Years ago, in Chicago, there was a successful improv comedy theatre company. They were so successful they got the city to include them in a major downtown “theatre district” build-out. They got a beautiful set of intimate spaces.

Spaces with rent that could not be covered even if they sold out every night of the week. I was stunned to learn that when a relatively short time after their space opened (two years), they had to close the spaces. Because of course they did.

The math never mathed. The more established non-profit theatre that was part of that major downtown “theatre district” build-out got the city to give them a $1 a year rent. True, deep civic support. And their spaces (they too have more than one) all have larger audiences than the intimate space the improv comedy theatre company had built.

This was in the improv/sketch comedy capital of the world of Chicago, and the gaining-prestige successful improv comedy theatre company got broken by their success because no one did math. During the design phase (news articles at the time touted the esteemed architectural firm/s that designed the buildings and theatre spaces) nobody ever did the math of: number of seats times ticket price equals maximum box office receipts and realized that number was permanently lower than rent.

The architects never did the math, the artistic directors never did the math, the managing directors never did the math and the city never did the math. Or if they did, they never brought it up. Or if they did bring it up someone, somehow, managed to “we’ll make up the shortfall with merch, donations, *hand waving*” it away until the reality set in.

Somehow, the theatre company on the upswing destined for having the option to pursue multi-city success on stage, and who knows what else, killed itself with arithmetic. And reading this, what Brian D. Frey has posted, we learn this sort of death-by-math is far from a one time event. Even in the arts, math counts, but is not everything.

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© Copyright August 14, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is a multi-hyphenate in the entertainment industry and has worked as an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent's Day, and after its theatrical run, it's now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town and many others. His product and visual effects artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers and theatre practitioners to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC's Marshall School of Business about internet marketing and sales funnel engineering.

David Ellison wrote an editorial in the New York Times (gift link) in which (I think) he tries to make the case for why he should be allowed to have his Paramount acquire Warner Bros. Discovery. He accomplished the opposite. He should not own them.

I read his writing with an open mind, and he firmly convinced me he should probably never own a well-read blog, let alone a major news-media-entertainment conglomerate.

"Add up every hour Americans spend watching television, and a combined Paramount-Warner would account for less than 20 percent of all watch time...Those are not the numbers of a company that can dictate what audiences watch or what writers get paid."

1 in every 5 minutes of watch time is too small to have any really impact? Respectfully, pound sand, David Ellison.

Talent agents make only 10% of what their clients make (let's ignore packaging for the moment) and not only does their over-a-century-old-business-model still work (they remain in business), we all know they can have an outsized impact on the market. If 20% ain't no thing, perhaps this particular billionaire can send me a check for 20% of his family's net worth; I'm not asking much: Just a token, really, a trifle.

"I believe this fight is not really about market share. If it were, it wouldn’t have been reviewed and approved by regulators..."

This hand I'm putting in your pocket and taking bills out of your wallet isn't theft, if it were the regulators whom me and my family helped fund the campaigns of would surely say so. Remember the sand I mentioned? Put some in your eye, David Ellison.

"The issue is whether I can be trusted as a steward of Warner’s CNN [and CBS and others]...Unfortunately, I can’t give anyone a view into my heart and mind..."

You are literally writing an editorial in the New York Times. You can't give a view into your heart and mind in a NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL?! What, exactly, do you and your Pepperdine University and the University of Southern California (USC) educations think is the function of an editorial, pray tell? Should someone who doesn't know what an editorial is, while they're writing one, be anywhere near the control of any news outlet? No. Ya know that sand? Eat it, David Ellison.

"...I hold some views that would be called conservative and others that would be called liberal..."

Oh, well, then, why haven't we given control of every fifth minute of watch-time to you, I mean: you did name check the political concepts of "conservative" and "liberal." Can we give you a Pulitzer for name checking ideas? Oh, David, since you're so new to the Journalism world, a veritable lamb in the wild, let me help you out: the Pulitzer Prizes are "designed to celebrate excellence in journalism, arts and letters." And no, you and your daddy aren't supposed to try to buy them.

"Our journalists will continue to answer to the facts and to all the people they serve - not to any party or cause."

It seems current CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, who works for you, was hired by you, did not get that memo. I would cite a source here, but the coverage of Weiss' evisceration of the once lauded 60 Minutes is so ubiquitous and pervasive it hardly seems necessary.

"In an age when so much of what fills our screens is machine-generated or engineered to enrage, journalism from real reporters matters more than ever. That is the work I intend to pay for, patiently, for a long time."

Machine-generated or engineered by whom, Mr. Ellison? Your dad's company, Oracle, proudly says, "97% of Fortune 100 businesses and hundreds of thousands of smaller companies run their most critical workloads on Oracle AI Database, including the largest banks, retailers, telecoms, and governments." So it seems the AI slop, slopaganda and algorithmic feeds that are doing that enraging are "calls coming from inside the house," inside the Ellison family home to be specific.

"That machinery [of the movie business] is in trouble. Hollywood is losing ground to technology platforms whose algorithms reward the loudest voices."

Whose technology platforms could you be referring to? Could it be TikTok, which is largely owned by (wait for it, let the tension build, the suspense over who owns what in the corporate landscape of mega-monopolies is so exciting, isn't it?) daddy's Oracle!

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Patrick K. Lin (Technology & Human Rights Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School's Carr-Ryan Center for Human Rights) says, "The new joint venture [that owns TikTok] is made up of a group of investors, including U.S. cloud computing and database software company Oracle..." which to be honest made me fall out of my chair. Then I did a spit-take, slapped the ghost of a long-lost relative and needed my pulse/blood pressure checked out of sheer surprise.

If the Ellisons wanted to establish effective monopoly control and influence on way more than 20% of the screens and conversations in the United States, I cannot think of anything they could do differently. They haven't missed a trick.

"I understand that promises from an executive in the middle of a merger invite skepticism. So judge us by the year we just had."

Really...you wrote a whole editorial because you're totally ok with skepticism. Sure, Jan. Then judge you we shall.

You say you increased the number of movies and TV series Paramount is releasing, which is great because we know quantity is so much more important than quality. We're all sitting in your board room or c-suite waiting to give you a pat on the back for "you make numbers go up."

"We raised our content investment by $1.5 billion."

Nothing says, "I have loved film since I was old enough to sit still for one" like calling movies and TV the generic, bland and interchangeable term: content. I can feel the love of movies coming through the newsprint on my computer screen. Your "spousal individual" and "diminutive offspring" must be so warmed to see their husband and father simply gush with such affectionate terms about motion pictures. If only you owned a movie studio, or a media company, and could get in touch with writers who could help you make this sound less sterile, and financial. Maybe you can find a billionaire who can hook you up with the funding for that.

This isn't the annual report, it is an editorial in the New York Times, do you not know wha- oh, right: already addressed your lack of understanding of news and journalism. I think you have almost convinced the residue beneath the garbage bag in the trash bin that you should totally helm more news organizations.

"...making more is the whole point of the company we are building."

While I personally cannot, in fact, confirm David Ellison exists, he is nothing if not honest. More of what, Dave, more of what? Money, power, control? Surely not a content lover like you? Say it ain't so?!

You then promise to "make number go up" in the future with the combined company. Awesome.

"I have learned better than to promise hits...nobody can dictate what audiences will love. What I can promise is the work, and more of it."

Can't dictate, but you can try, right? Lock up all the movie theatres with your material perhaps (so it won't matter what anyone else is producing)? I wonder if anyone (it was me, but probably not only me) could have predicted such a thing.

Horizontally integrate (Investopedia: "a business strategy where a company expands to increase its market share and competitive advantage by acquiring or merging with other firms operating at the same industry level") a lot of the cloud servers streaming sites run on, or buy/control most movie theatres, and so forth, and you get to dictate terms up and down the supply chain (yes, I wrote about this in 2015).

But sure, David Ellison, you're doing all this just for the love of the game. By the way, I have a bridge I'm thinking of selling, interested?

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© Copyright August 4, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is a multi-hyphenate in the entertainment industry and has worked as an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent's Day, and after its theatrical run, it's now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town and many others. His product and visual effects artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers and theatre practitioners to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC's Marshall School of Business about internet marketing and sales funnel engineering.

What’s with starting “into the middle of things” (Latin: in medias res)? It is crazy, right? Who would do that (except all the movies that do that)? Who would do that enough over multiple millennia so that people over centuries would have to come up with an entire phrase about it, am I right? This is madness. What is Nolan thinking?

Why would anyone make a disjointed and confusing trip home be, I don't know, confusing, or disjointed? Just let the poor guy get home. Five minute film. We're good. Shouldn’t stories be about destinations and not the journeys?

Why is it even about his trip, like, should it even be about a̶n̶ O̶d̶y̶s̶s̶e̶y̶ a journey and should it even focus o̶n̶ O̶d̶y̶s̶s̶e̶u̶s̶ on the one who takes a journey at all?

Doesn’t Nolan know what words mean?

Like, why make it a journey over water? Why not choose some sort of symbolism of the shifting and the hidden, of the dangerous and life sustaining, of things readily apparent and also lost beneath a surface, peril and peace, and why not have the water be sexual metaphors: for sexuality itself and connection during a journey from a war back home to his beloved wife who has been embattled by suitors, and instead do this??

And maybe he could, I don't know, make this more than just a white guy's story? Would have helped make it clear that the themes and events have resonated thousands of years because (even though it is the product and part of the canon of one culture) it can be meaningful and enjoyed by anyone. Would that have been too much to ask? Even just a hat tip to the universally human experience here.

Couldn’t Nolan have had some sense of justice visit his main character? Like after Odysseus comes up with the lie that allows the Greeks to breach both their own innate need to be hospitable to others, but also the very walls of Troy, and he does it through trickery and lies, finally bringing the drawn out stalled war to a conclusion, doesn’t he owe something. Like couldn't he owe a difficult trek during which he is lied to? And shouldn’t he lose something along the way? But instead his men all get killed and he is what, transformed by a journey that is part self rediscovery and part penance? I wanted a character arc, not this wading from obstacle to obstacle, seeing how step by step he is remade.

Like at least Nolan could have him lose a truly devoted best friend. And what’s with the dog? Why have him die right when Odysseus gets home? Could Nolan not have fit in how nature itself (and our connection to it, our domestication of it) finds closure even if such closure is heartbreaking to us? There wasn't room for something like that in a nearly three hour movie?

And why not have his wife be a final challenge Odysseus must encounter, understand and re-embrace to find again: remembrance, truth and authenticity. Why not have them both need to confront and process through their own illusions about their romantic partners before they can reconnect through love? Instead Nolan just has her test if it is he’s really him, and he goes after the suitors?

What, no release of ten years angst? Like what about having the long-building and built up fear, pain, grief and rage spill over in some integration of his true self, his dark side and authentic love revealing the final changes he has undergone instead of this combination of, what, his isolation, shadow self and anima into a new Odysseus that has, finally, changed, and in so doing earned his way home? Come on now.

I am looking forward to seeing the movie though.

© Copyright July 27, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

Brilliant gambit: the U.S. will now allow Iran to hit some of what they shoot at because that will surely lead Iran to capitulation. It has nothing to do with the fact we are running of of air defense interceptors (that's exactly what it is).

Thankfully, the U.S. has nothing we want to defend from aerial attack outside of the area of our Central Command in the Middle East (for reference, in addition to 4 functional commands, the U.S. has 7 geographic commands, allies in all of them and almost all Americans all live under the alleged protection of Northern Command [hat tip to Michael for the clarification]).

Also, the Pentagon has removed some of the killed and wounded in action from their casualty count because: during the ceasefire, while everyone was still shooting at each other, they were on a break (hat tip to Shanna for the insight).

Plus, the "...Pentagon is pretending there have been two Iran wars separated by a brief cease-fire," mentions Representative Massie, and the clearly-not-flailing-admin goes even further, as Massie clarifies, by "...going more than 90 days without congressional authorization @SecWar IS BREAKING THE LAW." Which honestly is the Secretary of War Crimes's favorite pastime, outside of drinking and mistreating the women in his life (according to his mom).

We're clearly winning the war, and we have plenty of interceptors, but you wouldn't know them because they go to another school.

© Copyright July 25, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

Too many, the storm drains run red, too many more and I fear within my bones that then justice so far deferred and delayed, dissembled and denied will with the unfocused rage of millions demand and extract ten thousand thousands of ice in bags, as if to staunch the swelling, stacked so high the light of the sun will be blotted out and the wails of the children bereft and torn from root will at long last be muffled under a mountain of death called vengeance but truly waste and despair.

A swirling blight of wrath, dislocated from reason, awaits the world that binges on cruelty and gorges itself, so with petty innocence we cry for war oblivious to the damage, the stains upon our souls of the violence we’ve lied to call righteous and the unquenchable insecurity marks us as we kill truth to wear like a mask what we name strength, and so, crippled by the moral vacuum we’ve hollowed out our own torsos to hold, we stumble and trip into graves ever vaster, ever growing, and in so doing we feed our loves, our cherished futures, our very selves, to annihilation, betraying our everything at once and always.

There will be no coming back.

A turning point, fixed with our indignation and driven home by our absent compunction, at which we will use up what was to be our dreams and instead be left with purest, darkest, interminably complete: nothing.

© Copyright July 14, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

The 15 protestors arrested by the federal government in Minneapolis this week are, according to the Justice Department’s own account of things, responsible for denting a government F-150 (by kicking it), and tipping a trailer (said to be owned by the accused) onto its side. Kicked a car and tipped their own trailer. That’s it.

Oh, and somehow belonged to the fictional group antifa. Luckily they don’t seem to have teamed up with Santa Claus, the Toothfairy and the Carebears to wage non-existent something something as a cabal of does-not-exist. At least not yet.

Why hasn’t potus nuked Minneapolis from space? Just to be sure.

The direct attack by the U.S. Department of Justice on Americans and the First Amendment makes me think we might not live in the free country I thought we did, and realize perhaps we never did: maybe I was just "lucky" not to notice how often our government has been doing this.

But it’s okay. The American people are a peaceful people, never prone to excessive violence, grudge holding or vengeance, and sure, there are more guns than people in the US, but there is nothing to prompt the American people to use them for anything other than the sport hunting or as agricultural tools, as they typically do. Americans are known for self-limiting their personal firearm use and not resorting to violence.

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It’s not like the government has implemented a Stamp Tax or anything like that (do import taxes, also known as tariffs, count?), they’re just shooting civilians to death in the streets and charging no one for it. No biggie.

In fact, to this Attorney General, federal agents killing people on the street is a-ok, but videoing the agents killing people in the streets is several felonies.

There is no cause for alarm.

Our priorities are in order and it isn’t like we teach tactical communication for military insurgency to our children in school or anything (did Paul Revere’s ride start with “one of by sea, two if by land” or was it “two if by sea, one if by land?” I can’t remember, it's been a while since I first learned it in kindergarten ★). We certainly don’t celebrate violently taking on one of the most powerful empires in history every year with explosions and barbecued meats (happy early 4th!).

And we absolutely don’t have a national case of oppositional defiant disorder. Thankfully. Why when COVID-19 came around, not a single person objected to being asked to stay home or wear a face mask. Surely increasing the costs of everything, cutting back people’s healthcare, ruining job opportunities and hope and then arresting folks protesting the disappearing of their neighbors by a well funded secret police won’t trigger any reactions either.

Why would it? No one is even considering tossing millions of dollars of merchandise into the Boston Harbor. I mean, it’s not like they keep flammable warehouses in the Boston Harbor or anything.

Americans, thankfully in this case, have no track record of being slow to anger and then apocalyptic once they cross a threshold. And surely, any day now, we’ll be able to go for a solid 24 hours without a mass shooting, because if Americans are good at anything it is seeking out the abundant and affordable mental health resources we have and using the peaceful conflict resolution options that are readily available and well used everywhere.

I am confident we will all remain calm, for our safety, and trust that the Department of Justice will bring about righteous and fair outcomes just as the fictional Ministry of Truth dispensed honesty in that one book (affiliate link).

Yes, I take solace, and the administration can to, that it’s not like one of the three colors of our flag symbolizes the blood shed in previous wars we have fought, thus revealing a ardent dedication to fighting. Thankfully, our national anthem isn’t expressly about enduring in the face of a literal barrage against all odds. I take refuge (and potus can too), from any fears of coming violence or chaos in the knowledge that the current benevolent president of the United States has had his tactical acumen recently confirmed by global events, and that he safely presides over the American People, a peaceful people. All the best people say so.

★ It was one if by land, two if by sea.

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© Copyright June 18, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

[This can't be satire, right? Source]

Social media platforms to be blocked from offering services to under-16s, marking a line in the sand and setting a new normal for future generations to surrender their freedom of expression and ability to resist government action, in the name of protecting kids.

• UK will go further to "protect" kids with world-leading additional restrictions on whatever we unilaterally decide to call harmful features online such as live streaming, strangers communicating with children, people speaking against the government, and un-self-censored posting
• Decisive action - backed by 9 in 10 parents according to us (trust us we wouldn't make up numbers, but we don't cite a source because "trust me bro" is perplexing to fit into APA format) - expected to be brought to Parliament before Christmas

The government plans to use the same model for a social media ban as Australia after that country's successes in beating back human rights, which for too long have been given to the wrong people. We do not intend for messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal to be included in the social media ban, but will "accidentally" include them later as only someone with something to hide would need encryption or privacy. We'll soon ban paper envelopes too since transparent ones are enough, unless you've something to hide.

The government will also be looking in more detail at overnight curfews (because once built and in government control "for young people," expanding them to the entire populace is a trivial programming challenge).

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said:

Parents want to keep their kids safe and happy, but "the online world has made that harder than ever" as long as we agree to ignore the built-in parental control functions all modern devices include today. Parents can often restrict what their children see with the hardware and software already in place, but doing so would deny the government the ability to control this narrative and the flow of vital information in the name of solving a problem parents can already work to solve.

This is a line in the sand, an apt metaphor showing how well us creators of this initiative understand the online world, which we imagine is full of sand.

The goal of protecting children from experiencing harm through digital systems in our culture is very valid, but I'll claim me and my government are somehow uniquely equipped (in unspecified ways) to solve this problem better than anyone else, despite our clear lack of understanding of digital systems, culture, children and how they interact. But take heart, this is a power grab and embellishment of the surveillance state that is merely being dressed up as an effort to protect people, not actual protection.

If the government can expand its own power enough, we can then centralize all sources of harm within the government and therefore ensure children are harmed by their government long before digital systems have a chance to wreak any havoc. Just look at how the American's pilot program of ICE detention for children has consolidated the harm those young people face. A child in a concentration camp, eating maggots, and being denied necessary medical attention, has no chance to be harmed by online danger.

The changes will back parents grappling with the risks for children that come from the online world (without educating those same parents about steps the parents can already take themselves). And we will go farther by choosing what is safe and age-appropriate for the parents too. Trust your government to take care of everything, and we promise you will never encounter anyone harmed by us; evidence of such things will never be found.

The government will also learn the lessons from Australia’s experience by introducing more highly effective age assurance (HEAA) measures to support compliance, support the creation of massive troves of poorly secured personal data, and make it far harder for children to employ safeguards that might keep their data out of nefarious hands. 

In a letter, the Secretary of State confirmed the government will ensure Ofcom has the funding it needs to carry out its new responsibilities - as well as continue its vital work to enforce the existing provisions of the Online Safety Act, including pretending we have success in protecting women and girls online, the farce that we're tackling harmful content that puts vulnerable people at risk, and taking action against serious illegal activity done by anyone (except the landed classes and members of the peerage), such as child sexual abuse material and online fraud and scams. We cannot have more members of key families publicly humiliated by facing consequences for their actions; that simply won't do.

9 in 10 parents said they would support a social media ban for children under 16 when we assembled 10 parents who worked in our offices in one room and asked them. We don't know how to cite that as a source under APA format, so let's pretend we wrote "ibid" after a citation for "trust me bro."

The majority of young people also backed action. Yes, we went out as strangers and spoke to young people about whether they want strangers talking to them. Two-thirds agreed both that children younger than 16 should not be allowed to use some social media platforms, and that us talking to them was "cringe." The APA really needs to add formatting guidelines for, "learned from accosting randos on the street," so we might properly cite this source going forward.

The government has already taken powers through the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act to act fast - using secondary legislation to introduce targeted protections without the inconvenience of bringing in a whole new Act, being subject to the oversight process and the safeguards of promulgating a new, sound law. This means the first set of regulations could be in effect in Spring 2027. After that, no one will object: how would you?

Last week, the Prime Minister challenged tech companies so that Britain will be the first country in the world to make it impossible for children to take, share or view nude images - with a 3-month deadline to make meaningful progress. If under the guise of stopping kids from taking nudies, you all won't be able to take photos or videos of state violence, then things will be much better, at least for us. Pics or it didn't happen, Amnesty International, pics or it didn't happen.

Yesterday, the government set out further steps to make sure children in every part of the country get greater access to enrichment opportunities in sport, creative activities, nature and the arts both in and out of school, unless they or their parents oppose the government's regimes.

Notes to editors 

• The government is examining the Australian model closely as it considers how to determine exactly which platforms will fall under the restrictions and which can be compromised to become part of larger surveillance efforts.
• By “communicating with strangers” we mean methods for unknown users to contact and talk with children, but not us asking children what they think, which we plan to keep doing. This includes gaming services but will not affect the ability for children to participate in multiplayer games online, provided a corporation profits off of that child's participation.
• The ban on live streaming will be for under 16s livestreaming themselves across all platforms, with the option of a trivial technical modification stopping all livestreams in case you all get uppity, ensuring no one sees what the government does in response.

© Copyright June 15, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

And Why Business Leaders Keep Getting It Wrong

A guest post/repost of a thread by fadeinpro.com (posted with permission):

Been thinking about the psychology behind "business leaders" pushing for "AI" in creative usage. Part of it comes down to the nature of the job: obviously they think what they do is super-important, and what they do is essentially telling other people what to do and having it happen.

But here's the problem. When you pay a writer to write something, for instance, you are not paying them to generate words on a page. You are paying them for the thought and creativity and understanding behind those words. For their effectiveness in accomplishing whatever the ultimate purpose is.

You need a logo for your hair salon? Fine, ask "AI" to generate one, I guess, and you'll get your business name and a pair of scissors in a logo that looks just like a bunch of others. In fact it's probably exactly like a bunch of others, since that's where it was stolen from in the first place.

But the thing is, that business leader should also understand that there is an expertise behind the work being done. When commissioning art, whether a logo or something else, they should be aware that intention and execution matter hugely in terms of effectiveness.

If you are the editor of a news site, you can use "AI" to fill content more quickly. Sure it may be badly written and rife with errors large or small, and no joy whatsoever to read, but at least you got those words on there.

The unimaginative business leader will not understand that there is a huge difference. We have an image. We have an article. We have a customer service "agent" that people hate. So what's the problem? I asked for the thing to get done and it got done so now on to the making money part.

From the unimaginative business leader's point of view, they've done their job (the most important job, in their eyes, deserving of the highest compensation). And if they lack the understanding or discernment to properly appraise the result, then they may even think it's been done well.

Everyone thinks they're literate, right? Everyone thinks they have taste. Certainly every "business leader" does. If they can't tell the difference between something "AI" has generated and something a capable, talented writer or artist has made, then in their untrained view there is no difference.

(The same thing applies whenever anyone proudly posts some piece of shit "AI"-generated "film". They are amazed that they have "created" this thing, like a toddler putting a doodle on the fridge, with no understanding of any of the underlying quality — or lack thereof.)

(This isn't necessarily new, of course, and is the reason so many YouTube/etc. videos are unwatchable. Just because you have a camera and can make a video doesn't mean you should, if you have no sense of getting information across visually through staging, angle, editing, pacing, etc.)

Anyway, the point is if you don't understand that intention and a deep understanding of the medium are essential to creation in it, you'll end up with garbage, ineffective work and you're not even going to know it. You'll have gutted the core value of whatever you're doing without even being aware.

If you need creative work done, pay a talented creative person to do it. Otherwise don't be baffled when the work does not have the effectiveness you want it to. Don't be surprised when it actually hurts the bottom line.

© Copyright May 27, 2026, fadeinpro.com, all rights reserved

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

be who you are as much as you can be

"Why would they pay us five figures when they can pay $200 and get endless output before their morning coffee?

I don’t have a great answer to that. Not yet."

• Alex Darke in Is AI Taking Over My Video Business?

Were you offering piles of "content" to clients, or as you say were you offering them "the stuff that separates content that converts from content that just exists." I think you know you offered more. That doesn't mean the math isn't changing, but it also doesn't have to mean survival is impossible.

In an earlier phase of the industry, I saw production companies who were crushed by the proliferation of affordable digital video cameras and editing software that could be run on the computer you already own. Let me give an example.

It was the aughts (2000-2009). There was a production company that cared not at all about creativity. They offered their clients essentially access to machines that cost a lot to own, but from this production company one could get access to perfunctory video shooting and editing for less than the expensive cameras and post production suites the production company owned.

They were essentially video production clerks. Their shooting was pleasant, the edits made no one recoil in revulsion. But, their whole business model was predicated on an obstacle: the high cost of equipment and software access. They were essentially reselling access to expensive gear they'd already invested in. The gear price went down, and dealing with their...not ideal abilities to make movies/TV/commercial and the like was suddenly no longer appealing. They had made themselves a commodity, competing only on price and offering little value beyond that.

We, entertainment and media professionals, need to remember our humanity has always been the major offering we have been making.

For example, year ago I was putting together some promos for a TV pilot I was developing. The director of photography (DP) for the shoot was unavailable for a pickup day (additional day of production) I was scheduling because one of the actors had become unavailable for the day of principle photography we had already done due to a stunt injury during unrelated training. So I reached out to a talented DP I had worked with before and asked them if they could be the DP for the pickup day.

When the DP gracious said yes, they made a point of pointing out that for these promos I was shooting (which had almost no budget at all, I bought people lunch and gave them a small gas stipend), they would not be bringing their $60,000+ camera system, but instead bringing their much less high end DSLR camera. I said straight out to them, because it was true, I was hiring the person, and their eye, not the gear.

People can have a sort of fetish for equipment, resolution for resolution's sakes and other elements that don't in the end define people's interesting in movies, TV and stories in the first place.

Did my promo shot on that pickup day need a higher end camera? I don't think so. Here it is:

Now has that pilot sold? Not yet. But that doesn't mean I should have hired a camera instead of the person. They did good work and I can rent a camera if I suddenly feel the need to have a certain piece of equipment.

We each get to, and need to, decide that our humanity is partly what drives whether or not we book work: who and what we are. If I book a job, someone else who couldn't be me wasn't going to, and if someone else books the job, then I (who cannot be them) wasn't going to.

This requires faith that if we do our part of the process, then the work meant for us will be ours. That faith isn't always easy to muster, but sort of like the idea of your only competition being who you were yesterday, I think it remains true.

Will there be some types of projects that only need a vaguely human-ish talking head that AI will replace? Sure, but those were always projects that asked less of use as entertainment and media professionals than we can do. And some projects will cheap out, or want to avoid real emotional vulnerability, and hope the audience will connect with a machine like they tend to with human performance. The human part of human interactions is still easiest to find by looking for it from humans. Nothing can really change that without shredding what we thing the word "human" means. An imitation might be mistaken for a thing itself, but as long as the word "imitation" has meaning, there will still be a difference.

Being our esoteric selves is, and probably to some extent always has been, the key to building our creativity, and voice, and career. AI may sharpen that reality, but it didn't invent it and I doubt any machine can human better than a human can.

Will some video production houses take a hit? Sure, and that is hard, and probably unhealthy for the entire ecosystem. There was nothing wrong with having industrials and other not-demanding-full-humanity projects paying the bills (an HR compliance video is probably not intended to touch our hearts and minds with the depth many motion pictures try to), only now it may be less possible. The math for a business may be, as Alex Darke suggests, getting tighter. And as he says:

"I keep coming back to one idea: the video was never really the product.

What brands are actually buying - when they hire a production company - is judgment. Taste. The ability to translate a business objective into a story that moves people. Those things aren’t in the prompt. They’re in the years of pattern recognition that precede it."

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) threatens to replace us, doubling down on our humanity, our squishy, is likely the best way forward, maybe our only way forward.

© Copyright May 6, 2026, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

I just wrote this to my Senators (and spoke with my Representative's staff).

Dear Senator and Staff,
I am David August, voter in [zip code].

Short summary:
DHS must enforce constitutional protections in all ways, including via tech interlocks: disabling or failing to enable safety systems on vehicles and equipment should be a federal felony (with years of prison as penalty) to prevent abuse and fatalities.

Longer statement:
DHS must have iron clad, risking-prison-if-they-fail, administrative and engineering systems set up with all their equipment and procedures to stop them from excessive force, civil rights violations and murder. Constitutional Protections must be enforced by both the personnel of DHS and the objects they use. Engineering safety interlocks already exist for many of their systems, pieces of equipment and weapons, and Congress must demand they be used at all times.

For example: DHS components (like ICE and CBP) have purchased, for instance, many Chevy Tahoes. Chevy Tahoes have have built-in pedestrian breaking systems for both the front and rear. These systems help prevent the vehicle from running pedestrians over. Chevy Tahoes also come with build-in top speed limit systems that (using the built in camera and navigation systems) can limit the top speed they’ll go. Taxpayers have already paid for these installed systems, and these systems must have the force of law require their deployment 24/7/365.

The US Congress should pass law that makes it a federal felony (perhaps 5 years in prison) for any one, including all federal personnel and contractors, to disable or fail to use the pedestrian breaking systems on any vehicles they use. We will never want them to be deliberately hitting pedestrians. It should also be a federal felony, with similar consequence, to disable or fail to use the top speed limiters on any vehicles they use. We never want them doing dangerous high speed chases as they have before, to fatal impact.

In the 21st Century, technologies exist to limit how machines may be misused by law enforcement. Before DHS gets another penny, they must be forced, under penalty of prison, to have their devices and gear limit their ability to hurt and kill the public.

[You can write or call your Senators and Representative too.]

© Copyright March 12, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

The Old Professional Roles Email Forward (with no insult meant, good intentions and tongue in cheek):

Producer:
• Leaps Tall Buildings In A Single Bound
• Is More Powerful Than A Locomotive
• Is Faster Than A Speeding Bullet
• Walks On Water
• Gives Policy To God

Director:
• Leaps Short Buildings In A Single Bound
• Is More Powerful Than A Switch Engine
• Is Just As Fast As A Speeding Bullet
• Walks On Water If The Sea Is Calm
• Talks With God

Playwright:
• Leaps Short Buildings With A Running Start
• Is Almost As Powerful As A Switch Engine
• Is Faster Than A Speeding BB
• Swims Well
• Is Occasionally Addressed By God

Actor:
• Makes High Marks On The Wall When Trying To Leap Buildings
• Is Run Over By Locomotives
• Can Sometimes Handle A Gun Without Inflicting Self-Injury
• Dog Paddles
• Talks To Animals

Technicians:
• Runs Into Buildings
• Recognizes Locomotives Two Out Of Three Times
• Is Not Issued Ammunition
• Can Stay Afloat With A Life Preserver
• Talks To Walls

Chorus member:
• Falls Over Doorsteps When Trying To Enter Buildings
• Says, "Look At The Choo-Choo!"
• Wets Self With A Water Pistol
• Plays In Mud Puddles
• Mumbles To Self

Stage Manager:
• Lifts Buildings And Walks Under Them
• Kicks Locomotives Off The Track
• Catches Speeding Bullets In Teeth And Eats Them
• Freezes Water With A Single Glance
• Is GOD

© Copyright March 10, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

A Two-Month-Old’s Agony in ICE Custody

Trigger warning: rage, baby torture, futile pleading to deaf ears

Ice detained a 2 month old baby boy. They have left that baby in respiratory distress for half its life (the entire month in ice custody). If you voted for this, did this baby scare you personally such that you want them struggling for air?

This baby was reportedly choking on his own vomit on Sunday. Do you rejoice that you voted for this two month old, not yet alive when you voted, to have to fight drowning on his own sick now?

If you voted for this, and also go to church, do you imagine God smiles on you for choosing for this baby to choke and struggle, to wheeze and hurt because ice predictably provided no doctors in the medical area where they held this newborn? Do you really think this precious little one, born innocent, is the worst of the worst and do you want them to be tortured in your name? Killed in your name?

Is this the greatness you have wished our country be lowered to? Do this infant’s lungs flooding with fluid make you feel good? Feel safe? Feel powerful and respected? Honorable or righteous? Do you thank God for giving you the power to hurt this child with your vote? With your indifference? Do you smile knowing whatever else you have done in life, you have cast your vote for his pain to grow, for his little lungs to burn and scar, for his tiny body to roil with terror and fear? Nothing else in your life will ever undo that vote (unless you start right now changing your ways, today, this very instant)?

Or do you think you owe this baby, and other babies, and yourself and the world, and God for having made the choice you made that lead directly to this and will lead to worse? Do you have any decency left within you, any glimmer of good, any spark of the divine, that could now fed your rage and regret to behold the wages of your choice, your actions, and could you now fight to make your past wrongs hurt the world less? Or do you revel in the suffering of that little boy who just wants to breathe? Do you wish you could suffocate him yourself?

It is not too late to start working feverishly to undo the harm your vote inflicted and keeps inflicting. Not too late to fight for redemption, to fight for that little boy, and your soul. You wrought this, and you can and should dedicate yourself to unmaking these horrors.

Start now. Or please, I invite you to go choke on your guilt for rest of your miserable life.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/choking-infant-juan-nicol-ices-201649159.html

© Copyright February 17, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

I was struck by this story. It is not quite about the Titanic, but the ship and people that fought to rescue her: The Carpathia.

"Carpathia received Titanic’s distress signal at 12:20am, April 15th, 1912. She was 58 miles away, a distance that absolutely could not be covered in less than four hours.

(Californian’s exact position at the time is…controversial. She was close enough to have helped. By all accounts she was close enough to see Titanic’s distress rockets. It’s uncertain to this day why her crew did not respond, or how many might not have been lost if she had been there. This is not the place for what-ifs. This is about what was done.)

Carpathia’s Captain Rostron had, yes, rolled out of bed instantly when woken by his radio operator, ordered his ship to Titanic’s aid and confirmed the signal before he was fully dressed. The man had never in his life responded to an emergency call. His goal tonight was to make sure nobody who heard that fact would ever believe it.

All of Carpathia’s lifeboats were swung out ready for deployment. Oil was set up to be poured off the side of the ship in case the sea turned choppy; oil would coat and calm the water near Carpathia if that happened, making it safer for lifeboats to draw up alongside her. He ordered lights to be rigged along the side of the ship so survivors could see it better, and had nets and ladders rigged along her sides ready to be dropped when they arrived, in order to let as many survivors as possible climb aboard at once.

I don’t know if his making provisions for there still being survivors in the water was optimism or not. I think he knew they were never going to get there in time for that. I think he did it anyway because, god, you have to hope.

Carpathia had three dining rooms, which were immediately converted into triage and first aid stations. Each had a doctor assigned to it. Hot soup, coffee, and tea were prepared in bulk in each dining room, and blankets and warm clothes were collected to be ready to hand out. By this time, many of the passengers were awake–prepping a ship for disaster relief isn’t quiet–and all of them stepped up to help, many donating their own clothes and blankets.

And then he did something I tend to refer to as diverting all power from life support.

Here’s the thing about steamships: They run on steam. Shocking, I know; but that steam powers everything on the ship, and right now, Carpathia needed power. So Rostron turned off hot water and central heating, which bled valuable steam power, to everywhere but the dining rooms–which, of course, were being used to make hot drinks and receive survivors. He woke up all the engineers, all the stokers and firemen, diverted all that steam back into the engines, and asked his ship to go as fast as she possibly could. And when she’d done that, he asked her to go faster.

I need you to understand that you simply can’t push a ship very far past its top speed. Pushing that much sheer tonnage through the water becomes harder with each extra knot past the speed it was designed for. Pushing a ship past its rated speed is not only reckless–it’s difficult to maneuver–but it puts an incredible amount of strain on the engines. Ships are not designed to exceed their top speed by even one knot. They can’t do it. It can’t be done.

Carpathia’s absolute do-or-die, the-engines-can’t-take-this-forever top speed was fourteen knots. Dodging icebergs, in the dark and the cold, surrounded by mist, she sustained a speed of almost seventeen and a half.

No one would have asked this of them. It wasn’t expected. They were almost sixty miles away, with icebergs in their path. They had a responsibility to respond; they did not have a responsibility to do the impossible and do it well. No one would have faulted them for taking more time to confirm the severity of the issue. No one would have blamed them for a slow and cautious approach. No one but themselves.

They damn near broke the laws of physics, galloping north headlong into the dark in the desperate hope that if they could shave an hour, half an hour, five minutes off their arrival time, maybe for one more person those five minutes would make the difference. I say: three people had died by the time they were lifted from the lifeboats. For all we know, in another hour it might have been more. I say they made all the difference in the world.

This ship and her crew received a message from a location they could not hope to reach in under four hours. Just barely over three hours later, they arrived at Titanic’s last known coordinates. Half an hour after that, at 4am, they would finally find the first of the lifeboats. it would take until 8:30 in the morning for the last survivor to be brought onboard. Passengers from Carpathia universally gave up their berths, staterooms, and clothing to the survivors, assisting the crew at every turn and sitting with the sobbing rescuees to offer whatever comfort they could.

In total, 705 people of Titanic’s original 2208 were brought onto Carpathia alive. No other ship would find survivors.

At 12:20am April 15th, 1912, there was a miracle on the North Atlantic. And it happened because a group of humans, some of them strangers, many of them only passengers on a small and unimpressive steam liner, looked at each other and decided: I cannot live with myself if I do anything less.

I think the least we can do is remember them for it.

-

If I can just add one personal note. I need to emphasize something I only touched on in the original post.

I need to emphasize that Carpathia failed.

A lot of the tags and comments have a tinge of...despair, or guilt, or wistfulness about things like this happening so rarely. Or inadequacy, or just being overwhelmed or unhappy about not being in a position to step up in a comparable way. And I want to gently bring up the fact that this is still the sinking of the Titanic.

They did not get there in time. They did not save the ship. It can be argued that they may not even have saved a single life; we have no way of knowing. This was still a horrific maritime disaster mired in arrogance and incompetence and a lack of care.

If the response to this story shows anything, it shows this: It matters that they tried.

Even though they got there too late, even though the ship still sank. It matters that they tried. The difference between making the best reasonable speed after confirming the seriousness of the situation, and the miracle they pulled off - it matters. It makes all the difference. Even if it made no difference at all. Not one of you read this and concluded that I was stupid for caring so much when the Titanic still sank and all those people still died.

You don’t have to fix the world. You’ll likely be cold and sick and miserable and testy and scared, and unprepared, and in over your head, and entirely too small to be of any real use. It feels stupid, passing out blankets and coffee in the middle of an ice field knowing what just happened. It’s hard to feel anything but useless when all you can do is tap a wireless transmitter and promise help that you know will come too late.

It matters that they fought for those people. It matters that they cared, and it matters that they tried. It matters that they didn’t stop. If it didn’t matter, you wouldn’t have read this far."

Source: mylordshesacactus

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© Copyright February 7, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

Naysayers Say Nay

July 12, 2034: Fremont County, Colorado - Gregory Bovino, serving several life sentences at both the federal and state levels in multiple states, has petitioned the courts asking that he be granted permission to wrestle a wild boar naked, and, if he survives, have the rest of his sentences commuted. He reportedly suggested the unclothed confrontation between him and a wild boar be televised as a pay-per-view event, no word if he'd dedicate the proceeds go to his victims and their surviving family members to help defray on-going medical expenses.

The disgraced former U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent has repeatedly attempted to circumvent the results of trials in six states and a Federal Court in what many stipulate are bids both to escape accountability and to regain the limelight he ardently enjoyed back in 2025 and 2026 while he was Border Patrol Commander at Large and commanded a campaign of mayhem that sickened the nation and world, and began a period that included some of the most grotesque atrocities of the 21st Century so far.

The UN Special Rapporteur on Serious Human Rights Violations in the United States, Accountability, Reconciliation, and the Clarification of the Fate and Whereabouts of Missing Persons dismissed Bovino’s latest petition as frivolous, saying “this effort is further proof he lacks any contrition, and this is him making a mockery of the serious crimes committed by him and at his command.”

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Thousands of former agents who worked for Customs and Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and a half dozen other federal agencies remain incarcerated. The handful not yet captured or killed are still pursued by authorities after being indicted in absentia for various crimes committed during the final years of the now disbanded Department of Homeland Security.

Experts from the Feral Swine Foundation say any wild boar is unlikely to be harmed, beyond mild stomach upset, during a confrontation with a 64 year old naked human. They point out there are several ways the boar would be expected to maul or kill a human in such a context. Public opinion is relatively unified, according to recent polling, that those federal agents, executives and political appointees imprisoned for these crimes remain behind bars and serve out their sentences.

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© Copyright February 7, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.

Planning to kill is bad.

In 2013, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) knew that their agents would sometimes “…intentionally put themselves into the exit path of the vehicle, thereby exposing themselves to additional risk and creating justification for the use of deadly force” (PDF from CBP web server).

Jonathan Ross, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent who (with seeming malice aforethought) shot and killed Renee Good last week, worked for CBP as border patrol from 2007 to 2015.

Since 2015, he has been ICE, and he told a court he has been “…a firearms instructor, an active shooter instructor…a field intelligence officer and…a member of the SWAT team, the St. Paul Special Response Team firearms instructors” for ICE (USA Today). He is the most professional ICE has to offer.

He possibly learned and has taught the method of premeditated murder he appears (in multiple camera angles) to have engaged in last week from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), specifically from and for CBP and ICE.

Seems ICE is trained to escalate things, and to kill civilians. Citizens and civilians are at risk of death and maiming as long as ICE is at large and behaving outside of laws. Civilians cannot be left to face ICE, suffer and die, alone. Local policing forces must enforce the law and be deployed to engage, detain and arrest ICE and CBP. SWAT and/or National Guard seem best trained and equipped to thwart ICE crimes, but someone authroized must take action. Vigilantism will not go well, but so far little beyond vigilantism has been put forward as a solution.

ICE and CBP are designed, and trained, to use deadly force without reasonable cause nor justification. ICE and CBP are now routinely focused on citizens and others alike, outside of their Congressionally created immigration jurisdiction. Since federal authorities have not even attempted to stop ICE and CBP lawlessness, more local authorities must enforce the law. Today.

© Copyright January 15, 2025, David August, all rights reserved davidaugust.com

David August is an award-winning actor, acting coach, writer, director, and producer. He plays a role in the movie Dependent’s Day, and after its theatrical run, it’s now out on Amazon (affiliate link). He has appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC, on the TV show Ghost Town, and many others. His artwork has been used and featured by multiple writers, filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and others to express visually. Off-screen, he has worked at ad agencies, start-ups, production companies, and major studios, helping them tell stories their customers and clients adore. He has guest lectured at USC’s Marshall School of Business about the Internet.