Rosemary Smith is the Managing Director of the Getting Better Foundation. Her background in media, marketing, and communications is well suited to further GBF’s mission of building trust through education about positive human progress and behavior.
In 2015, Getting Better Foundation (GBF) was formed with the objective of “Building trust through truth” with the strategy of helping people understand how to properly consume media.
GBF founder Joe Phelps believed then, as he does now, that media literacy helps to find the truth and protects us from mis- and dis-information.
“The more people trust one another, the more they are willing to help one another. Trust is the foundation of civilization and creates upward spirals.”
In 2020 GBF finished the production of “Trust Me,” a feature documentary about the problems caused by media illiteracy and for the film to to help raise the awareness of the need for media literacy. Recently, “Trust Me” received the Walter Cronkite Excellence in Journalism award for the feature film and its educational program written by the News Literacy Project. The film and curriculum serve as guides for schools, universities, and for all of us as parents and grandparents.
"Trust Me" brings awareness of people's need for media literacy to build trust, lessen polarization, and preserve democracy. Oscar-nominated Roko Belic traveled the world filming true stories where a lack of media literacy led to crisis, like the New Zealand parents who nearly lost their son due to misinformation they’d read online. Or, a young professional man killed by a Murki, a lynch mob in India, because the community circulated misinformation about a kidnapper on WhatsApp. Or the Chicago parents who are afraid to let their children play outdoors for fear of them being “taken.” And good news stories from schools seeing declines in student anxiety, depression and suicidology since implementing media literacy in classrooms. Roko then interviewed experts in psychology, journalism, and media literacy, who explain why our brains respond to sensational media. These experts then provide tools for us to use to become more resilient and collaborative.
The film has become a darling of the U.S. State Department who has declared media literacy a strategic defense priority.... screening the movie at embassies, universities, schools, and American Corners globally.
This first clip is called "Foreign Interference in Democracy." It demonstrates how war mongering governments like Vladimir Putin's, have been waging cyber conflict for decades. Experts then explain how we can identify online manipulation, abstain from “liking” and “clicking” on mal-information, and how we might protect others.
The full film is streaming here. All of the licensing and streaming fees go toward the 501c3 non-profit Getting Better Foundation and are utilized for media literacy.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.