Embattled Republicans are backing away from Donald Trump and his terrible poll numbers. Meanwhile, Trump’s reaching for his favorite remedy: Cash.
Say what you will about President Donald Trump, he has inspired a lot of art lately. True, most of it is damning — like Bruce Springsteen’s
▶protest balladorthe statueof Trump and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Now,there’s a new installmentin Strasbourg, France: A statue depicting a naked, obese, hideous Trump, squatting on the shoulders of a stick-figure man who groans under the president’s sheer tonnage. “I am sitting on the back of a man,” the plaque reads. “He is sinking under my burden. I will do anything to help him. Except stepping down from his back.”
That figure getting crushed under Trump might as well be any Republican running for re-election in the United States. GOP candidates are buckling under the weight of Trump’s
historic unpopularity, while heactively underminestheir prospects of winning with his war, inflationary policies and bad vibes. Some Republicans are now explicitly distancing themselves from the president, in a sign of how noxious he has become even to his own party.
Take Ken Paxton. The scandal-plagued Texas attorney general has privately admitted that Trump isn’t doing their party any favors, as revealed in
leaked audiorecordings. His latest faux pas: Affordability is “by far our biggest problem,” he told donors behind closed doors. That’s “why we’re having a hard time with numbers,” Paxton said in a recording obtained by Axios.
It’s hardly just Paxton. A
majorityof Republicans in contested races have either broken with Trump policies or tried to convince voters that they aren’t actually close with the president,according to a Reuters analysis.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) is a prime example. In last night’s debate against Democratic Senate nominee Troy Jackson, Collins
insisted thatshe acts independently of Trump, claiming that she’s “not exactly his favorite senator.” She added: “I voted against my party more than [any other] senator on either side of the aisle.”
**Trump is trying to solve his problem the only way he knows how: **with boatloads of money.
The war in Iran has driven up the cost of gasoline, groceries, and other daily essentials. In an effort to win back frustrated voters a month before the midterms, Trump has pledged to
hand voters huge wads of cash.
Where would that money go, exactly? Trump promised $90 checks for nearly 21 million people enrolled in a Medicare plan for seniors. The administration has reportedly sent $500 payments to nearly one million people enrolled in Obamacare. He has also pledged $5,000 payouts to every adult citizen, at a completely implausible total cost of $1.2 trillion. (Congress doesn’t seem willing to sign off on that one, understandably.)
Trump’s election-buying efforts aren’t always so direct. He recently announced federal funds — ranging from $18 million to $15 billion — for
Alaska,Iowa, andWisconsin, all of which feature competitive races which his allies could lose.
The GOP has a lot more money than Democrats do — but it doesn’t seem to matter. Republicans have
dumped more than half-a-billion bucksinto competitive races since last month, and the polls still favor Democrats. Some Republicansfear thatthe GOP’s money push is too little, too late.
If money won’t work… will Trump rev up the war with Iran again before the vote, in a frantic effort to demonstrate progress, or declare some kind of a win? He’s reportedly thinking about it, according to * The Atlantic*.
** Thirty-year mortgage rates are now the highest** they’ve been since November 2023, at 7.49 percent. I’m sure this is Joe Biden’s fault, somehow.
** Some oil tanker captains are being paid** up to $100,000 a month to steer through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the
** Donald Trump has plans to turn part of his **West Palm Beach golf course into a Camp David-style meeting place for future presidents and world leaders, according to the
** Defense tech companies tied to Don Jr. and Eric Trump** have raked in $6 billion in active or promised federal contracts since the brothers invested in them, according to an ABC News analysis.
** The White House is quietly trying to force the **Smithsonian museum system to embrace Trump’s preferred historical narratives by threatening to withhold $190 million in federal funding,
** A Black Hawk pilot who’s running to represent** Long Island in the House as a Democrat defended leaked photos that show him dressed in ads for a fetish brand in 2010. “I mean, all my friends know I’m kinky,” Chris Gallant told the
** Comedian Jordan Klepper interviewed **a January 6 rioter who wants to be paid for alleged government persecution. This interview is insane and hilarious: “We will be compensated. We will be vindicated. And you will feel like an ass for this interview someday,” the woman said, apparently realizing that he was making fun of her.
** An Alabama wasteworker found a Class of 1965 ring** in a sewer main that belonged to a graduate of a segregated school for Black students, which closed down a few years later amid integration. He tracked down the owner, who was thrilled to get the ring back. The man had given his late wife the ring: “Back then, you would give your steady girl the ring for her to wear,” he told the
** New crocodile just dropped!** A researcher discovered that a century-old crocodile fossil found in Egypt actually belongs to a previously unidentified genus. Part of the problem, the researcher said, is that archaeologists used to be less precise with how they described fossils: “They would make very generic statements,” he said. “They say something like ‘nasal bone, long or short?’ That’s very subjective.”
** A new home feature known as “Costco doors” **are becoming more popular in American households. The idea: You can drive a car right up to a door in the garage that connects to the pantry, and easily haul massive bags of Kirkland brand products into your home.
** This one’s for the bug lovers:** “The future of wētāpunga is looking bright,” a researcher told the Daily Mail. What’s a wētāpunga, you ask? It’s the heaviest insect in the world, which can grow up to four inches long and weigh as much as a mouse. It looks like a dinosaur cricket. The giant creepy crawly native to New Zealand was nearly driven to extinction by predators and habitat loss, but the species recently made a comeback due to a breeding program led by conservationists.
** A new study confirmed what many of us have long believed: **Cats are the key to human happiness. Countries with more cats rank higher on the happiness scale, the study found. But countries with high levels of a parasite found in felines, which can affect humans’ brain function, are sadder.
** On that note, a group of orphaned rescue kittens **in Minnesota recently took a field trip to an aquarium and had the time of their lives. I feel happier just watching this video.
