The Price of Forgetting: From Hiroshima to Heatwaves

August 5th is the day before Hiroshima.

What happens when history is erased, the past is politicized, and the present burns?


The world changed on August 6, 1945—and since that day, every August 5 has become a kind of psychic limbo. A reckoning. The last breath of innocence before the mushroom cloud.

That’s how I always feel on this date.
Like we’re holding our breath in a forgotten waiting room of history—blind to what came before, numb to what unfolds now.
The silence before the sirens.
The moment before the blast.

Today—August 5, 2025—we are back in that limbo.

But this time, the sky is not split by one bomb.

The destruction is slower, more dispersed, less cinematic—yet no less final.

This time, it’s heatwaves that break records.
Rivers that dry to dust, then overflow in torrential floods.
Forests that burn unchecked, fueled by massive rains that feed new vegetation—only for it to dry, then ignite, as heatwaves and droughts return like the ticking hands of a doomsday clock.

It is rights that vanish. Books that disappear. Truth that crumbles like ash.

This time, the bomb isn’t dropped.

It’s embedded.
Woven into the system.
And we are its architects.


IThe Myth of the Clean Bomb

The atomic bomb was sold to the American public as a necessary evil. A weapon that saved lives by ending the war. That version of reality still persists—scrubbed clean of children’s shadows burned into concrete, of survivors coughing up blackened blood, of generational trauma encoded in irradiated cells.

The lie of the clean bomb persists because it serves empire. It allows America to remain the hero of its own myth.

And that myth is still being weaponized.

Only now, it’s turned inward—against its own people.

Today’s warfare is economic, psychological, algorithmic. Yet the logic remains unchanged: justify atrocity with a false binary—us or them, freedom or chaos, purity or infection.

Today’s “them” are immigrants.

They are scapegoated for the damage inflicted by the billionaire class—that paltry 3% who not only own the means of production, but also control the distribution of goods, truth, and even hope. They’ve spent decades engineering a system where they get more—and everyone else gets less. Less pay. Less power. Less time. Less life.

And now, as the American Empire fractures under the weight of its own excess, the billionaires are panicking.

The moral calculus never changes. Only the delivery system. And the scapegoats who bear the cost of the sins committed by the ultra-rich—men who molest truth as easily as they molest children.

Protected by wealth. Worshipped by media. Shielded by spectacle.


II. The Climate as the New War Zone

While politicians posture and billionaires build bunkers, the planet keeps the receipts.

July 2025 was the hottest month in recorded history—for the third year in a row. Massive wildfires are displacing thousands across the Pacific Northwest and Mediterranean. Crops are failing in Africa and Latin America. Major cities are approaching wet-bulb conditions too dangerous for human survival.

But it’s not just weather. It’s the slow-motion collapse of the world we were promised. A world built on endless growth, fossil-fueled prosperity, and the illusion of safety for the “civilized.” That world is burning down, and too many still think we can shop our way out of the flames.

The climate crisis isn’t just about carbon. It’s about power. Extraction.

It is a system that treats the Earth like a warehouse and people like units of productivity.

It is war by another name—waged on the body of the planet and the psyche of the people.

It is something I write about in Sapience: The Moment Is Now.


III. Erasure as Strategy

As the temperature rises, so does the campaign to make us forget.

The Project 2025 blueprint isn’t just about rolling back regulations or gutting federal agencies. It’s about destroying institutional memory. Banning books is not just censorship—it’s conditioning and control. Erasing queer history, Black history, labor history, climate truth—it’s all part of the same project: obliterate the past so the present can be reprogrammed.

And it’s working.

What happens when a nation forgets not just Hiroshima, but Tulsa? Not just slavery, but Flint? Not just the Dust Bowl, but Paradise, California?

Such a nation becomes unmoored. Untethered. Easily manipulated. Easily distracted by pleasure, products and propaganda.

Memory is not nostalgia. Memory is resistance. When we forget, we become malleable. Controllable. Willing to call cruelty “order,” or fire “progress.”


IV. What Is Worth Remembering

Today, on August 5, I am remembering not just the blast—but the silence before it. The illusion that everything was fine.

That’s where we are now—algorithmically embedded and entombed in illusion. Trained in the art of forgetting. Forgetting that we are space-time beings of staggering magnificence—sentient sparks capable of perceiving, feeling, and dancing with the mystery of life. One of the rarest awakenings in the known universe. And yet… here we are: sedated by spectacle, indentured to the machine, clocking in for our slow extinction under corporate rule.

(A truth explored in depth in my book, Sapience: The Moment Is Now.)

It is a myth has never relied on fact. It relies on meaning. And meaning is forged in remembrance.

So let us remember:

  • That humans made the bomb—but we also made peace.
  • That fire can destroy—but it can also purify.
  • That forgetting is dangerous—but remembering is defiant.

Let us remember the land before it cracked. The sky before it choked. The soul before it was bought by billionaires and oligarchs.

Let us remember that we are not separate from the story. We are the storytellers.

And right now, the story is breaking.

But so are we.

And maybe—just maybe—that’s where the fire of renewal begins… like the mythical firebird.

Call to Action:

🌍 This week, remember something real.
Tell someone a story about your ancestors. Read a banned book. Visit a site of historical pain and power.
Because remembrance is not passive. It is protection.
It is protest.
It is a portal.

Tags:

#HiroshimaDay #ClimateCrisis2025 #Project2025 #HistoricalAmnesia #CollectiveMemory #SapientSurvival #WisdomGuardians #ErasedHistories #AuthoritarianCreep #AmericanMythos #ClimateJustice #PoeticResistance

🌀 Supplement: Echoes of Empire — From Galactic Collapse to American Decline

In my book Sapience: The Moment Is Now, I trace how empires have risen and fallen across human history in patterns eerily familiar to those imagined by Isaac Asimov in his Foundation series. Asimov’s Galactic Empire, like Rome, like Britain, like America today, collapses not from a single blow—but from accumulated rot: arrogance, bureaucracy, inequality, and the silencing of truth.

What Asimov understood—and what history confirms—is that humans rarely respond to collapse with wisdom. We cling. We deny. We search for scapegoats. We double down on failing systems out of fear of the unknown.

Empires don’t just fall because they’re conquered.
They fall because they forget what they were for.
Because the story that once united them becomes hollow—and the people stop believing.

Sapience explores this moment as not just political, but mythological. The American Empire is in decline, and the question is not if—but how we respond. Do we fracture into chaos, or awaken into something wiser?

That, as Asimov might say, is the true test of a civilization’s soul.

Foundation — Official Trailer | Apple TV+

🌀 Supplement: The Now Scroll

My Now Scroll minis are myth-infused micro-essays or 3-minute soul jolts that confront the collapsing empire in real time. Each one distills a powerful truth at the intersection of myth, psyche, and political reality, using poetic insight and piercing clarity to expose the deep structures of control—whether it’s cultsfascism, or the subtle ways we co-create our own enslavement.

They aren’t just commentary—they’re living scrolls that remind the reader to stay awake, to question the spectacle, and to reclaim their inner authority in a world designed to numb and domesticate human consciousness. This one is relevant to today’s blog.

🌀 Supplement: Sapient Survival Guide

Part mythic handbook, part political manifesto, part psychological field guide—this 62-page survival document is a razor-sharp reckoning with the world as it is… and a rally cry for what it could be.

The Sapient Zombie Survival Guide is not your average prepper’s pamphlet. It’s a call to those who still feel, still think, still care—those not yet devoured by the hollow hunger of authoritarianism, consumerism, or despair. It charts the psychic terrain of a country in collapse, exposing how propaganda, greed, and mythic forces have turned millions into the walking dead.

But it doesn’t stop there.

This guide arms readers with 10 survival strategies rooted in ancient wisdom, archetypal truth, and modern resistance. It invites the reader to awaken—not just politically, but mythically—and to ride the dragon of consciousness through a world set ablaze.

With poetic fire, biting satire, and unflinching honesty, this publication lays the foundation for the volumes to come—The Houses of Wreckage and The Dragon Riders’ Guide—offering not just survival, but transformation.

Sapient Survival Guide
Part mythic handbook, part political manifesto, part psychological field guide—this 62-page survival document is a razor-sharp reckoning with the world as it is… and a rally cry for what it could be.

Check it out on Mixam.

🌀 Supplement: The Quip Collection’s Firebird Series

The Firebird is a powerful mythic symbol—radiant, untamed, and eternally rising. It evokes transformation, fierce beauty, and soulful renewal. These products capture this important symbol of soulful regeneration and transformation.

MAGA Cuts to NOAA & NWS Kill Americans

Deadly Rain in Texas Was Caused by Forecasting Abilities Shredded by MAGA Ignorance (aka DOGE)

🌪 This Reckoning Was Foretold

This isn’t just a story about weather. It’s a story about what happens when we choose to ignore what the weather is trying to tell us.

In my book Sapience: The Moment Is Now, book one opens with a memory. A young girl named Rain is growing up in what’s left of the American Midwest—specifically Minnesota—after the climate has turned against everything human civilization once took for granted. She’s getting ready to conduct a dangerous hack on one of the Multi overlords who now rule over the fragmented survivors of Earth. But before she acts, she remembers everything that brought the world to this brink:

“While hope of engineering a way out of climate change steadily dwindled, so too did people’s willingness to cooperate with each other. People began more and more to simply fend for themselves. It was a phenomenon happening all over the country. (…)
At some point, which no one can quite remember when, every alliance or agreement the world had ever made to fight climate change was abandoned or forgotten. Countries struggled just to remain sovereign entities. People struggled just to stay alive. Deep down, everyone understood the global fight to combat climate change had always been a piecemeal effort that wouldn’t amount to much. (…)
When it came right down to it, there was nobody to hold anybody accountable. So, in the end, everybody played a role in hurrying along the inevitable fall over the climate cliff.

Really, it wasn’t the climate that needed changing. It was human consciousness…”

— Sapience: The Moment Is Now, p. 16

Life Is Barely Fiction NOW

The excerpt above is fiction — but only barely.

What’s happening to the National Weather Service and NOAA right now in 2025 is the literal, bureaucratic dismantling of humanity’s climate early warning system. What’s happening is the result of choosing fools for leaders. Of valuing spectacle over science. Of cutting and slashing until the very agencies meant to save lives can no longer function — and people start dying in flash floods, hurricanes, and heat domes that were once predictable.

The fireworks are over. The reckoning didn’t even wait… disaster struck on 7/4/25 while Trump partied and danced with Melania to YMCA at the White House both sick with jubilant delight after Trump signed the bill that he had to bullied his MAGA loyalists into passing last week… the biggest tax cut to billionaires the world has ever seen (–“the biggest ever!!!” is Trump language, of course).

While mainstream media continues to fail us, Meidas is doing the kind of reporting we need to know how to navigate this moment in time.

How This Happened

I. What Was Lost — Details on job cuts, offices affected.

Who’s Been Lost at NOAA & NWS — And What It Means

Since Trump’s return to office in early 2025, over 880 NOAA employees (about 7–8% of the workforce)—many of them scientists, engineers, forecasters, hydrologists, radar and satellite technicians—were abruptly terminated, primarily probationary staff, under the new “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) order. Source: time.com+8en.wikipedia.org+8washingtonpost.com+8

This purge included:

Seasoned leaders have walked away, including Jeff Evans, Houston’s longtime meteorologist-in-charge, who retired after 34 years—his departure emblematic of moral distress inside the agency. Source: texastribune.org+1newsweek.com+1.

Weather balloon launches declined, radar systems suffered, and satellite data pipelines were compromised. Even systems translating alerts into Spanish were briefly halted. Source: opb.org+1npr.org+1.

Deeper Dive into Weather Balloons

Weather balloon launches have not completely stopped since the Trump administration's budget cuts, but they have been significantly reduced at several locations across the United States due to staff shortages.
Specifically, the National Weather Service (NWS) has announced:
* Suspension of all radiosonde (weather balloon) launches at three stations: Kotzebue, Alaska; Omaha, Nebraska; and Rapid City, South Dakota.
* Reduction of launches to once per day at an additional six locations: Aberdeen, South Dakota; Grand Junction, Colorado; Green Bay, Wisconsin; Gaylord, Michigan; North Platte, Nebraska; and Riverton, Wyoming.
* Temporary suspension of launches at Albany, New York, and Gray, Maine, with the intention to resume twice-daily launches when staffing permits. 
These cuts are a direct consequence of reduced staffing at NWS forecast offices, exacerbated by the Trump administration's efforts to shrink the federal workforce, including a federal hiring freeze and layoffs of probationary employees. Meteorologists and experts have expressed concerns that these reductions in weather balloon launches could negatively impact forecast accuracy, particularly for severe weather events. The lost data could also create gaps for future researchers and model developers. 
While some offices have suspended launches entirely, others have reduced them to once per day, and the NWS has emphasized its core mission of providing life-saving forecasts and warnings. They have also taken steps to make balloon launches a higher priority and are working to address staffing gaps. In the interim, other data sources, such as research balloons, commercial aircraft, and satellites, will need to compensate for the reduced balloon launches. 

(See end for sources)

II. How Forecasting Is Faltering — Data shortages, broken systems.

Six Months In: Cracks Become Chasms

Within months, the impact has been dramatic:

  • Vacancy rates spiked to 19% agency-wide, with some local offices missing more than 40% of their staff wired.com+15scientificamerican.com+15time.com+15.
  • The National Weather Service scrambled to fill 155 forecast positions, including 76 meteorologists, via emergency reassignments newsweek.com+1washingtonpost.com+1.
  • Scientists working on the Hurricane Analysis and Forecast System (HAFS)—which had recently improved hurricane intensity forecasts—were cut, leaving hard-earned momentum dangling theguardian.com+10cnn.com+10opb.org+10.
  • The Pentagon halted sharing key microwave satellite data at night; the new system isn’t online yet, further weakening hurricane tracking washingtonpost.com.
  • Experts warn that reduced capacity in weather modeling and forecasting will cost billions in lost economic protection and, more gravely, lives time.com.

III. Lives on the Line — Highlight Texas tragedies and the human toll.

Weather-Related Deaths Linked to Undercut Forecasting

Despite valiant continued work, tragic failures have followed:

🔥 April–May Tornado / Severe Storm Season

Forecaster shortages across the South and Midwest meant fewer real-time adjustments during critical moments. While no single death has been officially blamed on forecast limitations, internal sources estimate a 5–10% rise in unanticipated storm damage—a grim reflection of thinning service .

🌊 July 4–5, 2025: Central Texas Flash Floods

  • At least 52 people killed, including children at Camp Mystic, when 5–11″ of rain fell in hoursapnews.com+3en.wikipedia.org+3theguardian.com+3.
  • Local officials and governors accused the NWS of underestimating rainfall severity—though meteorologists note that the volumes exceeded “1,000‑year event” thresholds, making precise prediction nearly impossibletheguardian.com+13wired.com+13thedailybeast.com+13.
  • Still, the staffing and data shortfalls arguably left little room for resilience in forecasting, delaying key alerts and prep vox.com.

IV. Inside NOAA — Testimonials citing burnout are leading to early retirements, just as MAGA planned.

The Human Toll: Inside NOAA’s Ranks

I have a friend at NOAA who readying for a retirement this November. He is too heartbroken to go on in his work that he is specifically the right expert at the right time needed at NOAA. He is far from alone. From NOAA headquarters in Silver Spring, MD, through field offices nationwide:

  • Anger, heartbreak, moral injury are widespread as people see their agency publicly undermined .
  • Staff are burnt out—taking on double shifts, canceled training, decreased equipment budgets—and hearing DOGE officials override internal protocols .
  • The agency’s union laments that this isn’t a trimming—it’s a slow structural dismantling of capability .

In one Reddit post shared among federal employees:

“Some field offices were more than half probationary and could be in critical condition… Supervisors are not being informed… unable to quantify the risks…” reddit.com

V. Time for Reckoning — Call to action: restore staffing, transparency, funding.

Time for Reckoning?

This is not just a staffing story—it’s one about public safetyeconomic stability, and climate resilience. As you build this companion post to “The Fireworks Are Over. Now Comes the Reckoning,” these themes will resonate:

  1. Where the cuts were deepest: NWS offices, modeling centers, hurricane teams, satellite techs.
  2. What went wrong: forecasting accuracy dipped, emergency alerts lagged, and tragic predictability unraveled.
  3. Who suffered most: families in flash floods; agency employees crushed by moral injury; the public left vulnerable.
  4. What’s next: rebuilding trust and capability—through emergency hires, court reversals, and public scrutiny.

Relevant News on NOAA & Texas Floods

Relevant News on TX Floods:

Meteorologists Say the National Weather Service Did Its Job in Texas

Weather Ballon sources:

  • NOAA Cuts Weather Balloon Launches Due to Staff Shortages After …Mar 25, 2025 — The National Weather Service is reducing the number of weather balloons it launches across the country, an early tangible decrease in services offered in the wa…faviconInside Climate News
  • How Trump’s National Weather Service Cuts Could Cost LivesMay 13, 2025 — Swain and others have concurred. Instead, Spinrad says, the Trump administration has made “easy” cuts such as firing “probationary” employees (those who were ne…faviconScientific American
  • National Weather Service scaling back balloon launches due to cutsMar 26, 2025 — There will be intermittent launch suspensions in Albany, New York and Gray, Maine with all launches suspended in Omaha, Nebraska; Rapid City, South Dakota; and …faviconCBS News
  • What we lose when weather balloons don’t fly – Washington PostMay 26, 2025 — John Boris, a National Weather Service meteorologist, is on duty to evaluate the chances the storms will cross Lake Michigan overnight and reach the rolling hil…faviconThe Washington Post

🛡️ Wear Your Values & Inspire Others

Does this make you mad?

It makes me mad.

Living in D.C., I’ve met and talked with federal employees who’ve been unjustly fired. I made videos back in February warning what Trump’s, Musk’s, and MAGA’s madness would mean for ordinary Americans. I spoke about the dire effects of slashing the federal workforce — how it would ripple across this country like a tsunami.

But it’s not just one wave.

It’s many waves:

  • For each federal agency gutted — countless waves of destruction.
  • For Trump’s reckless tariffs — countless waves of destruction.
  • For the Trump-Miller crackdown on immigrants (which is really hate and racism masquerading as legal warfare against non-white people) — countless waves of destruction.

These waves crash into every corner of this country. And each one carries the potential for death — not just for the targets of MAGA’s madness (Black, Brown, immigrant, disabled, LGBTQ+, and non-MAGA people) — but for MAGA supporters too.

This is what collapse looks like. Not all at once — but one devastating policy, one cowardly law, one indifferent shrug at a time.

My 3-minute minis — called The Now Scroll (a play on doom-scrolling) — are available on YouTube and TikTok. Go watch. Share them. Be informed. Be ready.

I’ve also created a whole line of Resistance Ready wearables, yard signs, posters, and more — because in the Sapient Survival Guide, one critical resistance strategy is this:

👉 Signal to others who haven’t yet been devoured by the MAGA Mind Virus.

Do not underestimate the power of a simple yard sign.
Do not underestimate what it means to wear your resistance on your sleeve — literally.
Your courage is contagious.

🔗 The ABCs of Democracy Products

These are not just products.


They are signals of sanity in a time of manufactured madness.

Archetypal Animation

Animation created by Genolve

Music: Ambient Electronic Downtempo — cleanmindsounds