Hans Hoffmann's Blog

I have been in the tech industry for over 30yrs, which has been an amazing run. When I started at Microsoft, the battle was between Word and WordPerfect, between Excel and Lotus123. It seemed so cutting edge at the time and at Microsoft we were young, we were passionate and focused on the fact that we would win. We all believed in the Microsoft mission statement, “A PC on every desktop and in every home”. We were pushing very fast providing upgrades to popular products, pushing the channel to sell and create new products and were focused on new and emerging opportunities. It was fast paced and it was exciting. Every day was an opportunity to learn. We were the future.

One thing that makes tech exciting is that from time to time moments happen that seemingly push the industry forward by ten years. Like you hit the fast forward button and wound up in a different time and space. In these moments it is as if the industry is at the center of a shark feeding frenzy, with every company fighting and praying to survive. But the blood is thick and many companies are swallowed whole, to be digested and never heard from again. These are the moments where possibilities seem endless and how we live our day to day lives is changed. It creates a tidal wave event where you can either hop on and ride the wave or get swept away to sea.

The year 1995 was significant in learning about these tidal shifts. A phenomenal Microsoft Marketing campaign was closing with the launch of Windows 95 and a small Silicon Valley based company called Netscape Communications was about to IPO. The significance of these two events was immense. Microsoft long had had their mission statement, “A PC on every desktop and in every home”. Though it would take a few years eventually this would come to pass, the Microsoft mission statement had been achieved. In my opinion this was one of the greatest mission statements ever. When Windows 95 launched it was one of the biggest product launches ever and fueled a frenzy of buying. The Windows empire was complete and if you did not own a PC at home you soon did as Windows 95 was much sexier than its predecessors. But the launch of Windows 95 was not enough. People were not buying a PC just so they could write Word documents or do complex spreadsheets in Excel a new buzz word was taking flight…the internet. One company signified this entry of a new market opportunity and it was Netscape Communications, led by the “new ” Bill Gates, Marc Andreesson (in all fairness there have been many “new” Bill Gates’ through the years). The reason we have become familiar with “www” was thanks to the work done by Netscape, prior to the world wide web we had technologies like FTP and Gopher, Netscape didn’t event the world wide web but they popularized it and in order to connect to the internet you needed a PC. When Netscape went public, Wall St went crazy…for the next 5 years. We also during this period become acutely of the emotional response of Wall Street. The dotcom boom raised the internet to new heights, it of course would be tempered by the dotcom bust. It a short time everyone seemed to have a PC at home and a dial up connection to the internet

In 2007 another momentous event would occur. This time it was the launch of Apple’s iPhone. It would be Steve Job’s crowning achievement. Prior to the iPhone the mobile experience had been led by Research in Motion (RIM) and their Blackberry device. Charging and not far behind was Microsoft with their Mobile Phone. Microsoft was relying on their tried and true formula, wait until version 3 and we will start to catch and crush our opposition. In this case the focus was Blackberry. Steve Jobs probably looked at the third release strategy with ridicule. He went about building a phone that was leap years ahead of everyone else. He had learned from his experience with Motorola (remember the Motorola Rock?) to know that he did not want to be beholden to device manufactures or the carriers. Like Microsoft Windows 95 Apple did a great job of hyping the iPhone and when it launched in June 2007 it did not disappoint. It was light years ahead of Windows Phone and Blackberry. The first time you used one you used it you had a real internet experience, you had tons of apps you could download, stream video etc…the bottom line it was fun. Within 6 months Windows Phone and Blackberry were dead. Microsoft would dispute this but they had no answer and by the time they had re-architected the OS, purchased Nokia, launched a new phone (which did get great reviews) the market was too far gone. In the meantime an entire iPhone ecosystem had emerged and in addition to the iPhone they launched the iPad. Today most people carry an iPhone (or an Android device..but that is another story). How many times do you see people just staring at the screen of their iPhone while on a bus? in a restaurant? at work? Zombies of their own making.

It is now 2023 and it has been a while since have had a tidal wave moment, where the industry is set to pivot. That is about to change. On January 18, 2023 Microsoft announced the general availability of its OpenAI bot ChatGPT. The commercialization of AI s not new, for the last decade there have been a number of AI startups and AI being incorporated into everything – go shopping on Amazon and offers appear based on your purchase history and interests. Google search, same thing. It often completes your search request before you are done typing. Every vertical market has AI technology. Financial Services, Health Care, Retail etc… Over time this technology will displace more and more workers in the respective verticals. It is inevitable.

ChatGPT is different. It goes beyond traditional AI. Here I will make a distinction. ChatGPT is not Artificial Intelligence it is Artificial General Intelligence. If you go to OpenAI’s website they make the distinction. We are transitioning to a new frontier where we will interact with technology in a fundamentally different way, not that it will necessarily be new, as Hollywood as immortalized this in film for decades, as has literature. A terminal or device where we interact in a more human and conversational level then merely receiving stale links or print outs. The idea of a computerized device being a friend will become a reality in the not so distant future.

In order to make AGI more useful it needs fuel to help it in making decisions, that fuel is data. Companies wanting to build competing technologies will need huge amounts of data. The race is on and has been going on for some time. Some in the tech industry and some in the geopolitical world. Microsoft in this regard was behind Amazon, Google and even Facebook in capturing huge quantities of data. I learned this first hand in a meeting I had at the Redmond campus. But luckily there was one data repository they did have access to; enter OpenAI and the internet. It seems simple in hindsight but makes the most sense. If you are going to tackle AGI then you need a data source that captures as large a variety of data as possible, who knows may this very blog I write will be a data source for AGI (I asked ChatGPT – I am not well known)

Google received a direct hit when Microsoft announced ChatGPT integration in all its tech. It thought it was leading but in my view they got lazy. Similar to what Microsoft went through with Windows Phone, where Microsoft got caught going through the motions rather than focusing on innovation. If you think about search in general what are you doing when we do a search? You are asking a question. In Google land they provide a answer to the right on occasion, quick view of a wiki page, but usually a bunch of helpful (or no so helpful) links you can click on. In ChatGPT the response is an answer in a conversational tone. They can provide an answer in a quick summary format or it your quest greater detail you can do so. The interesting and exciting thing about ChatGPT is interaction you have with the request is on a more personal level..

We are arriving at a point in time where we will be able to actually do the Turing Test, and in time a machine will be thought to be as intelligent as a human (or superior). For those fans of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel “Klara and the Sun”, we may enter the era of the artificial friend. We have already glued our children to their iPhone. We may enter an era where troubled kids turn to tech for conversational comfort. To re-wire a child is not that difficult especially when they are two or three years old. The ancient Greeks thrived in the discussion of the purpose of the human race. We may want to reengage in those discussions, because the disruption heading our way may sweep us out to sea if we don’t.

Good Night and Good Luck

Hans Henrik Hoffmann March 22, 2023

The news these past few weeks have been a bit depressing in Seattle as Amazon annouced it was laying off 18,000 employees and Microsoft followed a couple of weeks later saying it will be laying off 10,000. Google, who has a large presence in Seattle announced they will be laying off 12,000. To be clear not all layoffs are in Seattle, just a little over 3000. It is always hard to take this type of news, especially when people you know are getting let go. The driving force is diving economies, fueled by events beyond any indiviuals control. As humans we are programmed against uncertainty (though I would argue that is when you have great opportunity), it makes people anxious, we do not like that. It takes both a physical toll and mental toll. Lost sleep, stress etc..It is not just Seattle, as the economy dives companies like Goldman Sachs are laying off people. With all the doom and gloom, specifically on tech it is easy to fall prey to dystopian scenarios, but to be clear all is not lost.

It is hard to believe but I have now been over 30yrs in the tech industry and during that time I have now seen several periods of “bust” and econmoic uncertainty. Starting with sitting in a hotel with my wife and 1 yr old child in Sante Fe, New Mexico and watching CNBC as the entire market went bust, including Microsoft stock and my net worth dropping by 50%. The dotcom bubble had burst. The scenario in this one was a overhyped new world order under the guise of the Internet. Honestly the sentiment was not wrong it was just too early for the tech that would eventuallly power the web. The following month would watch many people and companies in a daze as retirenment plans were put on hold, big purchases postponed and too many internet startups went bust. The industry and the time had to do a reset, luckily for many who lost their job in the startup community the big boys were still hiring and many who I had watched leave Microsoft all of a sudden returned.

Looking back on the dotcom “bubble”, there were a number of Wall St gurus hyping stocks that had no real business model (Charles Gasparino’s book “Blood on the Streets” is a excellent source on this topic). Inherently Wall St is a very emotional entity and gets caught up in its own hype quite easily . At that time online trading was fairly new and it brought in a lot of new particpants, who got caught up in the hype. First stop: the tech workforce. It was a crazy time. As a Microsoft employee some of the startups I worked with gave me stock (before Microsoft cut the string on this activity..dang Jeff Raikes). For a brief while I could have sold those stocks at a 150k profit….I learned a lesson as I made less than 20k. But in the end the dotcom bubble would be a minor set back and valuable learning as the future would provide more grim reminders, but in between these “tidal” events the tech industry was doing fantastic.

The next fail was not one of hype but one of false economic expectations. Capatalism is a beautiful thing and in many ways perfect, but that perfection is not just wealth creation but wealth destruction. It is also controlled by humans, who in their greedy lust do very damaging things. In 2008 that came to fruition. The financial institutions in an effort to expand their market created new financial vehicles in an effort to spread risk. Providing loans to people where they could buy a house and not start payments for six months (just one example). All of a sudden you had people buyimg real estate investments, where based on their current level of income realistically they could not afford. Seem obvious that it was a bad business model. But as I said Wall St gets caught up in its own hype. When the bubble finally burst we had a huge issue of capital flow, when a market has no capiltal it ceases to become a market. Fear gripped the United States and quickly went global. That is a vey high level overview and a lot of great books have covered the subject better than I (One of many I recommend is Andrew Ross-Sorkin’s “Too Big to Fail”.). The fear in created was very real.

At Microsoft, as we met with customers time and time again we all heard in the sales force, “I need to do more with less”. All of a sudden the standard Microsoft Enterprise Agreement, instead of having a annual true up where the customer pays for more licenses we were being asked to true down as they wanted to pay for less licenses. Companies did not need more copies of Microsoft Office, they needed less as they no longer had 10,000 employees they had 7,500. At Microsoft annual company meeting Microsoft COO Kevin Turner tried to calm the troops by sharing a favorite Sam Walton Story (Kevin came to Microsoft from WalMart). Sam had said, “In times of econmic uncertainty there are those that participate and those that do not. The latter always gains marketshare”. I thought at the time Microsoft was going to use its large cash reserve to ride the wave, invest in our customers during the downturn and come out stronger on the other end. How wrong I was. The next day travel was cut as budgets were slashed. At Microsoft we had to do more with less. We were participants.

It led to what was a first at Microsoft; layoffs. When it was announced it was hard to believe it was happening. It was something that was unfathomable. In hindsight it probably should have been foreseen, the employee count at Microsoft was well over 100,000 and Microsoft was struggling with its own gitrth. It probably would have had to happen anyway, the financial crisis just accelerated the path to layoffs. I missed the first round of layoffs but was not so lucky in the second. It happened ironically on Nov 4, 2009. I started on Nov 4, 1991. I wil not go into all the details but you can read about that day here . When this happens it is a frightening experience especially when you have three young sons. I would land at another job in 8 months. The thing about econmoies and tech in particular is they always rebound, not to be a financial advisor but I would always have money saved up to survive a year as these cycles repeat themselves.

Every recession has its own motion. The current one for technology folks is interesting in that it comes out of a pandemic. Many companies sufferred during the pandemic (did anyone go to Disneyland?). However for tech it was a boom period as everything was done remotely and online. How many Amazon delivery trucks did you see during the pandemic? Where schools struggled as they had to move classes to remote, in tech it was simply an email “you will not come into the office but work from home”. Where many industries were struggling, tech was accelerating. The cloud was growing, streaming services like Zoom and Microsoft Teams were thriving. It seemed the Googles and Amazons of the world would cruise through the pandemic no problem. One issue: geopolitics.

The dotcom bom/bust and financial crisis were largely Wall St created events. The current crisis of inflation and rising interest rates are more the result of global events. Vladimir Putin has a very Russian sence of history and we all know he lamented the downfall of the Soviet Empire. On February 22, 2022 he set in motion the Russian attack on Ukraine. Russia being a major supplier of oil on the global markets (second only to the United States) sent energy prices sky rocketing. This set in motion a cascade of events as prices began to rise and the Federal Reserve to combat rising inflation increased interest rates. For the first time in a long time a big impact was on food prices. When food and gas prices increase you have to make decisions about purchases and things begin to slow down. When they slow down companies are forced to make decisions: layoffs.

So here we are again. The giants all laying thousands of people off. A lot of uncertainty about the future, which leads to fear. Having now been through 3 cycles (and who knows I could still get laid off during this cycle) I am not as worried as before as every time it has happenned the tech sector has come back stronger. One thing that was ingrained upon me early in my career by Bill Gates was if you are doing 9 things right and one thing wrong, what are you doing wrong? Even though we commanded 90% marketshare we were always fearful of what was around the corner. What big opportunities are we missing? If you look at Microsoft’s big competitors they operate the same way. It just takes a technological breakthruogh to wipe away a business unit or destroy a company. The iPhone destroyed Windows Mobile and crushed Blackberry (does anyone own this device anymore?). Google right now is stressed about OpenAI and Chat GPT. When these moments happen they pull the industry to new heights, which means new jobs and new opportunities.

Right now if you are out of work, enjoy time with family, friends and reflect on your past while you position yourself for your futture. It is ok now and then to have a pause from work and assess life and what are the values that are most important to you. With each passing year I become more bullish on the tech sector as we continue to tackle new problems and new challenges. We create new innovations, most of which will fail. But those that do not will be part of reshaping the industry. With every change comes new opportunities. There will be incremental changes and big changes. Right now AI is rapidly evolving and down the road we will have Quantum computing. These are just a few things to think about during your not self determined time-out. Enjoy it and remember the future is so bright you gotta wear shades.

Good Night and Good Luck

Hans Henrik Hoffmann Jan 25, 2023

I am part of a book group that set a goal of 22 books read for 2022. I am proud to say I read 29 so I have a fair amount of books to choose from for my top 10 list. What are my criteria? I think the first is do I remember the book and refer back to it in conversation and my thoughts. I appreciate great writing in fiction and non-fiction. It was hard to narrow down the list as a number of books I really liked did not make the list. Enjoy the list and hopefully one or two books catches your interest.

First book I recommend is Craig Whitlock’s book the “Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War”.

Second book I recommend is Mark Twain’s “The Innocents Abroad”

The Third Book is “The Growth Delusion” by David Pilling

The fourth book I chose is Evan Osnos’ “Wildland: the Making if American Fury”.

The fifth book on my list is Erik Larson’s fantastic book “Devil in the White CIty

The sixth book is “There is Nothing for You Here” and given my blue collar roots one I related to

The seventh book “Ghosts of Spain” returns me to Spain, where not a year goes by I do not read a book about Spain

Th eigth book, “Leaving Las Vegas” and one that was inspired by the movie of the same name, which it was based upon

The ninth book, “California Burning” a non-fiction book that tackles “The Grid”.

The tenth and final for this years list, “The Divider” and a return to politics.

It has been over a 100 days since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine which has led to countless lives lost and the destruction on many Ukrainian cities. All due to the lust for power and international recognition of one man: Vladimir Putin. Since the invasion we have seen an impact primarily of the almighty gas pump which to this day fuels American lives, right or wrong. We are also starting to see food shortages on top of an inflation spike which is hurting peoples wallet’s. Fingers can be pointed but in this case they will all lead back to one man, no matter what your political agenda. Global affairs is not something many American’s pay attention to until it directly impacts them. No President has ever been elected because people were passionate about his foreign policy agenda. Ukraine will not alter that, but it will impact how foreign policy is carried out moving forward, we live in a inter connected world and in the end we are all globalists whether we like it or not. Most Americans cannot find Ukraine on a map, but it will impact us in the near term and long term, funny as it may seem to some geography matters, here are just a collection of my thoughts.

There have been a number of books written about Putin, a couple I have read Stephen Lee Meyer’s, “The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin” and Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy’s “Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin”. I would recommend both. Putin as we know was a kid who grew up in the Soviet Union, looking towards a future in the KGB. Which he achieved and was eventually stationed in Dresden, East Germany. This is where he would be when the Berlin Wall fell. As is well noted Putin would say the fall of the Soviet Union “was a disaster”. The next decade as Russia transitioned would be a decade of disaster and humiliation for Russia as it saw its standing in the world order begin to plummet. It would also lay the groundwork for where we are today. From the ashes rose a new leader, seemingly from nowhere (ok he was from St Petersburg), to be the number two behind Boris Yeltsin and thus on the world stage Putin was born. How he rose from relative obscurity to become a virtual dictator is still clouded in mystery. He had not done anything of significant note in his past, but obviously in the back ground he must have been a shrewd player

Over the next couple of decades Russia would go through several US Presidents, but in Russia Putin would remain, even when demoted to Prime Minister he would return and consolidate power. During the decades many former Russian satellite countries would join the European Union and NATO encircling Russia in alliances with its former enemies. This can only have created anxiety within Russia (and in Putin’s mind). During this time Putin would increasingly put himself at direct odds with western Europe and push the levers of what he could get away with. Following the 2014 Sochi Olympics he would set his sites on Crimea and eventually annex Crimea. The west responded by reducing the G-8 to the G-7. Russia would interfere in the 2016 US elections and receive no punishment, with Trump in office it seemed they would skate along unimpeded. Acting like a puppet master to get what Putin wanted. But like all dictators they eventually over reach.

Putin is steeped very deep in Russian history and with that he saw a nation in Ukraine that shared what he believed was a common history together with Russia. Strategically the black soils of Ukraine have always been the bread basket of Europe. Ukraine also has desired ports in the Black Sea. Ukraine from a Russian perspective was a very attractive land grab and could create a land bridge to strategic ports in Ukraine. By annexing Ukraine it was in Putin’s mind a win for Russia and for Ukraine, problem being Ukraine had no intention of becoming a Russian satellite. As has been noted the expected welcoming of Russian troops into Ukraine did not happen, instead we have had a bloody war and now then a common shared history, one bent toward resentment and hatred. This shared history was not as glorious as Putin would have us think as one can discover in Miron Dolot’s excellent book “Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust” When communism showed up in Ukraine in the twenties the results were disastrous and let many Ukrainians to starve to death. Stalin was a ruthless leader. History has along arc, and Ukarinians have not forgotten the suffering at Russian hands.

A second point is the global world order, which since the fall of the Berlin wall has been dominated by one nation: the United States of America. We have lived in a unipolar world, much to the dismay of many nations. Putin came of age and grew up in a bi-polar world, where it was the USA and the Soviet Union. Putin would love nothing better than to see Russia return to the international stage in a place of power. The short answer is that will not happen, not with Russia. However the idea of a bi-polar world will happen, that other power being China. A big reason comes down to GDP. Russia’s economy is small compared to the US, where as China’s is at 70% compared to US GDP and growing and gaining. Russia’s is less than 10%. You can view GDP info here. Even though Russia has a very strong military their ability to keep pace with the US and China will be limited do the availability of money. In the need all great militaries need funding. To have great funding you need a modern and growing economy to achieve your ambitions.

Putin made some significant strategic mistakes. Most significantly he felt NATO was not as strong as it had been during the cold war. Which to a large degree was true as NATO had struggled for purpose since the fall of communism, the one exception being the Balkan War under President Clinton (that would also cause a split between the west and Russia). He under estimated the United States. It seems a common mistake, but President Biden to his credit rallied the allied forces and has built a stronger and now expanding NATO. Putin has done what was seemingly impossible, he has caused Sweden and Finland to seek membership in NATO. Neutrality has been part of Sweden’s DNA for over a century, but frankly Putin left them little choice (since I started writing they are now accepted into NATO). Putin gave NATO a renewed purpose. In the background watching very closely and taking diligent notes is China as they have a similar grievance called Taiwan.

There have been of late chips in he alliance. Recently President Macron in France stated, “We must not humiliate Russia”. I understand the spirit and historical context, but in this case he is just wrong. The Balkan War was a case in point where Russia was simply not listened to and shown any respect. The difference being in that war it was Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic who pursued geocide, which required international intervention. In this case Putin instigated this series of events and he will have to suffer its consequences. Macron comes across like a long line of French Leaders starting with Charles DeGaulle trying to carve out a position of power as a world leader, it has had limited success. That being said he is the one western leader in constant contact with Putin, which is better than a closed line. Right now a lot of attention at the negotiation table is finding a way for Putin to get out of Ukraine unscathed, Putin at the time this writing does not seem interested. The only thing Macron can buy him is time.

Economic pain being felt today and the foreseeable future will be the one thing that could cause the alliance to start to fracture. In my opinion it is also a opportunity. A main export for Russia is oil and much of the economic pain we see today stems from this . A gas prices rise so does the cost to get goods to market causing the prices of food to increase and this causing a spike in inflation. Our vacations will be scaled back as it is expensive to fly or drive anywhere. Going to restaurants is increasing in price, so we may have to eat in more. All this happening on the back drop of recovering form Covid, which has consumed us for over two years. The one thing in America that seem to be misunderstood by many is we do not set oil prices, even though we are the largest single producer of oil at 14% OPEC controls 37%. OPEC also controls 4/5 of global oil reserves. We are just a part of a global market place. Renewable energies can help offset costs at the pump as I am sure Tesla owners are very happy they are not on gas. This moment in time can be sure to accelerate that growth, but it is a long term play and will not help in the short run

Probably most concerning is not just the increase in food prices but the potential now for food shortages. Both Russia and Ukraine are major grain exporters In 2021 Ukraine exported 107 tons of grains and oilseeds. Much of that cannot move now do to ports being bombed along with grain silos. In terms of wheat exports Russia ranks number one, while Ukraine is number five. Having two countries in top 5 that are at war impacts global food prices. It is one thing to not be able to afford gas, but when food snot available people will begin to suffer and starve to death global opinions will change very quickly. In a world of social media and instant content, photos and video’s of people starving will have a major impact on peoples mental health.

Thinking long term Russia will become a pariah state. To the west. It’s one solace being it will have a welcoming market in China. However if Putin thinks this will be a game played on equal footing over time he will be sorely disappointed. China has its own global global ambitions and if Russia can help further those, great, but Russia will be the junior partner in that relationship. If you read Rush Doshi’s book on China “The Long Game” , China has time and is targeting and building the Chinese Century. Russia is not included and will not be a equal partner. It will be interesting how two big ego’s in Xi and Putin handle that relationship.

For Ukraine, Putin has done an accidently masterful job of creating a Ukrainian national identity. Not that it did not exist before, but Putin portrayed it as one with Russia. Now it is most definitely not one with Russia and now a country aligned with western Europe and seeking a future in the west and not the east. I do not think this will be as a member of NATO but down the road I could foresee a European Union membership (they have applied and willlikely be accepted). They have existing status within the EU just not as a full member. Given they are an agricultural power house they would be welcomed. In the short term Russia will still try and hold sway over this decision.

With all that Putin has done wrong and despite the significant investment of Western allies, it seems unlikely that Ukraine can holdout forever. Russia is a superior military with resources, so it will likely secure the eastern part of Ukraine and the southern coast. In the short run they will succeed but Ukraine will continue to resist and you will have a lengthy spell of an insurgency in the regions Russia has captured. They will continue to have access to weapons from the west. Not to mention Russia will be vulnerable on her borders with Finland and Poland. They have given NATO a purpose

Will the global order change? It most certainly will, that has been inevitable for some time with the rise of China and their One Belt, One Road initiative. Russia is looking to exploit that change and make themselves relevant on the world stage. Putin recently declare a end to the unipolar world (might as well have said the United States world), which is true and the reverberations will be felt for decades, in fact probably the remainder of the century. How we handle and more importantly balance that relationship will be critical for future generations. In America we often view the world through American eyes. What is outside our borders does not matter. But as we can tell what has happened in Ukraine has impacted us. I am sure when Hitler annexed the Sudetenland many US citizens said it would not impact them, it i seasy to get comfortable in your own home, in America we seem to excel at that. For long time we have lived in a global economy, and a global community. Driven in large part by the United States market driven economic policies. We are a connected global community and when that balance gets disrupted the cracks in the system start to become magnified, which s what we are experiencing now

Good Night and Good Luck,

Hans Henrik Hoffmann June 28, 2022

Since the Reagan era there has been a large move away from the federal government. As he so eloquently said “Government is not the solution to your problems, government is the problem”. Though I am personally not a big Reagan fan, I have to give credit where credit is due as his influence on our country was immense. Not all of it good. His ideas officially ended when Donald Trump was elected. But the conservative movement without him would have been nothing. A big part of Reagan was shrinking federal government, but to be realistic though the attempt was made to shrink the federal government, the problems that governments deal with were not destroyed. They were just transferred to the states, which in many ways made sense. States are not like Federal government they have to balance the books, they do not have the Federal Reserve, they cannot print dollars and issue T-Bills. They can issue bonds, but these are passed by state voters. As I write the sidewalks I voted on several years ago are finally being made, through bonds the city of Shoreline issued. Is doing things at the state level a good thing, it all depends on the issue.

People in the country are always moving, in fact since 1492 people in the US have been moving as the country expanded. Before independence we had pioneers. People moving west, before and after independence. Seeking new opportunities, seeking new lives it was the spirit of the frontier (it also was in the spirit of genocide of native Americans). It was romanticized in print and later in film. In current times that spirit still exists as people exit cities like Detroit and Cleveland going to where opportunity is available, cities like Seattle and Austin. We are a entrepreneurial country, Ford is now replaced by Amazon and Microsoft. As Ford exported its economy so a new one was needed to be built, but that is something America excels at. In many ways the spirit of the pioneer lives on in America, to be honest it is just part of the American DNA.

Early on in COVID-19 the idea put forth by the Trump administration was to put the onus on the states. Let them battle out for supplies and the Federal government can play back up. Quickly we discovered since it was a new virus and we were not prepared. Early on it was ventilators, some states were ahead of the curve when it came to the spread early on of COVID-19. New York needed ventilators and requested help form other states, the ugly side of this being New York could only count on blue sates to help. Other states needed to rely on contacts. to get necessary supplies. Maryland’s Governor Larry Hogan leveraged his wife’s South Korean roots to get COVID tests as the Trump admin was unreliable. As they went to market states competed against each other for supplies. While people were suffering and dying the federal government turned a blind eye. There are certain problems that come about the that only the weight of the federal government can solve as they have the resources. They have access to money that states do not, states by definition have to be fiscally conservative. They have a military that understands supply lines and how to quickly create and facilitate. They can coordinate at a national level and focus on areas with urgent needs. All things that a state just does not have access or visibility to.

Now we come to another divide as it looks like the Supreme Court will overturn Roe v Wade and pass responsibility to the states. Some of the arguments I have to admit are head scratching, I guess I am not inline with the “originalist” views of the constitution. Yes abortion is not covered in the original document. Nor were women or black people (refer to Dred Scott). But what really concerns me is how differently woman will be treated depending on what state you live in. Those who are hurt the most are the most vulnerable, the poor and the uneducated. Neighboring states will also be affected. Idaho will trigger one of the most extreme abortion laws if and when Roe v Wade is overturned. Idaho accounts for 5% of abortions in Washington State, that number is expected to increase by 385% should the new abortion law be triggered. There will be a corporate effect as companies opt to move out of states they view as less supportive of their female workforce. Roe v Wade usually comes in at 65% for and 35% against, but in hi-tech companies with educated and a growing population of female employees I would think the number is even higher (Microsoft has already announced it will fly woman who need an abortion at companies expense) .

When I look at this I am not sure we have thought through the long term ramifications of pushing more and more responsibility to the states. But once Roe v Wade is overturned, given we have a very right leaning Supreme Court what is next? I think a likely target will be same sex marriage. People think we can push more and more down to the states. Like it or not what we are promoting is division as a nation. You will have states where you are not welcome based on your political views. The issue wit States determining personal freedoms is you are going to have a patchwork of freedoms across the country, no uniformity. Literally as you drive across states you could have gay marriage in one, none in the other , no interracial marriage in one, transgender rights in one etc…Then how those laws are enforced and severity of punishment will differ. In the end it will be utterly confusing and unsustainable. The only winners will be attorney’s. If I had a law degree I would focus on confusing issues as that is where the money is.

Increasingly we are becoming narrow minded and isolated in our residence of choice. People move to places where the state government and people are inline with their views. Today’s America sees its citizen retreating to what they view as safe havens. In the long run this will not make for a stable democracy. We are transitioning from blue states and red states to ice blue states and blood red states. We are becoming extreme. Where depending on your political outlook you will either be received with open arms or thrown back to whence you came. The cost will be freedom, ironic for a country that was built on those word, but at the same time hopefully we can appreciate the meaning. Right now I am not so confident. As former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said “In the long run democracy is the most stable form of government, in the short run it is the most fragile”.

Good Night and Good Luck,

Hans Henrik Hoffmann May 11, 2022