Author: hamilton1788

During Trump’s first term, I used to say that the man’s many vices were mitigated, not by his virtues (does he even have any?), but by his other vices; he’s lazy, easily distracted, and vain, which makes it easier to shield him from his most destructive impulses. This time around, however, he is surrounded by minions who will work single-mindedly to make those impulses a reality. That’s why Trump 2.0 combines the worst features of both Trump 1.0 and a hypothetical DeSantis administration.

“All of the buildings and all of the costs/Were once just a dream in somebody’s head.”—-Peter Gabriel, “Mercy Street”

After you have determined what criteria you will use to determine what is true and what is false, the next logical question is one of causation. Was the visible universe created by an all-powerful intelligence transcending human understanding, or is it all there is? In other words, are you an idealist or a materialist?

Consider the quote from Peter Gabriel. Every building is a product of an infinite number of decisions, and not just from the owner, builder, and architect; it includes everything about the economic and social systems that made its construction possible. The material components of it are just inert parts of the planet. Are we to believe that the ultimate driving force behind the building is the raw materials for steel and glass?

Materialism has some intellectual appeal; it is simpler than idealism, and it avoids what I call the animal problem (more on that in a future post). It lacks a satisfactory answer to what I call the Joan of Arc problem (also to be discussed later), however, and it is contrary to my personal experience. Put me in the idealist camp.

The playing field is tilted against the Democrats in the Senate in 2026. On paper, the blue team needs to flip four seats to regain control. In reality, barring an economic collapse in the next two years, this is highly unlikely. The good news, however, is that Collins and Murkowski aren’t reliable GOP votes, so the Democrats really only need to flip two seats outside of Maine to deny Trump the approval he will seek for his most radical nominees. Which seats could these be?

The open seat in North Carolina is the most obvious opportunity. The second choice would probably be Ohio, particularly if Sherrod Brown decides to run against Vance’s appointed successor. Brown is a proven vote-getter, and he could have some success campaigning against the spending cuts in the BBB. I also suspect that Ramaswamy will be the GOP candidate for governor; given his anti-worker prejudices and rhetoric, he could well be a drag on the ticket for the right. On the other hand, Brown is a vocal supporter of tariffs, so his position on Trump’s protectionism will have to be nuanced, and nuance doesn’t usually play well in elections.

The bottom line here is that wrestling effective control of the Senate away from Trump would have some real benefits for the Democrats and the country, and the outlook is best described as partly cloudy. That’s not as good as sunny, but it could be a lot worse.

Given Trump’s poor approval ratings and the likelihood of further economic turbulence in the future, the Democrats will go into 2026 as the slight favorites to win the House even if extreme GOP gerrymandering efforts prove successful. It is an outcome that Trump clearly fears. Should he?

If the Democrats do, in fact, retake the House, you can expect to see a series of constitutional and fiscal crises for the following two years. The blue team will conduct investigations; Trump will stonewall them. The House will shut down the government; Trump won’t care. Trump will impound funds, the House majority will litigate, and the final decision will be left to Mr. Trump’s poodle, a/k/a the Supreme Court. It won’t be a pretty sight.

In short, the House will become a perfect foil for Trump and Vance, who will blame it for all of the problems they have actually caused themselves with their mass deportations, tax cuts, and tariffs. As a result, I submit to you that a House that stays under the nominal (but not effective) control of the GOP would actually be the better result for the blue team.

This afternoon, President Trump announced that he had fired all of the tens of thousands of teachers of science classes in the United States. Why? Because they persisted in instructing their students about the laws of gravity.

A spokesman for the administration told the media that Trump, in his eternal awesomeness, transcended anything which previously passed for a law of physics. In the new administration, unlike any of the old ones, things would go up and never come down. Anyone suggesting otherwise was clearly woke and richly deserved to be fired.

A representative for the teachers stated that a lawsuit was imminent, as Trump has no authority to fire them. The issue will ultimately be resolved by the Supreme Court, most likely on the emergency docket without an opinion.

Today’s jobs report was bad for July and worse for the previous two months. In the meantime, inflation has ticked up a bit. In other words, the evidence now shows that stagflation is here.

Trump won’t acknowledge that his tariffs and deportations are responsible for this, of course. He will blame Jerome Powell and Biden, because that’s what he does. If that doesn’t work, he can bring back the argument that the hypothetical long-term economic gains justify the short-term pain or go back to saying our kids should just learn to live with fewer imported dolls.

The tariffs are just beginning to bite. Things are going to get worse before they get better. Your job is to remember what the baseline was on January 20 and respond accordingly.

UPDATE: Trump is firing the employee who is responsible for compiling the bad employment numbers. I didn’t think of that alternative. I probably should have.

A pretty extreme GOP right-winger, Ralph Norman, is running for governor of South Carolina. In the speech opening his campaign, he blasted the mess and the corruption in Columbia. That’s standard practice, right?

Except that the current governor of South Carolina is a very conservative Republican, and the entirety of state government is similarly controlled by conservative Republicans. So what does this mean?

The populist outsider reflex of the GOP is so strong, it can’t be abandoned even when it is applied against people with a virtually identical bent. Imagine what that will imply for the Florida governor race, as well. I can’t wait to see Ron DeSantis attacked as a corrupt insider by candidates outside of his orbit.

Historically, as a result of some highly publicized scandals, American sports organizations did their best to build a wall between their events and gambling. In the end, they failed and embraced gambling instead; the sums involved were just too great to ignore. Commercials for gaming companies are now ubiquitous, even on regular network TV.

In professional sports, the assumption presumably was that the players were so highly paid, they wouldn’t risk being banned by consorting with gamblers. As fans of one of my teams, the Guardians, can attest, that assumption was always questionable at best. But what about collegiate athletes? The vast majority of them have no future in professional sports. In addition, they increasingly have few sentimental ties to their schools and view themselves as employees. What is to prevent them from taking the risk in exchange for big money? Not much.

I predict there will be a major gambling scandal in college sports, probably in NCAA basketball, within the next few years. It’s going to happen; it’s just a question of when.

I happened to notice that the vehicles identified in a couple of national Toyota commercials were 2024 models. It’s the middle of 2025, and the 2026 model year should be with us soon. What does this mean?

It means Toyota is scraping the bottom of the barrel of its inventory–the cars they haven’t been able to sell for two years–because those cars weren’t subject to tariffs. At some point, the company will run out of that kind of lackluster inventory, and prices will have to go up.

In other words, if you were thinking that the concern about tariffs and stagflation was just so much hot air, think again.

Ron DeSantis desperately wants to be our next president, but he looks like a dead man walking; he’ll be out of a job with no obvious landing place after next year, and the base hasn’t forgiven him for his premature challenge to their hero. It was hard to see much of a future for him.

But Alligator Alcatraz might have changed all that. Cruelty to illegal immigrants is Trump’s calling card; who among the potential candidates in 2028 now has more credibility on that issue than DeSantis?

I still don’t like his chances. He has all of the personal shortcomings that helped derail his candidacy last time, and he is clearly not Trump’s anointed successor. In addition, his record in Florida will not be above scrutiny, particularly on issues relating to insurance and growth. But his case is not completely hopeless.

Emil Bove denies that he’s Trump’s “henchman,” but the record strongly suggests otherwise. The willingness of the GOP Senate to confirm him consequently proves that there will be no red lines in the judicial nomination process. Trump will get anyone he wants–period.

It is possible, of course, that Bove will turn into a 21st century version of Becket and show some independence in order to address the fears of his many critics. As the saying goes, however, hope is not a strategy. Flipping the Senate seat in North Carolina would be a good start in the process of keeping him off the Supreme Court.

Assume that Volkswagen helps implement the trade deal by investing billions of dollars in new plant and equipment in the US. That’s a big win for Trump, right?

Except that VW won’t have any interest in making huge investments to build a kind of car that has no future anywhere except in the US. The cars built in the new plants will be EVs–the car that Trump hates.

Per Politico, “EU admits it can’t guarantee $600 billion promise to Trump.” Who knew?

“Europe” can’t really make enforceable promises to buy “American” energy, either. Neither can “Japan.” China, on the other hand, is an economic entity with control over its companies that can credibly make such commitments.

Oh, and here’s another insight from Politico: Viktor Orban is complaining that Trump ate von der Leyen’s breakfast. More on the reactions from Trump-loving far right EU parties in a future post.

Life in the time of Trump.

The EU deal is done.

Defense contractors did quite well

But who else really won?

The China question still remains

And Trump’s not playing nice.

I don’t know how this story ends

But we will pay the price.

Unlike Descartes, I don’t doubt that I exist. Actually, I suspect Descartes didn’t, either; after all, who was there to doubt if he didn’t exist? Having disposed of that question, the next one logically revolves around the question of authority. What does one rely on to determine what is true and what is false?

For me, the answer is as follows, in order of certainty:

1. Propositions that are compelled by the use of logic. Most of these are mathematical in nature (i.e., a =a);
2. Theories that can be verified empirically through the use of the scientific method;
3. The consensus opinion of experts on the subject matter; and
4. Personal experience.

Three observations are pertinent here. First, you will have noticed that reliance on religious texts is absent from my list. Second, “personal experience” isn’t limited to information derived from the senses; it includes the use of the subconscious, as well. Finally, because personal experience plays a large role in the process, evangelism is ultimately useless; your experiences inevitably are different than mine.

I will be using these criteria in the following weeks to set out my views on the workings of the universe, starting with the nature of ultimate reality. If you don’t agree, that’s ok; as noted above, evangelism is not the point.