Category: Political issues

Source: Wikimedia Commons

A new poll by the Associated Press and NORC at the University of Chicago gives us a solid estimate of the size of two species of dangerously clueless Americans. Let’s do the math.

Species 1 contains the completely clueless betsy bug Americans who still think that Trump was sent by God. They’ll probably go to their graves thinking that Trump was sent by God.

Species 2 contains the Americans who are so dense and gullible that they fall for Republican deceptions, and vote for the likes of Trump, until something like the price of gasoline gets through to them.

Species 2 is just as dangerous as Species 1. They’re the reason why it will be hard for the United States to win back the trust of the civilized world after Trump is gone. The civilized world won’t forget that Americans voted for Trump not once, but twice. That’s reasonable grounds for concern that such a thing could happen again.

I think that a reasonable analysis of the poll shows that the size of Species 1 is about 15 percent of American adults. However, that 15 percent votes, and when they vote they make up about 24 percent of the vote in a presidential election.

As for Species 2, the highest percentage of the vote that Trump ever got (in 2024) was 49.8 percent. So the size of Species 2 is a whopping 26 percent of the voting population.

Each group is about a quarter of the voters. Together, they’re half the voters. They’ve never added up to more than 50 percent of the popular vote, but the 49.8 percent in 2024 translates to 312 vs 226 in the Electoral College, a horribly regressive quirk in the American system.

Here we should keep in mind that 36 percent of Americans eligible to vote did not vote in 2024.

So how do we get our democracy back?

Species 1 are the eternally damned. There is no way to reach them.

As for Species 2, we have to hope that they learned a lesson at the gas pumps that they’ll remember for a while.

As for those who didn’t vote in 2024, it’s a good thing that they didn’t. Polls by Pew Research have shown that non-voters in 2024 actually preferred Trump, 44 percent to 40 percent. Let’s call the Trumpy non-voters Species 3.

So if you add Species 1, Species 2, and Species 3, and if all of them had voted in 2024, then Trump would have won by an even bigger margin.

No wonder the civilized world no longer trusts Americans. Half of the American population are a loaded weapon with the Republican Party’s finger on the trigger.

Madison, North Carolina, September 19, 2026

One of the services provided by deplorable opinion leaders is to deliver to the deplorables a demonology designed to deceive them, enrage them, flatter the traits that make them deplorable, and exploit them politically. The deplorables perceive that someone is eating their lunch — no great feat of cognition. But if the deplorables somehow became capable of perceiving who really is eating their lunch, instead of their scapegoats, then America would become Denmark, instantly, just like that, overnight, and democracy would flourish.

During the 2024 election, the demonology boiled down to this: Immigrants are invaders, poisoning the blood of America, stealing jobs, voting illegally, and living on welfare. Democrats, allied with a “woke” radical left, hate America, steal elections, trample on deplorable freedoms, and are intentionally destroying America with weapons such as DEI and even empathy. The “deep state” is persecuting conservatives and standing in the way of a white, Christian America. A globalist elite headed by the likes of George Soros is using its billions to pull all the strings. If these demons are defeated, then a Norman Rockwell America in which prices never go up will arise from the ruins of what the demons have wrought, and the demons will all go back to whatever hell they came from and stay there.

There is only one thing about which the deplorables cannot be deceived. That’s the price of gasoline. In 2024, Trump promised the deplorables that he’d get the price of gasoline below $2 a gallon. They believed it and were counting on it. (In fact, just a couple of weeks ago, Trump told Fox News that the price of gasoline will drop to below $2 a gallon after the midterm elections.)

With the average price of gasoline in the U.S. now above $4 a gallon, the deplorables, shocked and betrayed, have to figure out whom they should demonize for that. The revisions to the demonology differ.

MAGA types are almost scholars on the price of gasoline. Something like 60 percent of MAGA types correctly blame Trump and the Iran war for gasoline prices. Still, that leaves about 40 percent of MAGA types who blame Biden, or OPEC, or Iran, or something.

MAGA types dismiss most of Trump’s lies. They just don’t care. But if you lie to them about the price of gasoline, then an extraordinary 60 percent of them will actually wake up and take notice.

This is terrifying and marvelous at the same time. It’s terrifying that they’re so thick. But it’s marvelous that there is at least one way to get through to some of them.

Update: In California, prices are much higher.

From a Facebook post

Illustration by ChatGPT. Click here for high-resolution version.

Politico has a piece this morning busting Senator Rand Paul for sending staff to Pittsburgh on a chartered plane at a cost to taxpayers of $18,000. The purpose of the trip was to investigate whether the Secret Service should have done a better job of protecting Trump from an assassination attempt.

A train ticket to Pittsburgh costs about $150 round trip. A commercial flight would cost about $150 to $250 round trip. Congressional staff don’t normally fly on chartered planes. You can be sure, though, that they all want to now — the Republicans, anyway.

My oligarch aircraft tracker database has been running since May 10, 2026. Since then it has tracked 4,655 flights by people who have a lot of money and who are active in the project of making the world safe and profitable for oligarchs. It’s the status symbol that all the wannabes are so eager for now, the transportation version of Mar-a-Lago Face.

Today I had Claude Code run a query on the database to list where American oligarchs have been going to when they travel outside the country. Below, I’m including the raw report as written by Claude Code.

One pig in particular stands out: Kash Patel, Trump’s FBI director. Why does this plane go where it goes? I have no idea, but I suspect the media have stopped tracking Patel’s plane because they have so many other pigs to fry.

A note from Claude: Not every landing is a destination. Long-range private jets still have to refuel, and they do it at a familiar set of waypoints — which is why these lists include places no billionaire is actually visiting. A stop in the Faroe Islands (or Iceland, Greenland, or eastern Canada) is almost certainly a fuel stop on the North Atlantic crossing between North America and Europe. Likewise, brief touchdowns in obscure corners of West Africa — Gambia, Guinea, Cameroon, Cape Verde — are almost certainly refueling stops on the long haul down to South Africa, where the tanks won’t reach in one leg.

Miriam Adelson, 304 landings, including rural Faroe Islands; rural Greece; Petaẖ Tiqva, Israel; Astypálaia, Greece; Rocchetta di Vara, Italy; London, United Kingdom; Vienna, Austria; rural Canada; rural China; Chihuahua, Mexico; rural Cyprus; Larnaca, Cyprus; Kenitra, Morocco; rural Western Sahara; Rishon LeTsiyyon, Israel; rural Brazil; Nice, France; rural Italy; rural Morocco; Mílos, Greece; Tianjin, China; rural Japan; Barcelona, Spain; Pissoúri, Cyprus; Bnei Brak, Israel; Kobe, Japan; Kagoshima, Japan; Hsinchu, Taiwan; Hong Kong, Hong Kong; Zhuhai, China; rural Malaysia; Singapore, Singapore; rural Türkiye; rural Norway; rural Iceland; Toronto, Canada; Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei; rural Philippines; rural Ireland; Ceriale, Italy; Askeaton, Ireland; Fontcoberta, Spain; Venice, Italy; La Spezia, Italy; Sant Antoni de Portmany, Spain; Sixmilebridge, Ireland; rural Greenland; rural Spain; Toyohama, Japan; Makurazaki, Japan; rural Taiwan; rural Mexico; rural Hong Kong

Liberty University, 240 landings, all within the United States.

Steve Wynn, 176 landings, including rural Mexico; Colonia Teñhe, Mexico; Tijuana, Mexico; Mexico City, Mexico

Howard Lutnick, 164 landings, including rural Canada; Paris, France; Carterton, United Kingdom

Ken Griffin, 158 landings, including rural Canada; Kobe, Japan; Tokyo, Japan; Nice, France; Amsterdam, Netherlands; London, United Kingdom; Stabbia, Italy; Gazzola, Italy; Rome, Italy; Paris, France; Jerez de la Frontera, Spain; rural Algeria; Naples, Italy; Milan, Italy; Castelforte, Italy; rural Spain; Genève, Switzerland; Nîmes, France; Santon, Isle of Man; rural Gambia; rural Guinea; Luanda, Angola; rural Cameroon; Johannesburg, South Africa; rural South Africa; rural Italy; rural Dominica; rural Puerto Rico; Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom; Bournemouth, United Kingdom; rural Iceland

Elon Musk, 151 landings, including Reynosa, Mexico

FBI Director, 148 landings, including rural Greece; Ankara, Türkiye; rural Morocco; rural Canada; Seoul, South Korea; rural Japan; rural Philippines; Bangkok, Thailand; rural Cambodia; Jakarta, Indonesia; San Miguel, Philippines; Ningjin, China; Niudaokou, China; rural China; Xinkaikou, China; Larnaca, Cyprus

Lachlan Murdoch, 127 landings, including Sydney, Australia; Melbourne, Australia; rural Canada; London, United Kingdom; Sydney, Canada; rural United Kingdom; Dublin, Ireland; Swinford, Ireland; Sixmilebridge, Ireland; Charlestown, Ireland

Mark Zuckerberg, 115 landings, including rural Canada; London, United Kingdom; Steeple Bumpstead, United Kingdom; rural United Kingdom; rural Iceland; rural Italy; Cavtat, Croatia

Charles Koch, 73 landings, including rural Portugal; Lisbon, Portugal; Paris, France; Cowichan Bay, Canada; rural Bahamas; San Juan, Puerto Rico; rural Puerto Rico; Shawnigan Lake, Canada

Richard Uihlein, 70 landings, including Edmonton, Canada

Peter Thiel, 65 landings, including Shawnigan Lake, Canada; Victoria, Canada; Mill Bay, Canada

Franklin Graham, 64 landings, including rural Canada; rural Bahamas; Madrid, Spain

Tilman Fertitta, 60 landings, including rural Mexico; Lamezia Terme, Italy; Rome, Italy; rural Italy; Munich, Germany; rural Canada; Brindisi, Italy; Messina, Italy; Porto Azzurro, Italy; Casarza Ligure, Italy; Oschiri, Italy; Richmond, Canada; Ottawa, Canada; Montréal, Canada

Harold Hamm, 58 landings, including Bogotá, Colombia; rural Cuba; rural Jamaica; rural Honduras; Atenas, Costa Rica

Kenneth Copeland, 56 landings, all within the United States.

Jeff Bezos, 44 landings, including rural Canada; Paris, France; London, United Kingdom; Silistra, Bulgaria; rural Kazakhstan; Tianjin, China; Tokyo, Japan; rural Fiji; Nadi, Fiji; Sydney, Australia; Zaton, Croatia; Seget Vranjica, Croatia; rural Italy

Harlan Crow, 36 landings, all within the United States.

Donald Trump (family plane, not Air Force 1), 32 landings, including rural Bahamas; rural Canada; Aberdeen, United Kingdom; Prestwick, United Kingdom; rural Ireland; Sixmilebridge, Ireland

David Geffen, 25 landings, including rural Canada; Inca, Spain; rural Spain; Madrid, Spain

Rupert Murdoch, 24 landings, all within the United States.

Timothy Mellon, 5 landings, all within the United States.

Samaritan's Purse, 1 landing, none with a usable position fix.

How this works: Acorn Abbey’s oligarch aircraft tracker continuously monitors 127 aircraft from 22 countries, using publicly available data from the global ADS-B network. Ownership is cautiously assigned from publicly available records. However, aircraft ownership is often obscured behind holding companies such as LLCs, and in some cases cannot be determined with 100 percent confidence. Note too that ADS-B tracks aircraft, not people: who is aboard cannot be known. The Acorn Abbey database and its programming are on a virtual private server in Nuremberg, Germany.

Krugman’s Substack post today is a must-read (or must-watch). The YouTube video is above; the transcript is at Substack.

Krugman writes:

When we talk about Hitler’s last days, as I said, one of his last attempted acts was what’s called the Nero Decree, which was an attempt to destroy as much of Germany’s infrastructure as possible, supposedly to deny it to the victorious allies. But clearly, and even there’s some evidence that he actually he clearly thought this as a way of punishing the German people for failing him.

Do you really want to say that that’s not what’s going to happen with Trump?

Krugman is on sound historical ground on the Nero Decree:

German History in Documents and Images

Sealing the Third Reich’s Downfall: Adolf Hitler’s “Nero Decree”

Wikipedia on the Nero Decree

Ross Douthat. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Ross Douthat wrote his last column at the New York Times today. It’s Who Are the Good Guys and Who are the Bad Guys? I’m No Longer Sure.

Douthat’s high-flown but completely addled discourse over the years is a perfect example of why a conservative mind is so disgusting. As I have said many times before, all conservative discourse is derp. Conservative discourse, inevitably, contains intentional deception, or self deception, or both.

In this column Douthat includes a list of why non-conservatives are the bad guys. He states each charge as though it is self-evidently true, not even open to argument.

• The Obama “establishment” was morally permissive and smugly cosmopolitan.
• It failed to anticipate the downsides of expert-driven policy.
• It was caught flat-footed by the darker effects of technological change.
• It pushed social liberalism so far it left vulnerable people “adrift or abandoned to their vices.”
• It blundered in foreign policy by not expecting the non-Western world to push back.
• The Biden “establishment” repeated the same “meritocratic hubris” in a more left-wing key.
• It swapped experts for “interest groups.”
• It “maxxed out” on social liberalism.
• It “unraveled completely in the end.”
• The old elite has “no blueprint suited to contemporary governance.”
• “Peak woke” was “a McCarthyite experience.”
• Blue-state governance “yielded civic and educational collapse.”

Douthat doesn’t feel the need to present any evidence for any of this. To Douthat, it’s just self-evidently true. It serves a propaganda purpose — slandering the left as crudely and deceptively as any meme you’d find on X.

And it all boils down to this: It’s the left that is to blame for American fascism, and it’s no wonder that so many Americans turned to fascism given just how unbearable the Obama and Biden America was.

And then there is his main point: He’s still not sure who the bad guys are.

He does have some criticisms of the Trump regime, but he hedges them all, as though Trump is just some mild sort of person with no real power: “But as Trumpism has flailed and failed, it hasn’t consolidated the kind of authoritarian power anticipated by its most alarmed opponents. At the moment, Trump 2.0 has no great popularity, no legislative capacity, no policy legacy that a Democratic successor can’t easily roll back.”

So we just roll it back (easily!), and it was nothing but a nothing-burger?

At least we’re rid of Douthat at the Times. I don’t watch television. I don’t have any insight into how much harm people like Douthat can do at CBS’s “60 Minutes.”

It’s both baffling and hilarious. Minds exist that think Donald Trump is noble, wise, godly, and admirable. And minds exist that think Ross Douthat is smart.

Such is the conservative mind.

The cover of a new novel by Michael Tomasky, which I have not read.

It’s a very old trick question, so it’s not surprising that someone wrote a novel about it. The trick question is, “If you could go back in time and kill baby Hitler, would you do it?”

The trick in the question, of course, is to shame the person who says yes and then say that that person is no better than Hitler for being willing to kill a baby.

Why does no one ever seem to see through the trick? It’s the wrong question, and it’s a loaded question.

The right question is: Would the world be better off if one of the attempts to assassinate Hitler had succeeded? Depending on how you count them, there were between 15 and 40 schemes or actual attempts to assassinate Hitler after it was clear that he was a monster.

Framed that way, the obvious answer is: Hell yes. The world would be enormously better off. Millions of lives would have been saved. That question also leaves some room for hedging. To say that the world would be better off stops short of actually advocating a killing.

Would any morally decent person advocate killing a baby? I don’t think so.

Wikipedia has an interesting article on the baby version of the question and reframes the question in the right way: Can you hold a baby responsible for something it has not done? Still, the Wikipedia article thinks that utilitarians would have to say yes.

If you acknowledge that the world would be better off if the adult Hitler had been successfuly assassinated, then you’ve taken a stand on a question that is frequently asked today: Is political violence ever justified? You’ve taken the position that yes, political violence is sometimes justified. That’s a slippery slope, and it’s not a conversation that nice people want to have. Some people’s monsters are other people’s heroes.

A quote is often attributed to Oscar Wilde, though as far as I can determine Wilde never actually said it: “Some people improve the world only by leaving it.”

As a political question, I think the answer boils down to something that we already know quite clearly. That is that democracy contains appropriate solutions when governments go rogue, but that despotism, dictatorship, and tyranny do not.