Special Episode of We The Builders from @HillValleyForum 2026: Conversation with David Friedberg (@friedberg) on rise and fall of empires, the state of US economy, robots as an economic platform, what has changed since the Winning AI Race Summit featuring President Trump, reindustrialization, the end of institutional education and of course the California bankruptcy. Timestamps: 01:21 - Shifting landscape between Silicon Valley and DC 02:51 - AI has become a political attack vector 04:46 - Late-stage empires and the impact of national debt 07:03 - Potential for AI to rewrite the story of US economy 08:26 - AI’s recent performance and productivity gains 10:03 - Bullish outlook on humanoid robots 11:16 - Robots as a platform for economic mobility 13:41 - Reindustrialization and energy production challenges 15:15 - The “functionally bankrupt” status of California 16:50 - The declining value of institutional education 18:46 - Personalized AI-driven tutoring as the future 20:01 - Emerging private sector models for education