In 20 Years:

 1.  California:  Tax revenue generation will be approximately 70-percent of what it is today, with both SF and LA losing 1k residents each per month.  

2.  More than 50-percent of Americans will be unable to define a 'woman'.

3.  At least three states will have lowered the age of consent to marry to 14 (without parental consent or judge's consent involved).

4.  Some AI program will have constructed an entire album and gotten half the 'hits' to number one status within a 12-month period.

5.  The NY Times will have been bought by a Mexican news agency.  Half the journalists will be relocated to Mexico-City.

6.  At least 40-percent of all American kids by age 12....will be identified with a sexual disorder of some type.  Few if any of these kids will fail-out of school, however....they will be assigned the knowledge level of a 10-year-old kid by age 18.

7.  You will only be able to get baby formula via a prescription program (run by the gov't) or via local drug dealers.

8.  More than 500,000 people yearly in America....will be getting testosterone injections and be identified on a national database for massive rage episodes....and unable to work.  

9.  More than 12-million Americans will be assigned the status of 'scientist', but over half of them will have a knowledge level of a 2020-16-year-old kid out of high school.

10.  A young female trend (teenagers mostly) will start up where they shave their heads and are on some kind of hormone treatment to trigger unconsciousness.

11.   Besides UFOs....the federal government eventually agrees that Bigfoot is real, and that zombie's exist. 

12.  The term 'whore' will be treated like the N-word, and you will be confronted each time....where you have to utter the 'W-word'.

13.  More than 16-million Americans will be identified in a national database as 'fragile'.

14.  Editions of the Bible will be produced with the Old Testament separate from the New Testament..  Christians will sub-divide themselves along 'OT' and 'NT' lines.

15.  A candidate for the Democratic Party Presidential nominee.....will reach national level-status....who is a self-admitted meth-user.

16.  Stores in SF/LA will have a security cube situation where you have to swipe your credit card to gain entry.  More than 500 per day at these stores will be refused access because of past criminal behavior in the store.

17. At least one state will have out-lawed the sale of Christmas trees....in the interest of climate change.  Residents will only be able to purchase these in neighboring states.

18.  Ten years after the passing of Donald Trump.....at least 300 people a year are still being diagnosed as having TDS (Trump-Derangement-Syndrome).  Scientists are unable to explain why.

19.  At least five states will have a law forbidding you (as a restaurant) from serving a person at the table more than 1,000 calories.  

20.  The NBA will have a majority of European players on teams....because American players can't play at the level of the European clubs.  

The Reality Of The Salem Witchcraft Trials

 As things closed out in 1691....in Salem, Mass....the population of the local area was around 1,400 people.  If you were going to describe the local town....laid out....it was probably 3 x 3 miles, and it was mostly an agricultural or gardening type environment.  

Chief work/hobby? Well....religion.  It was their religion that brought them there....it was religion that focused everyone on community responsibilities....it was religion that would divide them.

In Europe, for about 200 years....witchcraft had been a major subject and the Catholic Church had pressed hard on the topic for local 'drama'.  The Lutheran Church (after 1525) would wonder into this, and it was hard for any 3rd religion to avoid the subject.

If you go back to the original start-up of the Salem trials....it involves to two kids (girls, ages 9/11) who seem to have something along the lines of epileptic fits.  I won't go into great detail but at least in this period of time....epileptic fits weren't that unusual and they weren't 'demonized'.  In this case....both girls uttered non-English words, threw things around the home, and crawled around the floor like some animal (none of these things fit the typical epileptic situation).

Some minister is brought in, and deems the two under some spell.

Over the course of the next week...a couple more teenage girls launch into the copy-cat situation.  I should note here....ONLY young girls acted this way.

Accusations began to fly around.....witches putting spells on people, etc.

All of this....over the next month or two....led to the locals now talking about demons, men being influenced by women (a terrible tragedy), and hot lusty stuff causing a division of the public.  

The only cure here?  Well....you needed to charge up people, and have a court render a solution to halt all this demon stuff.

Fifteen months would pass in this drama....May 1694 would arrive.  Out of the 1,400 residents....roughly 200 would be accused.  Thirty of this group would be convicted by the local court.  Nineteen of the group would be hanged.  A couple would die in the local jail.  

Then....the whole witchcraft thing just ended....with an authority arriving and declaring this was all 'faked-up'.  

Trigger?  I'd say it goes to three things: mass hysteria with no throttle of control, isolation of people with no outside skepticism, and total acceptance of accusations (no matter how weird they are).  

My belief of what caused the original episode with the two girls?  Use of mushrooms....given to them knowingly or unknowingly....triggering them to have hallucinations and some sense of euphoria.  If you look over research of the past couple of decades....some PhD people will now argue that use of 'magic' mushrooms can lead to permanent changes in personality/character....affecting your long-term mental health.

After the two girls....this was all mass hysteria.  

Observations

 1.  In 1977, as I graduated high school and left the farm....the top three priorities of people (99-percent)....were to: (1) get a job, (2) get a car, and (3) size up a relationship situation.  Today, out of every ten Americans, one person has a top priority of wanting you to accept them...as they identify as something.  

You just wonder how this transformation came (and went).

2.  I saw a comment yesterday...suggesting 'mob-driven-wrong-think' (MDWT) is a 'thing' now.  I sat for five minutes trying to imagine where this idea came from and how logical it is in the big world today.

3.  Just in general....when you buy any gun in the US and fill out the form...it'll ask about drug-use, and if you were a regular cocaine-user....the purchase would halt if you marked 'yes'.  

4.  For the record, there are two female sex hormones (estrogen and progesterone) which can play a part in the start-up and development of plain old depression problems.  

5.  Was Twitter ever worth what Elon paid for it?  As this whole thing came out and the 'offer' was staged....I looked at the stock, lack of dividends and lack of growth over the years.  Elon probably paid 50-percent more for Twitter than it was actually worth.  But I don't think he really cares about that segment of the story.

6.  Just an odd thing I noticed in California law business....there's a draft being circulated that would allow a kid (age 12 or older) to sign up to live in a 'group-home'....meaning they could exit the house or parent's control, if they desired this.  A better lifestyle or safer home?  I'm split on this.  Odds of passing?  Unknown.

7.  1980....rage in America was non-existent.  2023....rage pops up almost daily.

8.  Does it seem like more than 10,000 'experts' now exist on how to prescribe a peace deal between the Ukraine and Russia?

9.  If you asked 1,000 Americans to define stigmatizing....how many could accurately explain this in 40 words or less?

10.  For future reference, when you use the term 'useful idiot', it generally means a marginally intelligent person or someone rather naive....who can be pushed/manipulated into doing something for an agenda.   Note, the person could have a PhD, wear a uniform of some type, or even be a billionaire.