John Sambrook

America Needs a New Parade of Progress: Before “Anti-Clanker” Hysteria Derails the AI Future If you have anything to do with AI check my accurate insights of the future, I have a 97% accuracy rate. Now read this: - In 1936, at the depths of the Great Depression, General Motors did something audacious. It didn’t just sell cars. It sold hope. Charles F. Kettering, GM’s visionary head of research, launched the Parade of Progress, a rolling carnival of tomorrow that brought the future straight to Main Street America. Picture this: a gleaming fleet of custom-built Streamliners (later the iconic red-and-white Futurliners designed by Harley Earl) rolling into towns from Lakeland, Florida, to tiny Midwest hamlets. No ticket required. No hard sell. Just live demonstrations of jet engines, microwave ovens, atomic energy exhibits, 3D sound, chemical miracles, and concepts for safer, faster highways and homes filled with labor-saving wonders. Over three tours spanning 1936 to 1956, the Parade covered more than a million miles, visited 251 cities across the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and even Cuba, and drew 12.5 million visitors in an era when the entire U.S. population was under 130 million. In some small towns, attendance doubled the local population. Families picnicked, kids dreamed of becoming engineers, and a skeptical public left believing progress wasn’t something to fear. It was something to cheer. The brilliance wasn’t just the spectacle. It was the strategy. GM understood that technology only thrives when the public embraces it. The Parade humanized innovation. It showed how new ideas would make life better, safer, and more exciting, not for elites in coastal cities, but for farmers in Iowa and factory workers in Ohio. It turned abstract science into tangible wonder. And it worked spectacularly. It built decades of goodwill for American industry and cemented the cultural narrative that progress equals prosperity. Fast-forward to 2026. The AI and robotics revolution is here, and it’s colliding with a dangerous wave of fear. “Clankers.” That’s the slur you hear now on social media and in the streets, a Star Wars-inspired jab at humanoid robots and delivery bots that’s become shorthand for anti-AI rage. You are about to hear it more than “AI Skip”. oving groups of masked vandals are kicking over sidewalk delivery robots in cities from Berkeley to Chicago. Videos of smashed drones and toppled bots go viral as cathartic entertainment. Polls show American excitement about AI plummeting while fears of job loss, surveillance, and existential risk skyrocket. Paid “doomer” organizations, backed by billions in activist money, are flooding the airwaves with apocalyptic warnings. Their goal? Turn public anxiety into votes. This isn’t fringe noise. It’s coalescing into a political movement that will climax in the 2028 elections. Anti-Clanker sentiment is already being weaponized: calls for bans, heavy regulation, and “robot taxes.” If tech companies don’t act, the U.S. risks handing its lead in AI and robotics to competitors on a silver platter, not because our tech is inferior, but because our culture turned hostile. The contrast with China couldn’t be starker, or more alarming. While American streets see masked gangs attacking delivery drones, China is staging massive public spectacles that draw hundreds of thousands of enthusiastic spectators. Beijing’s World Humanoid Robot Games featured over 500 robots from 16 countries competing in soccer, sprinting, boxing, and more, in packed arenas where crowds cheered every stumble and triumph like it was the Olympics. Humanoid robots raced half-marathons alongside humans, with families lining the routes, waving flags, and posting proud videos. These aren’t sterile lab demos; they’re national festivals celebrating the future. China’s message is clear: Robots are cool. Robots are progress. Robots are ours. 1 of 2

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei: “50% of all tech jobs, entry-level lawyers, consultants, and finance professionals will be completely wiped out within 1–5 years.”