What Is the Speed of Dark?

If everyone talks about the speed of light, how come no one really talks about the speed of dark? Stored somewhere in my high school brain, I happen to know that the speed of light is approximately 186,000 miles per second. Which is pretty fast. But the speed of light is the stuff of space age advancement. Or science fiction...hyperdrive, warp speed, ludicrous or plaid speed....You know what I mean. 

But what about the speed of dark? How long does it take a devastatingly bad action to travel from idea to horrifying reality? I thought a brief timeline dive into early Nazi Germany might be useful:

1928: The Nazis got less than 3% of the national vote in the parliamentary election

1930: The Nazis won 18% of the national vote. They promised to

• fix the economy and put people back to work;
• return Germany to the status of a great European and world power
• regain territory Germany had lost in World War I
• create a strong authoritarian German government

1933: 

• January 30th, German President Paul von Hindenburg appoints Hitler Chancellor of Germany.
• March 22nd: Dachau opened to contain Nazi regime opponents
• April 1:  Nazis initiate nationwide boycott of Jewish-owned businesses and  professionals,
• April 7th: Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service is used to bar Jews and other political opponents from government employment, universities, and state positions.

That's just 66 days between the elevation of Hitler to Chancellor and the first laws to be put in place. 

It took a took another 859 days until September 15, 1933, the date The Nuremburg Laws stripping German citizenship from all Jews was enacted. 

Another 2,276 days days passed before Chełmno, one of the five camps designated for the Final Solution, began exterminating Jew on December 8th, 1941. Just so you know, on September 2, 1942, the Nazi called for the children under ten, the elderly, and the ill to be surrendered for "relocation." They were all summarily executed at Chełmno

That's a grand total of 3,234 days between the elevation of Hitler to Chancellor to the operation of the first Final Solution camp. 

8 years.

 10 months. 

8 days.  

Just a little more than 2 consecutive presidential terms. 

But that was then, this is now, you say. 

Since January 20th, 2025, Feckless Felon has signed over 277 executive orders. You can read about the scope on Ballotpedia's Donald Trump's executive orders and actions, 2025-2026. I just read through a bunch of them and, quite frankly, many of them do not serve the health and welfare of this nation...they bolster his personal wealth, his friends' personal wealth, and target the least able to afford basics like health care.  

Just to cite an example, my absolute favorite has to be Executive Order 14183 of January 27, 2025 Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness. This is a life-destroying, anti-military order predicated on his personal fear of homosexuality and transgender recognition. It is possibly the most heinous, neanderthal vivisection, most bullshit attack on our own fighting forces:

Recently, however, the Armed Forces have been afflicted with radical gender ideology to appease activists unconcerned with the requirements of military service like physical and mental health, selflessness, and unit cohesion. Longstanding Department of Defense (DoD) policy (DoD Instruction (DoDI) 6130.03) provides that it is the policy of the DoD to ensure that service members are “[f]ree of medical conditions or physical defects that may reasonably be expected to require excessive time lost from duty for necessary treatment or hospitalization.” As a result, many mental and physical health conditions are incompatible with active duty, from conditions that require substantial medication or medical treatment to bipolar and related disorders, eating disorders, suicidality, and prior psychiatric hospitalization.

Using this categorically lie-laden excuse, he has terminated ultra-qualifies officers, leaving gaping holes in our nation's preparedness. This is nothing more than a Nuremberg law dressed in 21st century clothing. What's next for the non-hetero population? Repealing marriage laws? Oh, wait, there are people already trying to do that. SCOTUS has, amazingly enough, declined to hear the Kim Davis Appeal. The former Kentucky county clerk asked the Supreme Court to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, but the justices declined to hear the case in November 2025, leaving marriage equality as the law of the land. But we all know it ain't gonna stop there. In at least 9 states, legislators have filed bills and resolutions trying to get state law to overturn same-sex marriage. 

But that's not enough damage for him  because it doesn't directly fill his own pockets. Nope. To do that, he has to create EOs that apply directly to him and his cronies.

 

Executive Order 14233 on March 6, 2025 Establishment of the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and United States Digital Asset Stockpile is one that defies any pretense at logic. Serious legal and ethical issues are raised by this executive order since it allows Feckless Felon and his family to profit massively. But did that stop him? Nope. The House Judiciary Committee issued a report, Trump, Crypto, and a New Age of Corruption, excoriating this EO. They raise the following concerns:

• President Trump and his family have earned hundreds of millions of dollars and added billions to their net worth through a network of cryptocurrency ventures launched during and after the 2024 campaign, including World Liberty Financial and the $TRUMP memecoin.
   
• The Trump family’s crypto ventures have attracted substantial investments from foreign nationals and state-linked entities seeking to curry favor with the Administration—raising severe constitutional, ethical, and national security concerns.
   
• The Trump Administration has intervened to halt or terminate federal investigations and enforcement actions involving multiple cryptocurrency firms that have donated to the President or invested in his companies, including Coinbase, Gemini, Robinhood, Ripple, Crypto.com, Uniswap, Yuga Labs, and Kraken.
   
• Trump has issued pardons and rolled back sanctions for known bad actors that have provided financial support to his ventures.
   
• The Administration has systematically dismantled anti-corruption and financial integrity safeguards, including dissolving the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team (NCET), and repealing investor protection rules adopted during the Biden Administration—moves that have directly advanced the President’s personal financial interests. 

And it's also worth noting, President Felon has revoked over 100 Executive Orders from previous administrations, mostly dealing with civil rights and equal opportunity actions, rollbacks of multilingual services, mandate rollbacks for medical services including COVID and other vaccinations. The list keeps rolling along, killing shorelines, wildlife habitat, sacred lands, whatever stands in the way of the almighty buck.

Look, no empire has survived into the modern age. The most recent examples...the British, the Ottoman, the Austro-Hungarian, or even the Chinese all crumbled in the face of growing technology. Power to the people wasn't about physical prowess; power was the intellectual and scientific capabilities that plowed under the old regimes. Just look at Russia struggling to regain its former expansionist existence. It can't do it. 

Feckless seems to think annexing Greenland or renaming the Gulf of Mexico or Lake Ontario, or even Canada will give him power, will make him look like a conquering hero. Not even Viagra will help him look like anything but a doddering old fool with delusions of grandeur.

But that still doesn't answer my original question. What is the speed of dark? 

The speed of dark happens when the social safety nets collapse around the population and the population must seek survival elsewhere. That can happen fast...or it can be a prolonged experience made infinitely worse by the refusal of those in power to recognize this is a real problem. Like Social Security running outta money by 2033. We, the People, pay for Social Security by investing our own money in the program. Occam's razor could apply here... that the simplest fix is probably the right one: adjust the wage cap to have more people on the higher end paying in. It's not like they cannot afford to keep paying in like the rest of us working stiffs.  But that would significantly impact the longevity of the program for those who need it and rely on it most. The speed of dark will happen when that social safety net breaks and millions die as a result of a new, unnecessary form of poverty. 

Maybe, the speed of dark is the time it takes for a government to stop caring about its citizens enough to protect them. Living spaces...be they empires, countries, city states, towns, or villages  collapse when the residents can no longer afford to live there. When living in a particular place becomes so much of a hardship that safety is completely and totally compromised, people leave. Fast. They don't hang around for the afterparty UNLESS they are prevented from leaving altogether. But that's a different story.

In my most humble opinion, I do think the speed of dark in any society is predicated on its inability to respond to the basic needs of its population. That apparently is a lesson no one is willing to learn.

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

Friday night begins Rosh HaShanah, our Jewish New Year.

Out goes 5787 and in comes 5788.

May you all be inscribed in the Book of Life

for a happy, healthy, and sweet New Year.