- gasp okay, that's ironic. Anyway, the Mac came with a suite of software including a desktop publishing program called Aldus PageMaker. This was really putting power in the hands of the people. Suddenly, any idiot could be a desktop publisher.

And do you know what? Every idiot became a desktop publisher. The world was papered with ugly, lousy, amateur posters and newsletters and banners. You could spot a PageMaker document a mile away, not because of any defects in the software, but because of the human who had used PageMaker with all the skill of a lefthanded troll to create such an ugly document.

Now we're seeing the same misuse of AI. We're already seeing the PageMaker-quality output in words, in images, and in video. Are you ready to hear it in music? With AI, any idiot can become a composer.

I read today that composer John Williams has just finished writing a piano concerto. The man is 93 years old. He has a lifetime of talent and experience behind him. AI music may be able to imitate his compositions, but it will never match his genius or the quality of his work. There is no shortcut to that kind of quality.

About Energy Drinks

Two disclaimers, right up front

First, let's get this out of the way: Drinking caffeinated drinks excessively or habitually is not good for your health. It puts unnecessary stress on your heart. It is addictive. Having acknowledged that, let's move on.

Second, because you will start wondering: This may end up sounding like a sales pitch. Remember, I don't do that. I do make some recommendations. You're free to follow them or not. Think of this more like Consumer Reports than advertising copy.

Get on with it, already

I made a conscious decision, over ten years ago, to start every day with an energy drink. My reasoning back then was sound. I won't give you my justifications here. They're irrelevant. But, being a good engineer, I did a comprehensive study of energy drinks before I started. What follows is based on the results of my study, and twelve years of experience.

In modern society, we don't get enough sleep, we deal with too much stress during the day, and we end up being constantly fatigued. We try to combat the fatigue by taking artificial stimulants. The most common stimulant in the USA is coffee. It is legal, it is socially acceptable, and it can range anywhere from a plain cup of instant coffee in the kitchen, to an artisanal brew from a coffee house — Starbucks being the modern archetype.

I don't like the taste of coffee. I don't drink it. But the energy boost cannot be denied. Caffeine is the ingredient in coffee that gives you the boost.

Caffeine can be easily manufactured and added to so many other consumables. Caffeinated sodas are a prime example. There's just enough caffeine in a 12-ounce can to give you a decent buzz. Drinking more soda gives you more buzz. But sometimes that's not enough.

Energy drinks are formulated solely to give you that buzz: an unambiguous, artificial energy boost. The two main energy-boosting ingredients are sugar and caffeine. Everything else is just snake oil.

The amounts of sugar and caffeine vary from product to product. Let's talk about caffeine first.

Caffeine

If you read the labels carefully, you will find that a can of energy drink delivers anywhere from 120 mg to 350 mg of caffeine. This compares to 96-195 mg for an 8-ounce cup of coffee, or 34 mg for a 12-ounce Coca-Cola.

The FDA recommends that you not consume more than 400 mg of caffeine in a day. That's if you're a grown adult, and not pregnant or planning to become pregnant. 

Slamming a can of energy drink can have disastrous consequences — no, that's too strong a word. Adverse consequences. Dumping that much caffeine in your system at once can cause a pounding headache, vision problems, a racing heart, and trembling or jerky limbs. It can also temporarily affect your emotions or personality, and not in a good way. So if you're going to drink an energy drink, you need to learn to nurse the drink.

Caffeine has a half-life of about 5 hours. That means, if you consume 300 mg of caffeine, 150 mg of it will still be in your body 5 hours later, 75 mg will still be there after 10 hours, and 38 mg will still be there after 15 hours. Remember, Coke has 34 mg of caffeine, so 15 hours after you slam a 300-mg energy drink, you will still have as much caffeine in you as if you had just drunk a Coke.

But if you stretch out that 300-mg drink, and take an hour or longer to finish it, then your caffeine levels at any moment will be lower and more reasonable.

Take small sips. Okay, maybe one guzzle if it's really refreshing, but mostly small sips. See how long you can stretch out the drink.

Sugar

Although we love our sugar, it has a whole list of undeniable health hazards, chief among which are weight gain and risk of diabetes. I would put tooth decay up there as well.

Coffee doesn't have any sugar in it, unless you add it yourself. But if you don't add sugar, coffee tastes like mud — burnt mud. 

Back to our can of Coke, a good benchmark: a 12-ounce can of Coca-Cola has 39 grams of sugar. Most energy drinks contain that much sugar, or more, with some going as high as 56 g.

How much is a gram of sugar? Well, a level teaspoon of sugar is 4 grams, and a heaped teaspoon is 7.5 grams. 50 g of sugar is 12 teaspoons. Four tablespoons. An entire quarter cup of sugar in your glass. That's crunchy!

Most energy drinks go cheap and use high-fructose corn sweetener in place of the cane sugar that we love so much.

Many energy-drink makers, recognizing that consumers are looking out for their health (HAHAHAHA) and trying to avoid sugar, replace sugar with sugar substitutes. Sometimes they are successful at making the drink taste good, but more often they make the energy drink taste like a chemical formula.

Choosing an Energy Drink, Then

I wanted an energy drink with the following characteristics:

• Tastes good
• Sweetened with real sugar, but not too much
• Not too high in calories
• Caffeine content 150 mg or less

I ended up settling on Bing energy drinks. Bing is made with real fruit juices, and not just a tiny amount. Each flavor of Bing has at least 5% real fruit juice. No other energy drink has any fruit juice. For comparison, Italian orange soda contains at least 12% orange juice, by law. That's the only carbonated drink I can think of with more fruit juice than Bing.

It only has 5 to 6 grams of sugar! Compare that to all of the other drinks we've discussed! Most of the sugar content in Bing is from the juices, although some flavors add 1 to 2 grams of real cane sugar. The caffeine content is on the low end of the scale, at 120 mg per 12-ounce can.

Bing contains other additives purported to boost energy, like taurine and ginseng. You can ignore these. The sugar and the caffeine are what really matter.

Bing energy drinks are also fortified with additional vitamins. I smile at this: healthy energy drinks! I'm not complaining, though. They have more vitamins than other energy drinks. Coffee and Coca-Cola have zero vitamins.

I was fortunate to live in Colorado while doing my research. Bing Beverage Company is a Colorado company, without the massive national/international reach of Rockstar, Monster, or Red Bull. It doesn't even show up in the lists of top-selling energy drinks on the Web. I might not have discovered Bing if I were living somewhere else.

Flavors of Bing

The Bing beverage company keeps the size of its product line intentionally small. They don't need the dozens of variations that Red Bull and Monster have.

Bing's product line in 2025

Here's a quick overview of the flavors, in order of discovery.

The original Bing

Bing cherry is the original flavor. This is the one that was invented in Denver, Colorado in 2006, formulated from a locally-produced black Bing cherry cider. It's still the best, and it's the flavor that hooked me on the brand — but see Black, below.

Bing Black

This is the second flavor they came up with. Bing Black is a blend of blackberry and cherry juice. For my tastes, this one is tied with the original. Sometimes I prefer Black over cherry, because it's not as sweet as the original and is slightly tart.

Bing Raz

This is a delicious raspberry-cherry blend. It's not as available as the cherry or the Black, but if you can find it, it's good.

Bing Crisp

When I first drank this, I was disappointed. I think my taste buds were expecting a caffeinated version of Martinelli's Sparkling Cider. But it's an apple-cherry blend. The cherry takes the edge off the apple, and my taste buds weren't expecting that.

However, upon further review, it's delicious. If you want something calm and understated, Crisp is the way to go.

Bing Blu (renamed Bing Blueberry)

This one is daring  — and it's delightful.

This flavor was a real surprise. There's no cherry in it at all. It's a blend of blueberry and boysenberry, two fruits you don't usually find in the soft-drink aisle. Your taste buds are not accustomed to these flavors in a drink, and so your first taste of it may be a little off-putting. Be persistent. Stick with it until you have finished that first can. I promise, you will come back for more.

Bing changed the name from Blu to Blueberry, sometime between June and November 2025. It still tastes good.

Bing Citrus

This is their most recent addition. Last summer, I suggested to the Bing Beverage Company that they consider a cherry limeade, perhaps as a limited-edition summertime drink. I mean, who doesn't drive through Sonic just to get a cherry limeade, right? Or better yet, a cherry limeade slush?

So Bing created a cherry limeade, but they added a bit of grapefruit, just to make it unique. It was a big success. On a hot summer day, the tangy Bing Citrus just hits the spot. Mix it with ginger beer and a sprig of mint, and you have a nice approximation of a Moscow Mule.

Where to Buy It

If you're in Colorado, you're in luck. Bing is a made-in-Colorado product, and so it's available nearly everywhere. You can find it at King Soopers, at Safeway, and sometimes at Whole Foods. Ironically, KS doesn't stock Citrus, and Safeway doesn't stock Raz, so you have to go to both stores to get all of the flavors.

At KS, you'd best go early in the morning. By afternoon, the shelves are empty. People in Colorado love their Bing. Safeway, for some reason, is better at keeping their stock up, although they do sell out of the more popular flavors.

Outside of Colorado, you will need to rely on the store locator at https://bingbeverage.com/retailer-locator/. The locator isn't always up to date, and the further you get from Colorado, the more likely the stores are to run out of Bing and not replenish it right away. Outside of Colorado, look for a small selection of Bing on the bottom shelf in the energy-drinks section.

In Colorado, Bing has pride of place, at eye level on the shelf. In some stores, because of its 5% fruit juice content, you can find it in the produce section. And if you're really lucky, you can find chilled cans in the produce coolers, next to the pomegranate juice and apricot nectar.

Alternatives to Bing

If you can't find Bing, then I suggest that you read the labels on the 12-ounce energy drinks. You're looking for something with less than 40 calories, with real sugar, and with 120 to 150 mg of caffeine. Here's a good online resource for both calories and caffeine content: Caffeine Informer.

One acceptable substitute is Alani Nu energy drinks. They come in a wide variety of very creative flavors. Some are weird, but they taste good. Their caffeine content is almost double Bing's, at 200 mg.

If you're in Canada, look for Guru energy drinks. Sweetened with real cane sugar, 140 mg caffeine, only 25 calories. They're made in Canada, and every flavor I've tasted (so far) is yummy.

Zevia is an energy drink sweetened with stevia, not sugar. That means it has zero calories. It doesn't contain any juice, but it has only 120 mg of caffeine. Some people think it tastes good.

If I have to choose a mainstream energy drink, my preference is Monster Energy Lo-Carb, the blue one. It has only 30 calories and 140 mg of caffeine in a 16-ounce can. In my opinion, all Monster drinks taste like chemical formulas, but this one is okay.

In a pinch, you can drink Celsius. Celsius has become the third largest-selling energy drink in the USA, after Red Bull and Monster. A 12-ounce can contains 200 mg, same as Alani Nu and almost twice what Bing has. But every Celsius I've had tastes like a chemical formula — every single one. And, to be honest, the ingredient list on the can reads like a chemical formula as well.

Potholes! A new video game idea.

We're visiting our daughter and her family in Kansas City this week. We have been visiting, on and off, since last August. While we've been driving around this week, it has been obvious that the roads around here had a hard winter: potholes, potholes everywhere.

Potholes, potholes, everywhere!

Map of potholes in Kansas city

While attempting to dodge the potholes, I got an idea for a great new video game. I'm going to call it "Potholes!". With the exclamation point.

Here's the basic idea

The premise is simple. It's a first-person point-of-view driving game. You are in the driver's seat, looking through the windshield as the road scrolls towards you. This should be easy to do in a 2D game engine, like Defold or Godot.

As you drive along, potholes appear in the road. Each time you hit a pothole, you register some degree of damage. The larger the pothole, the greater the damage. When your damage reaches a critical point, your car falls apart, right there in the middle of the road. (Use a cut scene for this.)

Scoring

Your car has an odometer. Your score is how far you can get before your car falls apart.

Details of operation

The point is to dodge the potholes. You can drive around them, or you can straddle them. Damage occurs when your tires hit the potholes.

You get an animated "bump-bump" when you hit a pothole. The larger the pothole, the larger the bump.

You can dodge into the oncoming lane, but if you collide with oncoming traffic, you crash, obviously. (Use a different cut scene for this.)

There is a rare, giant, car-eating pothole. When you drive into it, your car disappears, as you can imagine. This one gets a Warner Brothers Cartoons style cut scene, where you see the car drive out into thin air and then drop straight down, leaving a puff of dust at ground level.

Enhancements

Day and night. At night, you have wimpy headlights that may or may not catch all the potholes. 

The headlights occasionally flicker, often at just the wrong time. If this is too annoying and spoils the game, I will drop it.

Fog! Potholes are invisible, until you're almost on top of them. Maybe I should add heavy fog, where the potholes are completely invisible.

Degrees of difficulty

• Easy: slow speed, few potholes (This will be the original game)
• Medium: higher speed, more potholes
• Hard: highest speed, lots of potholes, but density will vary at random

Steal this idea! It is NOT copyrighted.

Feel free to steal my idea and make it your own. Feel free to sell your game and get rich from it! Maybe just acknowledge me in the credits.

Cory Booker shines again

Cory Booker just finished giving a 25 hour, 5 minute, speech on the floor of the U. S. Senate, speaking in opposition to Donald Trump's policies and executive actions. The black man broke the previous record of 24 hours, 18 minutes, set by white segregationist Strom Thurmond in 1957, speaking in opposition to the Civil Rights Act.

 In 2019, Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) threw his hat into the 2020 presidential ring. He was impressive at the time, although he didn't get very far in the competition. He sat out the 2024 election, in deference to Joe Biden and then to Kamala Harris when Biden dropped out of the race.

It's a much different world today. Biden won in 2020, Harris lost in 2024, and we're all watching as Trump and his minions run roughshod over American institutions, in a clumsy yet brutal attempt to remake the USA into the Germany of the late 1930s.

The Democrats were so thoroughly defeated in 2024 that they still haven't recovered. They do not have a champion, a leader, someone with the charisma of Bill Clinton or Barack Obama to show them the way out of their wilderness. The Republicans in Congress, in the courts, and in most of the states, will not oppose Trump, and the Democrats are in every way too weak to oppose them.

I was mildly optimistic about Booker in 2019. He was certainly a better alternative than Hillary Clinton. But maybe now is his time to stand up, take on the mantle of leadership, unite the Democrats, and do something effective to oppose Trump. It's been five months since the election, three and a half months since the inauguration, and we have around three years to go until the next presidential election -- that is, if we get to have one.

Democrats need to unite behind somebody. Booker just showed that he may be the man for the job this time.